business letters with subject headings

If a letter has a subject heading, it must be underscored. Subject headings are written according to the style/form of the business letter. for example, in a fully-blocked letter, the subject heading will start at the left-hand margin like all other lines and will be underscored. In semi-blocked letters, it will be in the in the middle of the letter, and so on.

FULLY-BLOCKED BUSINESS LETTER

Our Ref

Date

Mr. Walter Jones,

4B Main Kano Road,

Kaduna.

Dear Sir,

L.P.O. NO, 2465

It has been brought o my notice that you have not yet supplied (to date) all the goods which we ordered through you on your L.P.O NO. 2465.

Several attempts have been made to contact you in Kaduna by our area sales representative but to no avail. Please note that if we do not hear from you two weeks from the date of this letter, we will be forced to recall our L.P.O. NO.2465 and our future accounts with you will be closed.

Yours faithfully,

I.B. LADI

Manager (Sales)

ENCLOSURE AND POSTSCRIPTS

If a business letter has an enclosure that has been mentioned in the body of the letter, to show that the enclosure is attached with the letter, a sign ‘Enc’ or Enclosure is added at the end of the letter.

If any addition has to be made to the body of a letter or the writer wishes to draw special attention to a certain point, a postscript is used. This is indicated by the sign ‘PS’ at the end of the letter, two single-line spaces after the signatory.

Let us take a look at the following letter, showing both enclosures and postscripts.

Our Ref:

Date:

1. Ali & Sons Ltd.,

14 Dugbe Road,

Enugu.

Dear Sir,

Cleaning Equipment

We are a firm dealing with cleaning materials and equipment with the main office in Enugu and branches in each of the states of the federation.

We enclose our brochure which gives you details of each of our main office and branches, catalog and complete description of our goods and prices.

We believe that we can be of service to your company and look forward to serving you.

Yours faithfully,

1. O Okoroma

Marketing Manager

P.S. Prices for small quantities of cleaning materials will be forwarded to you on request.

Enc.

LETTERHEADS

Many companies, organizations, and offices have letterheads specially printed for them. The letterheads give the name, addresses and telephone number of the company/organization/office. The letter-heads of some companies indicate the directors or top management team of the company. This is a form of advertisement for the company.

Envelopes sometimes have the name and address of the company printed on them. When typing on letterheads care must be taken to ensure that work produced is neat and clean as this is another way of showing customers/visitors how well-organized and efficient the organization/company/unit/office is.

Letterhead Paper

CARBON PAPER

This is a thin paper coated with colour and used between sheets of paper for writing or typing. Carbon paper can be obtained in different sizes and colours. Black carbon paper is mostly used for typing office work. Some are single coated (on one side).

FLIMSY PAPER

These are thin papers of different colours. Some organizations/offices use white or some other colour to make carbon copies. It is cheaper than a letterhead which has to be specially printed. Flimsy carbon copies are usually filed copies. This is economical for filing since the flimsy sheets will not take too much space.