Business Letter Format

Most students admit to having learned in junior high school or in high school about writing business letters and about conventional formats for them. When it comes down to writing them, however, all too many students seem not to know how and to be unwilling to look up the forms (or perhaps they don't have a reference about using English). This web page was prepared so that you would have an easily obtained description of what to do.

When a business that has letterhead stationery writes a business letter, the first page of the letter uses paper with the printed letterhead and succeeding pages, if any, use matching quality and color sheets without the letterhead. A business with very good quality printing might generate the letterhead graphic with an image embedded in a word processor document. An individual normally won't use letterhead stationery and won't attempt to fake it. An attempt at letterhead that produces a tacky result or that conveys pompousness produces effects that you want to avoid.

In a business letter, everything that you "type" should be in the same typeface and in the same font size. You should use "formal English" and you should very carefully check your grammar and spelling. You should arrange things neatly. You should consider the appearance of the letter "at arm's length" as well as close up -- use white space to produce an attractive sheet.

In a conventional business letter you should see these parts, in order top to bottom:

A return address
This item is the postal address of the author of the letter. Each line of it is left justified -- either at a tab stop that puts the information toward the right side of the page or at the left margin. Normally the return address is at the top of the page, but you can move it down a little to improve over-all appearance. Do not put email addresses here -- if you need to convey an email address, do it in the body of the letter.
The date
This item is the date of the letter. It is aligned with the return address. Formerly there was never whitespace (blank lines) between the return address and the date, but some current styles allow blank lines.
An inside address
This item duplicates what goes on the envelope. It has the formal name of the intended recipient of the letter and that person's postal address. Each line of the inside addres is left justified at the left margin. No email addresses appear here. You can put blank lines between the date and the inside address to fill the page better and to improve the "arm's length" appearance.
A salutation
This item formally addresses the recipient. If the addressee is not a friend, you should write "Dear Mr. Brown:" or "Dear Mrs. Smith:" or "Dear Ms. Jones:" or "Dear Dr. Greene:" or the like. A letter to a close associate might say "Dear Mike:" or "Dear Sally:".
There is at least one line of white space between the inside address and the salutation. You can put a little more to improve the over-all appearance.
Before the days of political correctness a letter to an organization would begin "Dear Sir:" or "Dear Sirs:" or "Gentlemen:" -- for example, if the envelope were addressed "Personnel Director, XYZ Company, City, State" you might do this. These days you should probably make an effort to get a name, but...

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