Letterhead (шапка письма)

A letterhead is the name and address of a person or an organization printed at the top of a personal or office stationary. Your letterhead gives you more freedom to express the character of your company than any other part of the letter. The letterhead should give your correspondents all the information they might need if they want to contact you: your company name, your address, your telephone and fax numbers.

Your letter should follow certain order and style.

Date

British American

24^th October, 20 ___ October 24, 20____

24 October 20 ____

24 Oct. 20____

This is used to be shown as 24^th October, 2011, but is now almost always shown as 24 October 2011 without the “th” after the day, and without a comma after the month. In American letters, the date is written in the following way: October 24, 2015 (October twenty fourth, two thousand fifteen). If the date is written in figures, it will look as follows: month / date / year, 05/ 04/ 2014, which reads as follows: the fourth of May, two thousand fourteen

Your reference (ссылка)

A reference is not essential, but it can help you retrieve a letter from your filing system. It will usually be the initials of the person who dictated the letter and those of the person who typed it. It can also contain a file or account number.

Inside address (внутренний адрес)

It is placed in the top-left corner. Make sure you get the name and job title of you correspondent right. If you are replying to a letter, address the person in the form in which he or she has signed. If someone has signed his letter Hywell Walters, you should address him as Hywell Walters, not H. Walters.

Men can be addressed as:

William Sykes Esq.

Mr. William Sykes

William Sykes

Women can be addressed as:

Miss (or Mrs. or Ms) Hilary Briggs

Hilary Briggs

Esq. is a very formal form of address, it is considered a little old-fashioned. It is polite to use the following titles Mr., Mrs., Miss, Dr, but nowadays it is becoming more and more the norm to address people simply as Hilary Briggs, William Sykes etc. If you have never previously met a person, you should use the title, which is more formal. If you have met them, you should decide, whether they will be offended if you leave the title out, or whether they regard you too formal if you use it.

Salutation (обращение)

It is a part with which the letter starts: the part which begins “Dear …” If you know your correspondent, you could begin “Dear John” or ”Dear Mary”.

If you don’t know your correspondent, the correct salutation is “Dear Sir or Madam”.