Formal letter Endings

Formal letter endings are chosen in line with the type of the formal letter you have drafted.

In a case you choose the wrong closing, you might damage the goodwill you have built up in the rest of your communication. Therefore formal letter ending needs to leave the reader with positive feelings about you and about issue/cause you have wrote about.

In the table below we have provided you a guidelines on ho to end a formal letter. Please note that ending a letter will highly depend on the fact whether you know the person to whom you are writing or not.

ENDINGS

1) Yours faithfully, / Respectfully yours,/

If you do not know the name of the person, end the letter this way.

2) Yours sincerely,/ Sincerely,/ Sincerely yours,

If you know the name of the person, end the letter this way.

3) Your signature

Sign your name, then print it underneath the signature. If you think the person you are writing to might not know whether you are male of female, put you title in brackets after your name.

4) Very truly yours

Closing for formal business letter in USA

5) Best regards / Kind regards / Regards

Used as a standard in e-mail communication to end a letter.

6) I look forward to hearing from you / I am looking forward to hearing from you.

Both should be followed with a name of the sender and signature

   

Furthermore letter ending is also dependent on the fact whether you write formal or semi-formal letter. Since semi-formal letters are mostly sent to the persons you already know personally, most likely you will close it with “Yours sincerely,/ Sincerely,/ Sincerely yours”.

Most formal letter ending phrases seem reserved, however there are certain degrees of warmth and familiarity among the proposed options.

The most important thing you have to bear in mind is that your ending should be appropriate. This is especially relevant for British English.

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