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How to Start a Business Letter in French

My French teacher made a joke, that when you move to France, the first thing you have to buy is a printer/scanner because you lot will be making copies, scanning and sending official letters all the fourth dimension… I do find that I send I exercise ship a decent amount of letters in French republic, only information technology has been the same in every country where I lived.
In this post, you will acquire the proper construction of an formal alphabetic character in French, the correct sequence of information, French letter of the alphabet layout, French politeness formulas for various levels of formality and recipients, phrases you can use and adapt to your letter immediately. There are also French punctuation rules and general tips at the end.

Who is a formal alphabetic character in France for?

administration alphabetic character: what you send to the préfecture, majors office (mairie), insurance companies…
motivational letter
letter of complaint or reclamation to a company

When do you lot utilise breezy advice?

forums and public give-and-take forms
low-level complaints sent via email and not as a carve up attachment
depression-level requests, like an email to your dominate asking for fourth dimension off, ill leave, day-to-day correspondence with teachers, doctors, police etc.

The use of "vous" and polite forms (like le conditionnel) are withal obligatory in breezy messages, unless the recipient told you lot specifically yous tin can switch to "tu".

Formal letter in French meme, using "tu" versus "vous".

Why practise you (equally a non-French person) demand to know how to write a formal alphabetic character in French?

If you know the proper French code, you lot will

look more integrated into French lifestyle
you will be thought of as polite (or normal)
exist able to laissez passer the DELF B2 exam (official certification of French-linguistic communication abilities for non-native speakers; writing a formal letter of the alphabet is 1 of the possible written exercises for the B2 (avant-garde) level)
you volition get things done faster and people helping you volition exist friendlier and more obliging

What is important to know (and I wasn't enlightened for several years after moving to French republic) merely how important respecting the proper formalities are. As much as the ideals of égalité are in identify in French republic, in formal letter writing, hierarchical relationships need to be respected.

Word of caution

Kids are taught most of the rules early, so it's like second nature for the French, and nosotros foreigners need to learn to practice (specially if you come from a less formal country). These formalities and so varied levels of address are commonly a remnant of monarchical times.
Some of the formulas you can find online aren't in use anymore, equally they were reserved for kings and royalty and people might non exist likewise happy if y'all use them. Equally in other forms of advice, words we choose can have a political or ethical value, so it'due south meliorate to choose the formulas we take seen before. If you lot can avoid it, do not utilise translation apps.

Concept of respect in France?

Every culture knows the concept of respect. But every culture expresses it differently. Our French instructor explained to us that every time you brand a request to someone, even a elementary 1, politeness and proper formulas mean showing them respect. Think of it as respect for their time, the work they do, and acknowledging them are human beings (that didn't make the rules and volition make mistakes). You make their job easier when:

y'all follow the exact procedure that they give you or are outlined on a class
Sometimes, there are set procedures that need to happen in a detail sequence. They might not make sense to you, and some might not make sense to them either.
brand the alphabetic character courteous, well organized, straight

Content of official alphabetic character

Correct layout of an official French letter, proper organization of elements. — There is a printable version of this exact document bellow.

HEADER

i. Meridian left (left-aligned) is reserved for the sender: your name, last name, accost, telephone number and/or electronic mail (so they know how to contact you).

In France, you don't normally include academic titles in personal formal messages. Madam and monsieur are by and large all you will need. If y'all are writing letters where titles are relevant, you likely accept staff that will write and mail everything for you.

Still, when you are writing in the name of your employer, or association, it'south practiced to include your job position.

2. Top right (nether sender, right-aligned) is where yous write the recipient proper noun (person and/or company) and address. When you are writing to a specific person in an organization, you include both (similar on the photograph).

3. Under the recipient (still right-aligned) is place and date in this format: à _________, en (appointment in a number form) (month written course) (year). Example: à Lyon, en 5 juin 2021

4. Under place and date left-aligned is the subject (in French Objet 🙂 why yous are writing/what do yous want.
You want to be precise and straight. Is information technology request, complaint, answer to public call…
If the wrong office gets your letter of the alphabet, they need to know information technology's non for them (and who to give information technology to) just by your object.
1 line.

5. Outset polite form of the letter, the salutation. Information technology's limited to 1 or two words (no academic titles or other).

to address a woman: "Madame," or "Madame (her last name)", simply never "Madam (name) (final name),"

to address a man: "Monsieur," or "Monsieur (his last name)", just never "Monsieur (name) (last proper noun),"

when you don't know the recipient: "Madame, Monsieur,"
You could also write "Madame la maire" or "Monsieur le maire", which technically makes information technology 3 words.

BODY

6. French written word is specific in how yous want to structure and organize your thoughts. For most of us, this was a part of our official grooming, though I still constitute the French fashion a chip different from what I'thousand used to in my native language or English language. For a formal letter you need to be precise, and find a tricky residuum between polite forms and being direct (as to not waste their time).

Keep it to 2 or three paragraphs maximum. If paragraphs aren't visually distinct enough, people might indent the first line of the paragraph.

Paragraph 1

Start with a polite phrase "I am writing to…" Side by side y'all want to present yourself, and give any relevant background details.

Explain your situation in order of relevance or time (this happened commencement, so this happened, so this happened, so now I am in this and this situation…). If you are pitching an idea, or have a complaint you include all the events that are relevant to your crusade. If your formal letter is a suggestion or participation give reasons as to why you are suggesting something, and results you are trying to accomplish. Optional: if you lot have information to support it, include it here too, merely information technology might make the letter besides long.

Some examples of how to start a formal letter in French:

« Suite à l'offre d'emploi parue sur le site … je me permets de vous écrire… »

« Votre offre d'emploi cascade un poste de _ a retenu toute mon attention… »

« Par la présente, je vous informe de mon souhait de… »

« Dans votre courrier en date du [date], vous me demandez de… »

Paragraph 2

When you explained the who, what and why, you ask for what yous want them to do. If y'all take several suggestions, you tin can put them in bullet points.

When you are writing the torso, you lot will want to exist using more than advanced sentence structures (if you can), meaning formal phrases and conditionel. Depending on your level of French, yous might want to stick with shorter simples sentences which too increases readability. The bespeak is to communicate clearly and directly.

7. Paragraph 3*if applicative

Your attachments, announced with another polite form.

Actually IMPORTANT: When you are writing a formal letter of the alphabet in French, list your attachments in a logical order or as they asked of you. When yous are getting all your papers together to send, organize all your attachments in the same order as you listed them. It saves them time and they "go it", considering yous did it "the French way".

FOOTER

8. Possible closing salutations. Here is where it gets complicated. Back in the day, each championship, position, required its own version. Some of these phrases are still very much in use in France today. Equally much and you can away with a simple "Cordiallement" at the terminate of an email, in a formal letter this volition non practise.

If y'all desire to swoop really deep, here is a guidebook for French admin employees (in French). For a quick and easy version, here is a simple chart. Simple find your recipient in the chart and copy-paste it into your letter.

9. Your signature goes the bottom left or right, and when y'all are singing the letter, sign in a higher place your name.

They might ask for your original signature in either bluish or blackness ink. The pen you lot use needs to be no smudge, not erasable… just a evidently practiced onetime-fashioned regular ballpoint pen (in blue or black). If you lot are wondering why this matters… With black, your signature could look similar a photocopy, when the ink is blue, they know immediately, it's the original.

Hither is a pdf of my sample layout for a formal letter. You can go on on hand and adapt it when yous need to.

French rules of punctuation

Spacing

Commas and periods (including three dots) take no space before, one infinite subsequently.

Colon, semi-colon, exclamation mark, question marking and special symbols like %, #,€, $, «, » demand one space earlier and after.

« C'est incroyable ! » dit Paul.

Capitalization

Nationalities, languages, professions, months… all start with a minuscule, for example french, english language, january, …

The but nouns that become capitalized are proper names: commencement and last proper name, city names, rivers, cities… but also names of documents or names of projects.

Quotation marks

Proper French quotation marks look like this « quote» . (note the extra space)
Quotation marks like this (" ") are called English quotation marks which are sometimes used to be more « cool » , which is non what you want in an official French letter. (") or (' ') are non accepted as a proper quotation marker.

How to send your official alphabetic character

Best option is lettre recommande, with or without suivi. The general rule is if you are sending sensitive documents, then "avec suivi" (with tracking) is all-time. I have had letters get lost, though information technology is rare.

In my experience, it takes well-nigh two-3 days in mainland France, no matter where you were sending it. Even a couple of years agone, it could be a calendar week for a letter to be delivered even in the same metropolis, though I recollect it'due south much faster now. If yous are sending via courier service, I strongly discourage the use of Chronopost. They have lost several of my packages, without them taking any responsibleness. ( I guess I should send them a strongly worded formal complaint alphabetic character in french…). Some of my friends used them successfully, so it might be a affair of location as well.

Some general tips for sending formal letter and semi-formal messages in France

when you are sending originals (similar Fiche de soins), make a copy or take a photo of the document
I keep a couple of printed copies of my most often used documents like ID, proof of accost, piece of work contract… at dwelling
French page with free example letters for (almost) whatever occasion, request, complaint or office
go on some stamps or prestamped envelopes at home. You tin can purchase all types of stamps online as well and print them yourself

So here you have it. Depending on your situation, you might non desire to use all of the formulas, but you can at present write quite an first-class formal letter in French.