Being American I can say that "Sincerely yours" and more commonly just "Sincerely" is AmE. I have never signed a letter with faithfully. In AmE faithfully is a salutation for lovers to declare their loyalty to one another. And

I specifically remember learning this punctuation in grade school and high school: Hello, Dolly. (Hi, John.) I remember learning to put the comma after a casual opening, but if it was "Dear" or "To", etc., you would not put the comma there

Clive wrote: It seems that a lot of Forum readers feel very, very uncomfortable with the idea of not starting with a formal salutation, yet in email I would say that this is more or less the norm for native speakers. Perhaps this lack of

Hi again. Dear Messrs. would probably do... Sorry, definitely not. That is rarely used, and really only with multiple surnames. If I want to write a very stiff and extremely formal letter to a law firm that I don't like, I might address

Clive wrote: Email is much more informal than 'regular' mail. You don't usually need any salutation at all. Just use politeness. Uh, but does regular mail still exist? Ok, I won't say anything, I'll just ask what I have to ask. Thanks. BTW,

Hi, Uh, really? I was going to use it in a letter... I have to write an email to the Munich turist office... Should I say: "Dear German office workers..."? LOL So I was thinking of using "To whom it may concern". Email is much more informal

Anonymous wrote: Please can anyone tell me if the sentence 'To Whom it May Concern' should have everything except the 'it' capitalised or should 'May' be lower case? Many thanks Linda Hi, This is certainly an intereting topic.

Nona The Brit wrote: This is going to sound a little unkind but as writing skills are such a vital part of marketing and marcomms, I think that we should let the company see your own work without too much of our interference or assistance.

This is going to sound a little unkind but as writing skills are such a vital part of marketing and marcomms, I think that we should let the company see your own work without too much of our interference or assistance. I will say that 'Dear

Rare as it is, I think that's just the exception. I really know hardly anything about the organisation. This is sort of a response to an ad; an application for the courses the institution offers. I doubt they have departments there. 'Dear Sir or