Dear Valued Customer,
Thank you very much for your support to XXXX.com.
With reference to your inquiry dated Oct 24, 2008, we would like to inform you that according to the ordering record of your order 5186818, a refund in the amount of US$14.99 in terms of XXX Credit is under process for your next or future shopping at XXXX.com. Usually, the refund process will be completed in 1 – 2 business days. Once the refund process is completed, we will immediately notify you by sending you the respective refund confirmation.
We would like to have your kind understanding that our official settlement currency is in US Dollar and therefore, if you would like to have a refund via your credit card account, we will only be able to arrange such a refund in US Dollar too. Under such a situation, loss arising from exchange rate difference, for which we are not responsible, is possible. In order to avoid such a possible loss, we usually make XXX Credit as a defaulted refund media so that customers will be able to have a "real full refund". Of course, if this possible loss is not your concern, we are glad to arrange refund through your credit card account. Please kindly confirm if you would like to have the refund through your credit card account so that we can arrange for you accordingly. However, we would like to have your kind attention that the processing time for credit card will be longer than 1 – 2 business days as we have to arrange such refund with your credit card issuing bank via our payment gateway. Please do not reply to this email directly. Should you have any further inquiry, please kindly refer to our Customer Support Section at
http://www.XXXX.com/global/0-0-0-0-en/question-feedback.html.
Best regards,
Daniel Keung
Customer Service Department
XXXX.com
This is an email I received from an online shopping website replying to my enquiry (on whether they can refund directly to my credit card account instead of refund me XXX Credit which can only be used for further purchase from their website).
The letter seems to be courteous, as expressions such as “Dear Valued Customer” or “We would like to seek your kind understanding that…” have been used. But I feel it would have been more courteous if this customer service officer had addressed my name instead of “Dear Valued Customer”. Since I had been asked to fill in my full name when writing to them, I would expect all the other customer service officers to be able to address me by my name in their reply.
This letter meets the criteria of correctness, as it replied to my enquiry directly. In addition, this customer service officer also stated clearly which enquiries that he is replying to, (With reference to your inquiry dated Oct 24, 2008) which makes the reply professional and sharp. Furthermore, I think the reply contains concreteness and clarity with all the reasonable detailed explanation given for why they prefer to refund in term of XXX credit.
With the brief mentioning of the current situation at the beginning of the letter with follow up actions and the further explanation of possible delay that may occur if direct refund is chosen, I feel that coherence and completeness are fulfilled.
Since there is no redundant information in the body of the letter, the concise criteria is also met. But I think it would be clearer if the exquisite of further action can be written as the paragraph following the comparison of the two ways of refund.
我的简介
- lovely Lu ^_^
- Final year at Industrial & Systems Engineering, National University of Singapore.
Hey Feng Lu,
回复删除This letter certainly fulfil the 7Cs of writing. After i read the letter, i was clear of the steps i need to do regarding the refund procedure.
This was commendable given that most of us would be referred to a hotline to call and clarify.
Cheers!
Johny
Hi Feng Lu,
回复删除I certainly agreed with what u mentioned about the 7Cs that the letter contains. However, I feel that the letter can be further broken down into more paragraphs to make it friendly to the reader's eyes.
Regards,
JF
Hi Feng Lu,
回复删除I agree with JF about the letter should be broken down into paragraphs, because the long sentence and long paragraph makes me lost concentration and I may need to read again in order to get what the writer is trying to say.
Overall, the letter is quite well written and polite to the customer. It is complete as all the details are inside the letter.
Dear Feng Lu,
回复删除I agree with JF and MuiPeng. I could not fully understand the letter until I read your comments. Thanks for your clarification.
Overall, the letter is well-written and addresses the audience's needs directly.
Dear all,
回复删除Thanks for the advice.
Yes, definitely this letter would be more reader friendly if it breaks done to more paragraphs and shorter sentences!
Cheers,
Lu
Hey Lu,
回复删除I think it is true that most of the 7Cs are followed. The writer was definitely trying to be as courteous as possible, with words like "kindly", "dear valued customers" etc generously found through out the letter.
The letter is quite clear, but one peeve which I had while reading it was the "long-windedness" of the letter. Perhaps in the writer's bid to be courteous, the crucial points which the writer wanted to convey could only be sieved out after the second read. Perhaps it might be better to break the letter into shorter paragraphs, with each paragraph conveying only one piece of critical information. That might make it more concise and clearer. :-)
Ken