What to leave out of the first paragraph
The opening decides how fast your letter gets read and who it gets handed to. Four things weaken it, and all four are what a reasonable person writes first.
Who is reading it
The first paragraph is a sorting decision
A letter about a job that went wrong lands on a desk with other letters. Somebody reads the opening and decides two things: what this is about, and who has to deal with it. Both decisions are made before they reach paragraph two.
So the opening is doing one job. It tells a stranger what file to pull and what is being asked for. Everything that makes that slower is what comes out.1
The four
What weakens an opening
The apology
Sorry to bother you, I know you are busy. It reads as permission to deal with this later, and it is the first thing a reader uses to rank the letter against everything else on the desk.
The threat you will not carry out
A lawyer named in paragraph one, with no lawyer behind it. Whoever reads this has seen it before and can wait to find out. A threat that goes unexecuted is worth less than no threat at all.
The backstory before the ask
Six sentences about how the job started before anybody learns what you want. The reader is skimming for the request, and everything above it is what they skim past.
The number with nothing under it
A figure that arrives before the arithmetic that produces it invites a counter-offer against the figure. A figure that arrives after it invites a conversation about the arithmetic.
What goes in instead
The four facts it has to carry
Who you are
Your name, and the address or account the work was done under. Whoever opens this has to find the file before they can answer it.
What you bought
The contract, the date, and what it was for. One sentence, and it is the sentence that makes the rest checkable.
What is wrong
The specific failure, in the fewest words it takes. What the contract said, and what is there instead.
What you want done
The remedy, stated as a request rather than as a grievance. This is the sentence the reader is looking for, and it belongs where they are looking.
Before and after
The same letter written twice
The apology, and the ask buried under it
Weaker
I hope this finds you well and I am sorry to trouble you again about this. I know everyone has been busy this season. I have tried to be patient about the bathroom but it has now been a while and I am starting to get a little frustrated, so I wondered whether somebody might be able to look at it.
Stronger
I am writing about the bathroom renovation at 14 Alder Street, completed under our contract of 3 March. The shower pan was installed without the waterproofing membrane the contract specifies, and water is now reaching the subfloor. I am asking you to remove and reinstall it to the specified detail.
The number before the arithmetic
Weaker
You owe me twelve thousand dollars for this and I want it back. The whole job was a disaster from the start and frankly I think that is generous given what I have been through with your company over the last four months.
Stronger
The contract price was for a full tear-off and replacement. The invoice bills for both. Two of the three roof planes were not torn off, which the inspection report of 2 August records. I am asking for the difference between what was billed and what was done, itemized below.
The lawyer nobody has hired
Weaker
If I do not hear from you within 48 hours I will be taking legal action and my attorney will be in touch, and I will also be reporting you to every agency I can find and leaving reviews everywhere.
Stronger
I am asking for a written response by 30 September. If I do not have one by then I will use the options open to me, which include the licensing board and small claims.
Where this goes
The paragraph, and the letter around it
This is the opening of a letter that already exists. The demand letter template is the rest of it, and the notice to cure is the earlier letter, sent while the contractor is still on site. What happens to the letter after you write it is on sending it so it counts.2
Disclosures
- 1.Satisfy is not a law firm and does not provide legal advice. This page describes how to write clearly. It does not assess any particular dispute, state what a letter should demand, or say whether one should be sent.
- 2.The openings on this page are illustrations written for it. They are not drawn from any advocacy file, and the names, addresses and dates in them are invented.