The Complimentary Close in a Letter or Email

The  complimentary close is the word (such as Sincerely) or phrase (Best wishes) that conventionally appears before the senders signature or name at the end of a  letter,  email, or similar  text. Also called a complimentary closing, close,  valediction, or signoff. The complimentary close is usually omitted in informal communications such as  text messages, Facebook entries, and responses to blogs. Examples and Observations September 28, 1956Dear Mr. Adams:Thanks for your letter inviting me to join the Committee of the Arts and Sciences for Eisenhower.I must decline, for secret reasons.Sincerely,E.B. White(Letters of E.B. White, ed. by Dorothy Lobrano Guth. Harper Row, 1976)   October 18, 1949Dear  Josà ©,I am glad to hear that you are only half dead. . . .The moon which moves around over Havana these nights  like a waitress serving drinks moves around over Connecticut the same nights like someone poisoning her husband.Sincerely yours,  Wallace Stevens(Excerpt from a letter by American poet Wallace Stevens to Cuban critic  Josà ©Ã‚  Rodriguez Feo.  Letters of Wallace Stevens, ed. by Holly Stevens. University of California Press, 1996)​ The Complimentary Close to a Business Letter The complimentary close must be included in all but the simplified-letter format. It is typed two lines below the last line of the body of the letter... The first letter of the first word of the complimentary close should be capitalized. The entire complimentary close should be followed by a comma.The choice of the proper complimentary close depends upon the degree of formality of your letter.Among the complimentary closes to choose from are: Yours sincerely, Very sincerely yours, Sincerely yours, Sincerely, Cordially, Most sincerely, Most cordially, Cordially yours.A friendly or informal letter to a person with whom you are on a first-name basis can end with a complimentary close such as: As ever, Best regards, Kindest regards, Best wishes, Regards, Best.(Jeffrey L. Seglin with Edward Coleman, The AMA Handbook of Business Letters, 4th ed. AMACOM, 2012)-The most common complimentary close in business correspondence is Sincerely. . . . Closings built around the word Respectfully typically show deference to your recipient, so use this close only when deference is appropriate.(Jeff Butterfield, Written Communication. Cengage, 2010)- Bus iness letters that begin with a first name--Dear Jenny--can close with a warmer ending [such as Best wishes or Warm regards] than Sincerely.(Arthur H. Bell and Dayle M. Smith,  Management Communication, 3rd ed. Wiley, 2010) The Complimentary Close to an Email It’s time to stop using best. The most succinct of e-mail signoffs, it seems harmless enough, appropriate for anyone with whom you might communicate. Best is safe, inoffensive. It’s also become completely and unnecessarily ubiquitous. . . .So how do you choose?  Yours sounds too Hallmark. Warmest regards is too effusive. Thanks is fine, but it’s often used when there’s no gratitude necessary. Sincerely is just fake—how sincere do you really feel about sending along those attached files? Cheers is elitist. Unless you’re from the U.K., the chipper closing suggests you would’ve sided with the Loyalists. The problem with best is that it doesn’t signal anything at all. . . .So if not best, then what?Nothing. Dont sign off at all. . . . Tacking a best onto the end of an email can read as archaic, like a mom-style voice mail. Signoffs interrupt the flow of a conversation, anyway, and thats what email is.(Rebecca Greenfield, No Way to Say Goodbye.  Bloomberg Businessweek, June 8-14, 2015) The Complimentary Close to a Love Letter Be extravagant. As much as you might mean it, don’t end with Sincerely, Cordially Affectionately, All best wishes or Yours truly. Their punctilious formality smacks of someone who wears wing tips to bed. Your humble servant is appropriate, but only for certain kinds of relationships. Something closer to Truly, Madly, Deeply, the title of the British film about undying (for awhile) love, might do.On the other hand, if you’ve done your job up till the last sentence of so intimate a letter, the swooning reader won’t notice the omission of this epistolary convention. Be bold. Skip it.(John Biguenet, A Modern Guide to the Love Letter. The Atlantic, February 12, 2015) An Archaic Complimentary Close The typical complimentary close has grown shorter and simpler over the years. In Correct Business Letter Writing and Business English, published in 1911, Josephine Turck Baker offers this example of an amplified complimentary close: I have the honor to remain,Most Eminent Sir,With profound respect,Your obedient and humble servant,John Brown Unless used for humorous effect, an amplified close such as this one would be regarded as wholly inappropriate today.