Communication Skills: Polite Requests

Welcome

Jack: Hello my name’s Jack

Jack: and I’m Rich and welcome to this week’s Premier Skills English podcast

Jack: Where we talk about football and help you with your English.

Rich: We recommend that you listen to this podcast on the Premier Skills English website because that is where we have the transcript, language examples, activities, quizzes and a discussion page to help you understand everything we talk about.

Jack: However,  if you’re listening on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, you could leave your answers in the review section. We do read all the reviews and would love to hear from you. 

Rich: You may also be listening or should I say watching us live or recorded on Facebook or YouTube. This is new.

Jack: Yes, it is. And if you are watching us, do say hello, say where you are from, what football team you support and if you are learning English. So, what’s happening this week, Rich?

Rich: In this week’s podcast, we’re going to be talking about the language you need when talking on the phone and asking for information in a polite way.

Jack: We are going to do a short roleplay - a conversation on the telephone and then we will look at some of the phrases, the grammar and the vocabulary we use when being polite on the phone.

Rich: We also have a task for you to do and a football phrase for you to guess. 

Football Phrase 1

Jack: But, before we start the roleplay on the telephone let’s look at last week’s football phrase.

Rich: The phrase was ______ _______ ___. This is the day when the transfer window closes. There are two of these days each year. One of them is the last day in January and the other is in August. The word _______ is more generally used to describe the exact time that something has to be finished by.

Jack: Teachers give students _______ for essays and assignments and football journalists have to work to very tight ________. The match might finish at half past nine and the newspaper needs the match report by ten to print it in the newspaper.

Rich: Lots of people got the right answer this week. A big well done to Plmert from Turkey, Milos from Serbia, Agam Aprilo18 from Indonesia, Liubomyr from Ukraine, Amanymoustafa from Egypt, Ahmed Adam from Egypt, Lakerwang from China, Acicala from Spain, and Elghoul from Algeria.

Jack: Good to see lots of people from different countries there. We’ll tell you the answer to last week’s football phrase and we’ll have this week’s football phrase later in the show.

Introduction to Roleplay

Jack: As we said at the beginning of the show, in this week’s podcast, we are going to help you with talking on the phone in English. 

Rich: More specifically, we are going to help you with talking on the phone in polite situations - when you need to ask people for help or information.

Rich: This is more difficult than talking to friends because we often use special polite phrases or expressions in formal situations. 
You are going to listen to a roleplay. Rich is phoning Liverpool Football Club ticket office because he wants to change a football ticket that he has bought.

Jack: While you are listening we want you to answer two questions. Question one: Does Rich get a refund for his ticket?
Question two: Which match is Rich going to go to?

Roleplay

Rich: Right here we go. Where‘s the number? Ah, here it is … 0151 907 9955.

Jack: Hello. You have reached the Liverpool FC call centre. If your enquiry is regarding the online Anfield store, please press one, for enquiries regarding Anfield museum and tours, press two, for match ticket enquiries, press three or hold the line to speak to one of our agents.

Rich: Three.

Jack: Please hold the line.

Rich: Waiting, waiting …

Jack: Hello there. You are through to the ticket office. My name’s Jack. How can I help you today?

Rich: Yes, hello. I was wondering if you could help me. I have a ticket for the Liverpool - Watford match but I won’t be able to attend the game. Could I get a refund? 

Jack: Let me see … the match is on the 18th of this month. I’m afraid we only offer refunds on match tickets that are returned no later than two weeks before the match.

Rich: Today is the 5th. Is there any possibility that you can make an exception?

Jack: I’m terribly sorry but I’m afraid that is the policy. You can exchange the ticket for another match though.

Rich: Oh, that’s great ... I was wondering if there are tickets still available for the Tottenham match at the end of the month.

Jack: I’m afraid tickets for the Tottenham match sold out weeks ago. There are tickets still available for the match against Cardiff City.

Rich: Sorry, against who? I didn’t quite catch that.

Jack: Against Cardiff City.

Rich: Oh Cardiff. I can’t remember when that match is. Would you mind giving me the details?

Jack: Of course not, it’s on the 20th of April. Kick off is at three.

Rich: That sounds like a good possibility, but I’ll have to get back to you on that.

Jack: No, problem. Thanks for calling.

Rich: Bye.

Roleplay Comprehension Questions

Jack: In a moment, we’re going to look at some of the language we used in the roleplay, but first we need to give you the answers to those two questions we gave you.

Rich: The first question was: Did I get a refund for my match ticket? 

Jack: No, you didn’t because you were too late but you do have the possibility to exchange your ticket for another match.

Rich: And the second question was: Which match am I going to go to?

Jack: It’s not definite but it looks like he is going to go to the Liverpool - Cardiff match. Now, let’s look at some of the language we used in the roleplay.

Language Focus 1

Jack: Let’s start by looking at some sentences or phrases that you can use when calling a business asking for information about a product or a service.

Rich: These conversations are quite formal because you are not calling a friend. When someone answers your call, you will often hear a sentence such as: ‘Good, morning. How can I help you?’ or something similar.

Jack: In the roleplay, you heard: ‘Hello there. You are through to the ticket office. Jack speaking. How can I help you today?’.

Jack: This is when you need to say why you are calling. You should be polite and formal. You could start by saying something like: ‘Good morning. I was hoping that you would be able to help me.’

Rich: In the roleplay, you heard: ‘Yes, hello. I was wondering if you could help me.’

Jack: When we are asking for help or requesting something in a polite way we usually create a sentence in two parts. First, we usually say something such as ‘I was hoping’ or ‘I was wondering’ to be polite. 

Rich: Then we ask the other person for help by completing the sentence with something such as ‘that you would be able to help me’ or ‘if you could help me’.

Jack: You can then go on to make your request more directly. Rich said ‘I was wondering if you could help me.  I have a ticket for the Liverpool - Watford match but I won’t be able to attend the game. Could I get a refund?’.

Rich: We often use a lot more language when we are being polite. You may have noticed I said ‘Could I get a refund?’ not ‘Can I get a refund?’. We’re going to look at this in the next section.

Language Focus 2

Jack: When making polite requests we use ‘could’ and ‘would’ a lot. In the roleplay, Rich said ‘Could I get a refund?’ not ‘Can I get a refund?’.

Rich: When I asked for more details about a specific match, I said: ‘Would you mind giving me the details?’ which is much more polite than ‘give me the details’ and more polite and formal than ‘Can you give me the details’.

Jack: When we use ‘would’ for a request we often use the phrase ‘would you mind’. This phrase is followed by the gerund - the ing form. Rich said ‘Would you mind giving me the details?’.

Rich: Let’s hear some more common examples:

Jack: Would you mind closing the window?, Would you mind meeting a little later tomorrow? Would you mind watching my bags for a few moments?

Rich: We can also add the word ‘possibly’ when we use ‘could’ to be more polite. Let’s hear some examples:

Jack: Could I possibly borrow your car tomorrow? Could you possibly turn the music down a little? Could you possibly come into work a little earlier on Friday?

Rich: So, when we are making requests in a polite way either on the phone or face to face, we use ‘could’ and ‘would’ a lot. 

Jack: In the next section, we’re going to look at some more phrases that you may hear or use on the phone when calling a call centre or business.

Language Focus 3

Jack: When we call a business these days we often don’t speak to a person immediately. We often hear a pre-recorded message and get some options.

Jack: I think the keywords and phrases here are ‘enquiry’ and ‘hold the line’.

Rich: Yes, I agree. You often need to press a number depending on your enquiry. Your enquiry is basically your question. If you call a computer company, for example, your enquiry might be about software, hardware, repairs, purchases etc. You probably have to press a specific number depending on what your enquiry or question is.

Jack: Another important phrase to know is ‘hold the line’. If you hear this phrase it means wait. Sometimes it means wait for thirty seconds and sometimes it means to wait for half an hour or more!

Rich: Yes, holding the line can be very frustrating. 

Jack: Something else that can be frustrating is the quality of the call. The line might be bad and it can be difficult to hear the other person. In this situation, you may hear or need some specific phrases to get people to speak more loudly or repeat what they said.

Rich: In the roleplay, I said ‘Sorry, I didn’t quite catch that.’ This is a polite way of saying that I didn’t hear what you said and I am asking the person to repeat what they said.

Jack: There are other phrases we can use to ask politely for someone to repeat something. Here are some common examples:

Rich: I’m afraid I didn’t hear that. Could you speak a little louder, please? Or Would you mind speaking up a little? I can’t quite hear what you are saying.

Jack: We’ve covered quite a lot of language there and if you want to look at this type of language in more detail we have lots more examples, the transcript and activities on the Premier Skills English Podcast page on the website.

Rich: Yes, we had a comment from Nhat Park in Vietnam on the Apple Podcast Page last week requesting transcripts. If you are listening in Vietnam or anywhere else, all the transcripts are available on the Premier Skills English website and they are all free to access.

Jack: Right, in the next section, we’re going to take a little look at pronunciation.

Pronunciation Focus

Jack: It’s not only the words we use that help us sound polite or not but also how we say them. When we talk about how we say something we are talking about intonation - the way our voice goes up and down.

Rich: To sound polite our voice goes up at different points in a question. We don’t want to sound too flat.

Jack: For example, we say ‘I was wondering if you could help me’ rather than ‘I was wondering if you could help me’.

Rich: It’s good to practise your intonation. Listen to these three sentences and try to repeat and practise the sentences in exactly the same way Jack says them.

Jack: Hello there. I was wondering if you could help me with my computer.

Jack: It’s really chilly in here. Would you mind closing that window? Thank you ever so much.

Jack: Good afternoon. I was hoping you could put me through to Dave Carol in accounts.

Comments about last week’s task:

Jack: Before we move onto the task that we have for you this week, we’d like to look back at last week’s task.

Jack: If you remember, last week’s task was all about negotiating skills and we asked you to tell us about a time when you had to negotiate something.

Rich: We had lots of interesting answers. Olmert from Turkey told us about how he had to negotiate broadcasting rights for Basketball matches in Turkey.

Jack: And Ahmed Adam from Sudan told us about a time when he had to negotiate about rewiring his entire house.

Rich: It’s great to hear your answers to these tasks so keep the comments coming!

Task

Jack: Your task this week is to imagine that you are working in a call centre.

Jack: You are a team leader in the call centre and your job is to make sure that your team is as polite as possible to the customers.

Rich: You are going to listen to three examples of what members of your team say to customers on the phone.

Jack: Your team is not doing a very good job. You need to tell them what they should be saying in the comments section at the bottom of the page on the Premier Skills English Podcast page.

Rich: If it’s easier for you, you could write your answers in the review section on Apple Podcasts. 

Jack: Here are the three members of your team talking to customers on the phone. Team member one.

Rich: Yeah? What do you want? What? Eh? No, I can’t hear you mate? Can you talk up a bit?

Jack: He sounded a bit rude.  Remember it’s your job to make that language more polite.

Rich: Let’s listen to team member two.

Jack: No, no there’s no way we can do that. Wait there. No, you’ll have to ring someone else. 

Rich: I wouldn’t want him in my team either. And finally team member three.

Jack: What else do you want? Is that it? How are you gonna pay? Bye.

Rich: Doesn’t sound like a great customer service team, does it? I’m sure all of you can improve those conversations!

Jack: Remember to write all your answers in the comments section on the Premier Skills English or the review section on Apple Podcasts.

This week’s football phrase:

Jack: The final section this week is this week’s football phrase. 

Jack: The football phrase this time is an object you wear on your legs. They are called **** **** and you wear them under your socks to protect your legs from bad challenges.

Rich: Let’s see who can get it right! If you know the answer, write your answer in the comments section at the bottom of the page. We will announce your name in next week’s podcast if you get it right.

Jack: We also need to give you the answer to the football phrase we set at the beginning of the show. The answer as many of you know already was transfer deadline day.

Rich: Right, that’s all we have time for this week. Bye for now and enjoy your football!