Online Technical Writing: Inquiry Letters

This section focuses on the inquiry letter. The inquiry letter is useful when you need information, advice, names, or directions. Be careful, however, not to ask for too much information or for information that you could easily obtain in some other way, for example, by a quick trip to the library.

See the following example inquiry letters:

Example 1: Questions about blood glucose monitoring systems	Frames	Nonframes	Plain
Example 2: Questions about hardware support for Red Hat Linux	Frames	Nonframes	Plain

For related matters, see the section on general business-letter format and style.

There are two types of inquiry letters: solicited and unsolicited.

You write a solicited letter of inquiry when a business or agency advertises its products or services. For example, if a software manufacturer advertises some new package it has developed and you can't inspect it locally, write a solicited letter to that manufacturer asking specific questions. If you cannot find any information on a technical subject, an inquiry letter to a company involved in that subject may put you on the right track. In fact, that company may supply much more help than you had expected (provided of course that you write a good inquiry letter). If you need to find the names and addresses of businesses related to your report project, see the section on finding information in libraries.

Your letter of inquiry is unsolicited if the recipient has done nothing to prompt your inquiry. For example, if you read an article by an expert, you may have further questions or want more information. You seek help from these people in a slightly different form of inquiry letter. As the steps and guidelines for both types of inquiry letters show, you must construct the unsolicited type more carefully, because recipients of unsolicited letters of inquiry are not ordinarily prepared to handle such inquiries.

1. Early in the letter, identify the purpose — to obtain help or information (if it's a solicited letter, information about an advertised product, service, or program).
2. In an unsolicited letter, identify who you are, what you are working on, and why you need the requested information, and how you found out about the individual. In an unsolicited letter, also identify the source that prompted your inquiry, for example, a magazine advertisement.
3. In the letter, list questions or information needed in a clear, specific, and easy-to-read format. If you have quite a number of questions, consider making a questionnaire and including a stamped, self-addressed envelope.
4. In an unsolicited letter, try to find some way to compensate the recipient for the trouble, for example, by offering to pay copying and mailing costs, to accept a collect call, to acknowledge the recipient in your report, or to send him or her a copy of your report. In a solicited letter, suggest that the recipient send brochures or catalogs.
5. In closing an unsolicited letter, express gratitude for any help that the recipient can provide you, acknowledge the inconvenience of your request, but do not thank the recipient "in advance." In an unsolicited letter, tactfully suggest to the recipient will benefit by helping you (for example, through future purchases from the recipient's company).

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