You are the head of research for a biological research organization. Six months ago, you purchased a $2,000 commercial refrigerator for storing research samples. Recently, you suffered a loss of more than $600 in samples when the thermostat failed and the temperature in the refrigerator rose to more than 48 degrees over the weekend. Inventing any reasonable details, write a claim letter to the manufacturer of the refrigerator.

As the recipient of the claim letter described in Exercise 1, write an adjustment letter granting the customer’s request.

You are the manager of a private swimming club. A member has written saying that she lost a contact lens (value $75) in your pool and she wants you to pay for a replacement. The contract that all members sign explicitly states that the management is not responsible for the loss of personal possessions. Write an adjustment letter denying the request. Invent any reasonable details.

As the manager of a retail electronics store, you guarantee that the store will not be undersold. If a customer finds another retailer selling the same equipment at a lower price within one month of his or her purchase, you will refund the difference. A customer has written to you and enclosed an ad from another store showing that it is selling a router for $26.50 less than he paid at your store. The advertised price at the other store was a one-week sale that began five weeks after the date of his purchase. He wants a $26.50 refund. Inventing any reasonable details, write an adjustment letter denying his request. You are willing, however, to offer him an 8-GB USB drive worth $9.95 if he would like to come pick it up.

TEAM EXERCISE Form small groups for this exercise on claim and adjustment letters. Have each member of your group study the following two letters. Then meet and discuss your reactions to the two letters. How effectively does the writer of the claim letter present his case? How effective is the adjustment letter? Does its writer succeed in showing that the company’s procedures for ensuring hygiene are effective? Does its writer succeed in projecting a professional tone? Write a memo to your instructor discussing the two letters. Attach a revision of the adjustment letter to the memo.

Louise and Paul work for the same manufacturing company. Louise, a senior engineer, is chairing a committee to investigate ways to improve the hiring process at the company. Paul, a technical editor, also serves on the committee. The excerpts quoted in Louise’s email are from Paul’s email to all members of the committee in response to Louise’s request that members describe their approach to evaluating job-application materials. How would you revise Louise’s email to make it more effective?

Because students use email to communicate with other group members when they write collaboratively, your college or university would like to create a one-page handout on how to use email responsibly. Using a search engine, find three or four netiquette guides on the Internet that focus on email. Study these guides and write a one-page student guide to using email to communicate with other students. Somewhere in the guide, be sure to list the sites you studied, so that students can visit them for further information about netiquette.