Collins Cobuild English Grammar (211 page)

For
yes/no
questions, you use
if
or
whether
followed by a clause with affirmative word order.

Can you tell me
if he got my message
?
Do you know
whether the units have arrived
?

For
wh
-questions, you use a
wh
-word followed by a clause with affirmative word order.

Could you tell me
what you’ve got on today
?
Have you any idea
what it would cost
?

You can ask for confirmation that something is true by making a statement, and then adding a
question tag
such as
isn’t it
? or
doesn’t she
? (see
5.15
to
5.20
).

They work on Saturdays,
don’t they
?
You can park there,
can’t you
?

You can use a
negative question
to express surprise at a situation.

Didn’t you arrange
to meet them at the airport?
Wasn’t
the meeting at nine?
Haven’t you finished
yet?

Talking about experience

talking about the present

You use the
present simple
to talk about permanent facts and routines (see
4.9
to
4.11
).

We
offer
a wide range of services for the bio industry.
Every week, Susan
drives
to Edmonton for a meeting with the factory manager.
The first thing we
do
is a site survey.

You use the
present progressive
to talk about current situations when you want to emphasize that they are temporary or in progress at the time of speaking (see
4.17
to
4.19
).

We
are updating
our flight rules to adapt to the new scenario.
Users
are looking
at other ways of financing IT projects.
He’
s staying
there as the guest of our Taiwan-based supplier.

talking about finished past situations

If you want to talk about a situation or an event that happened at a particular time in the past which is finished, you use the
past simple
. Time expressions like
last week
and
a year ago
, which refer to finished time periods in the past, can be used to make the time reference clear (see
4.27
to
4.29
).

Ballmer
flew
to California last week and proposed the merger.
After Harvard, he
studied
at Oxford University.
Ms. Caridi previously
worked
in the legal department at Lehman Brothers.

You use the
past progressive
to emphasize an action in progress or to give the background context for events (see
4.31
and
4.32
).

The company
was losing
money, so he decided to sell.

The plant
was making
a profit of $250,000 a year and the market
was growing
steadily.

talking about past situations in relation to the present

The
present perfect simple
can be used to talk about:

experiences, without stating a specific time

events and situations that started in the past and continue up to the present

events and situations that have an immediate effect on the present.

You cannot use time expressions like
yesterday
,
last year
, or
at Christmas
with the present perfect simple (see
4.33
to
4.35
).

Yes, I’
ve bumped
into him a number of times.
We’
ve met
with all the major shareholders.
Spending
has risen
steadily since the beginning of the year.
Have
you
brought
the report with you?

You use the
present perfect progressive
:

when you want to talk about situations that started in the past, that may or may not be completed, but that you see as temporary

when you want to emphasize duration (see
4.36
).

We
have been looking
for a European partner for some time.
The company
has been working
hard to reduce its overhead.

talking about a particular time in the past

If you want to show that one event happened before another in the past you can use the
past perfect
(see
4.37
).

When people left the meeting, they were more enthusiastic than when they
had arrived
.
Before the negotiations started, they
had decided
to give employees a 4% pay rise.

Negotiating

Making and modifying proposals

softening the message

You can use
comparatives
to show that you are prepared to negotiate on a particular point (see
2.103
to
2.111
).

We need a
more flexible
arrangement.
I’m looking for figure
closer
to three dollars sixty a unit.
Would you be
happier
with a fixed rate?

You can use the
modals
would
,
could
,
may
and
might
to make your message less direct.

We
might
be able drop the price.
Could
we look at that side of your proposal later?
Would
you consider reducing discounts?

thinking about possible future events and exploring possibilities

The
modals
could
,
may
and
might
are also used to say that a particular result or situation is possible (see
5.124
).

There
may
be a slight delay.
Yes, that
might
be possible.
Yes, I can see that this
could
have great potential.

You can use
conditional sentences
to discuss options and explore possibilities in a hypothetical way (see
8.25
to
8.42
).

If you could give us exclusivity
, we can settle this now.
The discount could be bigger
if you increased the quantity
.
If I drop the price
, have we got a deal?
Unless you can show a bit of flexibility
, we might as well call it a day.