Plain English Writing Services

Advancing the use of Plain English by Governments 

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Introduction

The enactment of the Plain Writing Act of 2010, which requires the agencies of the executive branch of the Federal government to compose all documents in plain language, was the direct outcome of mainly two bills tabled in the U.S. House of Representatives, and their associate bills presented in the U.S. Senate between 2007 and 2010.

The initial set of bills, both inclosed in the first (2007) session of the 110th Congress, were House Bill 3548 (H.R. 3548) and the companion Senate Bill 2291 (S. 2291). Both were ruled out in their respective houses: the House bill stalled in the Senate after a House committee's amendment was approved and the bill was placed on the Senate Calendar; the Senate bill  went no farther than being placed on the full Senate's Calendar.

In 2009, altered variants of the two bills were introduced in the respective houses of the 111th Congress. The Senate bill (S. 574) again failed to progress farther than the Senate Calendar, but the House bill (H.R. 946) prevailed, finally being signed by President Obama on October 13, 2010, and therefore becoming Public Law No. 111-274; 124 Stat 2861. Send us your document and we will transcribe it into plain English. If you would like to evaluate a sample of our plain English writing services please send us a 400-word sample of your document and we will rewrite it according to plain English writing guidelines.

Here's a short sample for your preview:

Original Text In connection with the opinion expressed herein, we have examined the originals or copies, certified or otherwise authenticated to our satisfaction, of the Registration Statement, the Company's restated certificate of incorporation, the Company's restated bylaws, the records of corporate proceedings that have occurred prior to the date hereof with respect to the Offering and the form of underwriting agreement relating to the Shares in the form filed as an exhibit to the Registration Statement and approved by the Board of Directors of the Company (the "Underwriting Agreement"). We have also reviewed such questions of law as we have deemed necessary or appropriate. As to matters of fact relevant to the opinion expressed herein, and as to factual matters arising in connection with our examination of corporate documents, records and other documents and writings, we relied upon certificates and other communications of corporate officers of the Company, without further investigation as to the facts set forth therein.

Plain English transcript Before offering our opinion included in this document, we have studied all the relevant documents, namely: The Registration statement The Company's restated certificate of incorporation The Company's restated bylaws The records of corporate proceedings related to the offering and underwriting agreement of the Shares, approved by the Board of Directors and  submitted as an exhibit to the Registration Statement. We also reviewed all necessary and relevant legal aspects. We base our opinion stated in this document solely on facts gathered from examining corporate documents, records and other documents and writings,and on details collected from examining corporate documents, records certificates and other communications of corporate officers of the company.

Most text, particularly those used in business and legal applications, contain jargon, redundancies, complex sentence structures and tautologies. The enactment of the Plain Writing Act of 2010, which requires the agencies of the executive branch of the Federal government to compose all documents in plain language, was the direct outcome of mainly two bills, and their associate bills, presented in the U.S. Senate between 2007 and 2010.

Plain English uses a writing style that can be understood in one reading.  It uses words that are easy to understand, with clear and concise phrases, and avoids jargon and non-standard speech as much as possible. Plain English writing carefully looks into the following when composing text;

• What is the primary subject?
• What information do I actually need to give?
• What is the purpose of the message?
• How much does the reader already know about this subject?
• What do I want the reader to do?
• Which words should I use to create the right tone?

Principles of plain English writing

Plain English writing is governed by specific principles for the prime purpose of promoting understanding, reducing confusion, encouraging action and avoiding errors arising from mistaking. Plain English writers:

• Adapt the writing style according to the readers' needs
  
• Use simple words and keep sentences short
  
• Keeps paragraphs compact (3 to 4 sentences)
• Uses white space effectively
  
• Uses active rather than passive verbs
  
• Avoid 'noise,' repetition and unnecessary words
  
• Express technical terms in simple language
• Do not use jargon, trite, acronyms or 'foreign' words
  
• Write in conversational English
  
• Use punctuation effectively to improve understanding
  

Formatting the document according to the principles of plain English writing

The appearance of a document plays an important role in improving understanding and lessening misunderstanding.  Plain English writers format a document using:

• Correct heading and subheadings
• Numbering and bullets
• Appropriate line spacing to improve readability and comprehension
• Clear fonts
• Pagination
• Word wrap, limiting sentence span to between 72 and 80 characters

Plain English writing avoids using tautology.

Tautology is artificial,  inapt, usually confusing , and is, unfortunately, considered necessary for 'business' English.  Good professionals plain English writers use workaday words and phrases. For example:

Use	Instead of
because	due to the fact
start or begin	commence
more	additional
consider	give consideration to
soon or state specific date	in the near future
about	in relation to
as or because	in view of the fact ..
now or immediately	at this point in time
based on	pursuant to
during	in the course of
how	the method by which
before	prior
soon	without undue delay

Our plain English rewriting fees are on a per-word basis and ranges from AU$0.03 to $0.05 per word,  depending on the complexity of the text. We will quote based on the sample received. Email us.