Mike Markel, in Technical Communication, advises writers to avoid clichés common to correspondence to avoid sounding "stilted and insincere". He then gives the following list of common cliches and "their more natural equivalents" (414).

Clichés	Natural Equivalents
attached please find	attached is
cognizant of	aware of
enclosed please find	enclosed is
endeavor (verb)	try
herewith ("We herewith submitt...")	(None. "Herewith" doesn't say anything. Drop it)
hereinabove	previously, already
in receipt of ("We are in receipt of...")	"We have received..."
permit me to say	(None. Permission is granted. Just say it.)
pursuant to our agreement	as we agreed
referring to your ("referring to your	"As you wrote in you letter of March 19..." letter of March 19, the shipment of transistors...")
same (as a pronoun: "Payment for same is requested...")	(Use the noun instead: "Payment for the merchandise is requested...")
wish to advise ("We wish to advise that...")	(The phrase doesn't say anything. Just say what you want to say.)
the writer ("The writer believes that ...")	"I believe..."

 

Edit this extract from a letter removing letterese and clichés and replacing them with the appropriate phrases

In accordance with your request for information about the length of a piece of string, enclosed please find the same. This writer is cognizant of the ISO standard on string length, but due to the fact that the standard will undergo revision in the immediate future, this writer is desirous of informing you about our efforts to remain current with these changes. I wish to express my gratitude for your interest referred to hereinabove. Contingent upon receipt of your order and pursuant to our agreement, we will endeavor to ship you more of our product in our patented "Ball™" shape as soon as possible.

 

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