The Writing of Business Punctuation Exercise

Find the punctuation errors in the following sentences, including incorrectly used commas, omitted commas, apostrophe mistakes, and so on. Add the appropriate punctuation--or change the punctuation already present--wherever needed.

1. The new system would cost a little over $25,000, however, with a useful

   life of 20 years, the cost can be allocated at approximately $1,250 per year.

2. Other companies have expressed their pleasure in working with this new

   equipment and we are sure that you at World Photo will also see the

   advantages of these innovations.

3. Desktop publishing programs like PageMaker, PageMill and QuarkXPress

   make typesetting of newsletters and quarterly reports obsolete.

4. The new equipment will not be subject to as many breakdowns as the

   old auger system, this will eliminate lost production time and wages.

5. The committee has almost finished it's deliberations and will arrive at it's

   decision soon.

6. You will be glad that you purchased our model 530 Hanford Miles receiver,

   it is one of the finest styles that we carry.

7. Posting, done by computers, eliminates many errors associated with

   addition, subtraction and transposition of account balances.

8. The decision will be based on these considerations, repair costs,

   replacement costs, and training time and costs for a new system should it

   be purchased.

9. Return the enclosed postcard before November 1, 1995 and we will ship

   your RT-8833's immediately along with our summer catalogue.

10. Some companies are reluctant to say anything negative about their former

    employees, therefore, employee background checks provide little help to a

    business reviewing prospective employees.

11. Two sections of the procedures manual which were ambiguous were revised.

12. Performance reviews during the first quarter resulted in the promotion

    of 12 people who received merit raises of 2.5% in addition to the cost-of-living

    raise of 3.2%.

13. The vivid color never fades and one coat of varnish is all the protection

    needed.

14. Prospective employees with MBAs and at least five years of experience

    have an advantage over a prospective employee whos an MBA with little or

    no experience.

15. Employees are generally instructed to call a crime control hotline number,

    however written theft reports are also common.

16. If anything proves defective during the first 90 days you may take the

    speaker to a nearby dealer and it will be fixed and returned within 10 days.

17. I am planning to use the coffee mugs in a promotional campaign, therefore,

    I will need the merchandise by March 21st.

18. We understand that your company needs durable binders that give you

    a good return on you investment, that is why we were concerned about the

    condition of the binder you returned to us.

19. Quality, consistency and customer satisfaction are standards on which

    A & S bases it's reputation.

20. Students and alumni will be proud to display their school colors and sales

    on cold football weekends will be strong.

For questions and suggestions, please e-mail us at kilbornj@stcloudstate.edu or rinkster@stcloudstate.edu.