The accuracy of the typed matter is commonly increased. There is many a slip between what the dictator says and the stenographer types-slight inaccuracies no doubt, but frequently embarrassing. The wax cylinder records faithfully what is entrusted to it and the typist, by using the back spacer, may have this repeated any number of times.

The machine also frees the typist from interruptions. When busy with filing, typing, or other duties, she is not obliged to drop them upon signal that her employer has thought of a letter or memorandum he wants to get off his mind.

Considerable criticism has been directed toward these machines, both by typists and dictators. The real source of these criticisms probably lies in faulty dictation. The man who speaks directly into the mouthpiece and enunciates his words clearly, turns out cylinders which a typist has no difficulty in transcribing.

The Automatic Correspondent

Those who handle a large volume of correspondence, particularly when the subject matter is limited, find themselves day after day going over pretty much the same ground. Orders, complaints, collections, sales talk-each of these topics constitutes a class within which exists a certain sameness and the letters to a hundred men in this class are often practically identical. When the tongue slips into well-worn combinations of words and the task of dictation becomes monotonous, it is a signal that short-cuts are overdue.

Many practical schemes are available to solve this problem. These are occasionally subjected to criticism by those who claim the letters produced are inferior. But what constitutes a good letter? Is it not, after all, one that produces the desired effect? Does it give the inquirer the information he wants? Does it convince the prospect he needs the prod

uct? Does it get the money and yet retain the customer's good-will? Should a form letter with a fill-in prove able to do these things, it constitutes a good letter and hence is worth using. As a matter of practice, the man who analyzes his correspondence can frequently, without any loss in effectiveness, turn over a hundred names to a typist with the single statement, "Send them letter number 4."

In an Eastern stove factory the overworked head of the correspondence department was prevailed upon to use these form paragraphs, and the account of his experience will suggest how they may be adapted to any business. As a start, the typists were instructed to make an extra carbon copy of every letter sent out during the next two weeks. The following subject outline was then drawn up:

Dissatisfied with goods

Bill incorrect

Miscellaneous

Closers

.500-524

.525-549

.550-574

.575-600

The carbon copies were classified under the foregoing subject headings and then cut up into paragraphs and sorted into piles according to the outline. These piles were next taken up in order, all paragraphs judged of poor quality excluded, and the remainder revised with care. The quality paragraphs, after being numbered consecutively in each class and copied, were bound in a loose-leaf binder and indexed. It may be well to add that in copying, paragraphs of two separate classes were never placed on the same sheet since this would have been confusing when it came to planning the index.

A customer from up-state, let us say, writes in a long letter of complaint which boiled down means that he has received the wrong goods. The correspondent consults his form paragraphs a moment, jots a few figures upon a small card, clips this card to the customer's letter, and tosses it into the typist's tray. His part is done.

The customer, however, receives an excellent four-paragraph letter, which adjusts the matter to his satisfaction, and he is not at all concerned with the manufacturer's form paragraph system.

The use of form paragraphs offers certain practical advantages:

Speed. The correspondent can dispose of his letters more rapidly; the typist can transcribe faster.

Low Cost. The speed with which letters are produced and the fact that a typist may be substituted for a first-class stenographer lowers the cost per page. (See Figure 21.)

Accuracy. The slips which creep in as one dictates, and the errors made as the stenographer transcribes from notes are both reduced.

Figure 21. Card Used to Save Time of Dictating

This small card, clipped to the letter, represents the answer as dictated by the automatic correspondent. The typist inserts the special items specified in the column at the right, in this way increasing the flexibility of the system.

Quality. The paragraphs are well written, interesting, convincing, far superior to the grade of work usually turned out by the correspondent because they represent his one best way of putting a point. The sales argument, the acknowledgment of an order, or the reply to a complaint, once it has been standardized and reduced to form paragraphs, becomes independent of moods. An attack of indigestion or some hot altercation with a competitor does not disturb the persuasiveness of the selling talk nor the smooth diplomacy of the collection appeal when these repose in a correspondent's manual.

Freedom from Drudgery. There is no merit in chaining

a high-class mind to the drudgery of grinding out the same monotonous phrases day after day. If freed from such routine through the use of form paragraphs, the correspondent is more able to give special letters the hard, concentrated thought they deserve.

Flexibility. When the stock of form paragraphs has attained the degree of completeness to which it appears feasible to extend it, the man who may have commenced the use of this system somewhat skeptically will be agreeably surprised at the facility with which through its use the most varied letters can be prepared. Moreover, a single paragraph can often be made to cover a number of cases, and in a distinctly individual way, by leaving blank a space for the date, the name of the article, its price, size, or color, the name of the prospect, etc. Such items are noted on the card at the time of dictating (See Figure 21), and filled in by the typist. Form paragraphs may also be interspersed at will with paragraphs which are dictated solely for the letter at hand. This plan need cause no confusion whether one uses a dictating machine or employs a stenographer.

It is true that for the executive's correspondence the form letter usually proves inadvisable, yet the principle upon which it is based-a standardized communication-does apply with much force. Again and again several persons or firms are written concerning a certain subject in practically the same terms. What is in reality a form letter can be used if, after exercising care in dictating the first letter, the writer hands the stenographer the name and address cards of the remaining firms with the remark, "The same letter for these." The recipients of these letters concern themselves solely with the product laid before them. Is it a good letter?

Form paragraphs unmodified will not, of course, serve for all letters, yet it requires only an analysis of his correspondence to convince the average man that the percentage of it