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BUSINESS COMMUNICATION
CASE I: A Reply Sent to an Erring Customer
Dear Sir,
Your letter of the 23rd, with a cheque for Rs. 25,000/- on account, is to hand.
We note what you say as to the difficulty you experience in collecting your outstanding
accounts, but we are compelled to remark that we do not think you are treating us with
the consideration we have a right to expect.
It is true that small remittances have been forwarded from time to time, but the debit
balance against you has been steadily increasing during the past twelve months until it
now stands at the considerable total of Rs. 85,000/-
Having regard to the many years during which you have been a customer of this house
and the, generally speaking, satisfactory character of your account, we are reluctant to
resort to harsh measures.
We must, however, insist that the existing balance should be cleared off by regular
installments of say Rs. 10,000/- per month, the first installment to reach us by the 7th.
In the meantime you shall pay cash for all further goods; we are allowing you an extra
3% discount in lieu of credit.
We shall be glad to hear from you about this arrangement, as otherwise we shall have no
alternative but definitely to close your account and place the matter in other hands.

2. Yours truly.
Questions:
1. Comment on the appropriateness of the sender’s tone to a customer.
2. Point out the old – fashioned phrases and expressions.
3. Rewrite the reply according to the principles of effective writing in
business.
CASE II: ADVERTISING RADIO FM BRAND
A young, gorgeous woman is standing in front of her apartment window dancing to the
1970s tune, “All Right Now” by the one – hit band free. Across the street a young man
looks out of his apartment window and notices her. He moves closer to the window,
taking interest. She cranks up the volume and continues dancing, looking out the
window at the fellow, who smiles hopefully and waves meekly. He holds up a bottle of
wine and waves it, apparently inviting her over for a drink. The lady waves back. He
kisses the bottle and excitedly says, “Yesss.” Then, he gazes around his apartment and
realizes that it is a mess. “No!” he exclaims in a worried tone of voice.
Frantically, he does his best to quickly clean up the place, stuffing papers under the sofa
and putting old food back in the refrigerator, He slips on a black shirt, slicks back his
hair, sniffs his armpit, and lets out an excited , “Yeahhh!” in eager anticipation of
entertaining the young lady. He goes back to the window and sees the woman still
dancing away. He points to his watch, as if to say “Come on. It is getting late.” As she
just continues dancing, he looks confused. Then a look of sudden insight appears on his
face, “Five,” he says to himself. He turns on his radio, and it too is playing “All Right
Now.” The man goes to his window and starts dancing as he watches his lady friend
continue stepping. “Five, yeah,” he says as he makes the “okay” sign with his thumb and
forefinger. He waves again. Everyone in the apartment building is dancing by their
window to “All Right Now.” A super appears on the screen: “Are you on the right
wavelength?”
Questions:

3. 1. What is non – verbal communication? Why do you suppose that this
commercial relies primarily on non-verbal communication between a
young man and a gorgeous woman? What types of non – verbal
communication are being used in this case?
2. Would any of the non-verbal communications in this spot (ad) not work
well in another culture?
3. What role does music play in this spot? Who is the target market?
4. Is the music at all distracting from the message?
5. How else are radio stations advertised on TV?
CASE III: Arvind Pandey Caught in Business Web
Arvind Pandey is a project manager at Al Saba Construction Company in Muscat. It s a
flourishing company with several construction projects in Muscat and abroad. It is
known for completing projects on time and with high quantity construction. The
company’s Chairman is a rich and a highly educated Omani. A German engineer is
Arvind’s Vice – President for urban and foreign construction projects.
Three months ago, Al Saba had submitted a tender for a major construction project in
Kuwait. Its quotation was for $ 25 million. In Kuwait the project was sponsored and
announced by a US – based construction company called Fuma. According to Al Saba,
their bid of $ 25 million was modest but had included a high margin of profit.
On 25 April, Arvind was asked to go to Kuwait to find out from the Fuma project
manager the status of their construction proposal. Arvind was delighted to know that
Fuma had decided to give his company, (Al Saba) the construction project work. The
project meant a lot of effort and money in planning the proposed construction in
Kuwait.

4. But before Arvind could tank the Fuma project manager, he was told that their bird
should be raised to $ 28 million. Arvind was surprised. He tried to convince the Fuma
project manager that his (Arvind company had the bast reputation for doing
construction work in a cost effective way. However, he could always raise the bid by $ 3
million. But he wanted to know why he was required to do so.
The Fuma manager’s reply was, “That’s the way we do our business in this part of the
world, $ 1 million will go to our Managing Director in the US, I shall get $ 1 million, you,
Mr. Pandey, will get $ 1 million in a specified account in Swiss Bank.
Arvind asked, “But why me?”
“So that you never talk about it to any one.” The Fuma Project Manager said.
Arvind promised never to leak it out to any one else. And he tried to bargain to raise the
bid by $ 2 million. For Arvind was familiar with the practice of “pay – offs” involved in
any such thing. He thought it was against his loyalty to his company and his personal
ethics. Arvind promised the Fuma project manager that the bid would be raised to $ 28
million and fresh papers would be put in. He did not want to lose the job.
He came back to Muscat and kept trying to figure out how he should place the whole
thing before his German Vice President. He obviously was at a loss.
Questions:
1. Analyse the reasons for Arvind Pandey’s dilemma.
2. Does Arvind Pandey really face a dilemma?
3. In your view what should Arvind Pandey do? Should he disclose it to his
German Vice President?
CASE IV: Company Accepting a Contract
A computer company was negotiating a very large order with a large size corporation.
They had a very good track record with this client.

5. In this corporation, five different departments had pooled their requirements and
budgets. A committee was formed which had representation from all the departments.
The corporation wanted the equipment on a long lease and not outright purchase.
Further, they wanted the entire hardware and software form one supplier. This meant
that there should be bought – out items from many suppliers since no one supplier
could meet all the requirements of supply from its range of products.
The corporation provided an exhaustive list of very difficult terms and conditions and
pressurized the vendors to accept. The computer company who was finally awarded the
contract had agreed to overall terms that were fine as far as their own products were
concerned but had also accepted the same terms for the brought – out items. In this
case, the bought – out items were to be imported through a letter of credit. The
percentage of the bought – out items versus their own manufacture was also very high.
One of the terms accepted was that the “system” would be accepted over a period of 10
days after all the hardware had been linked up and software loaded.
The computer company started facing trouble immediately on supply. There were over
100 computers over a distance connected with one another with software on it. For the
acceptance tests, it had been agreed that the computer company would demonstrate as a
pre-requisite the features they had claimed during technical discussions.
Now, as you are aware, if a Hero Honda motorcycle claims 80 km to a litre of petrol, it is
under ideal test conditions and if a motorcycle from the showroom were to be tried for
this test before being accepted, it would never pass the test. In corporation’s case, due
to internal politics, the corporation persons from one department – who insisted on
going exactly by the contract – did not sign acceptance since the “system” could not
meet the ideal test conditions.
Further, in a classic case of, “for want of a horse – shoe, payment for the horse was held
up”, the computer company tried to get the system accepted and payment released. The
system was so large that at any point of time over a period of 10 days something small or
the other always gave problems. But the corporation took the stand that as far as they
were concerned the contracts clearly were concerned the contract clearly mentioned that
the “system” had to be tested as a whole and not module by module.
Questions:

6. 1. Comment on the terms and conditions placed by the corporation.
2. What factors influenced the computer company’s decision to accept the
contract?
3. Was it a win – win agreement? Discuss?
Case V: HAZARDS OF HILLS
INTRODUCTION
This case is based on an actual incident which took place in an Army Unit deployed in
field area. A part of a Battery (about ¼ of an Artillery Regiment) was deployed in a snow
bound high altitude area of Kashmir. This was the first time, an artillery unit was
deployed in an area with roads and tracks still under development. Preparation of this
area for such a development needed a lot of digging for guns, pits for ammunition
storage, living place of the personnel, slit trenches and weapon pits for local defence
against any possible enemy/terrorists’ attack on the position, place for storage of
rations, cook-house and communication trenches, etc.
The total strength of the party deployed there was
a) Officer - 1 (Second Lieutenant with about one year service)
b) Junior Commissioned Officer (JCO) - 1]
c) Jawans – 40
The Battery Commander (BC) remained with the Regiment Headquarters at Srinagar
(with the remaining part of the Battery) as per the orders of the commanding Officer.
There was a vehicle with the part of the Battery which was deployed at high altitude to
assist in the daily administration of the troops like collection of ration, stores for
preparation of defences, water, and ferrying of personnel from one place to another. The
vehicle could go only upto a limited number of places due to bad road conditions and
steep gradients. Only one driver was kept for this vehicle to reduce administrative
problems due to more number of personnel. The vehicle completed about 35 to 40 kms.
of running daily in its routine commitments.

7. The part had just been inducted about two weeks back. The defences were being
prepared which involved lot of effort in digging of hardened ground due to the cold
winter months of November. The defence stores were to be collected, once the digging
was complete, from another Engineering Unit located about 5 kms. to the rear. The
roads were treacherous; with a number of stones and slides falling down occasionally
during drizzle due to precipitation in atmosphere, there were steep gradients, narrow
roads with sheer falls on one side due to the road having cut into the side of hills. The
digging was complete by end November. In the month of December, snow fall at that
location was expected any time, as it had already started snowing in the higher reaches
and tops of mountains. The digging had been completed in a record time of two weeks.
The party under the stewardship of the young officer had done a commendable job.
In the first week of December, the only driver of the vehicle reported pain in the chest
and problem in breathing. He was evacuated by helicopter the next day with
instructions to inform the unit to send another driver for the vehicle. It took about three
days for any one to reach this area, with staying of two nights enroute in order to
acclimatise by stages. The detachment was to be without any driver for about three days.
Another driver was detailed to proceed to this area, after having been medically
examined and found fit. A day after the dispatch of the driver, the young officer with this
party arrived in the unit and reported that the vehicle had fallen from a hill-side road
and was completely damaged. The office was in a complete state of disarray and shock.
What actually had happened goes something like this.
After the first driver of the vehicle was evacuated, the weather started turning bad and it
seemed that it was going to snow that day. The officer realised that in case of snow fall
all the efforts put in by the troops would go waste, if the dug-ins were not covered.
Realising this, he borrowed a driver of an ambulance from a local medical unit to direct
his vehicle for collection of defence stores. After the stores had been collected and
dumped at the site of defences, the vehicle was being driven back to the party’s location.
Before it could reach this location, it had to negotiate a dusty and steep track. At a steep
climb the vehicle stalled and got switched off. All the men got down, prevented the
vehicle from reversing by putting stones behind the wheels and started checking what
had gone wrong.
After the check on the engine had been carried out, the bonnet cover slipped off the
hands of the driver while closing it and fell to closing it and fell to closing position with a
bang. Because of the jerk thus created, the stones placed behind the vehicle slipped off.
It was later discovered that there was a glassy smooth layer of ice under the thin layer of

8. dirt which could not hold the stones firmly and stopped upside down because of the
obstruction created by a big boulder. As there was no one in the vehicle, there were no
injuries to personnel. On close inspection by the officers, it was found that the vehicle
body, cabin, bonnet steering wheel and two of the four wheels were badly damaged. The
office, being quite young and inexperienced, could not ascertain the real condition of the
engine and chassis. He thought those too were damaged, whereas because of some
providential chance, the chassis and engine remained intact.
The BC was given the responsibility of getting the vehicle back to the unit. He was given
a vehicle fitter and recovery vehicle with a driver. The BC took two more Non-
Commissioned Officers (NCOs) and proceeded to the location to retrieve the vehicle. It
took two days to reach with a few hours of the last leg of the journey in complete
darkness in that snow bound area with treacherous slippery roads. On reaching the
location, the Commanding Officer of the local unit, who happened to be the Station
Commander of that sector, expressed his unhappiness on their taking such a great risk.
With the assistance of all ranks of that unit, who came in willingly, it took two days to
get the vehicle out of the boulder strewn area on to a track. It was a minor military
operation in itself in that hostile terrain, and inclement weather of high altitude. The
troops and officer had a very good rapport with those of the local unit and there was not
much of a problem in getting the men of that unit to assist.
While coming back, the hazards of night journey were very obvious. There was a thick
layer of snow on the road with slope towards the khuds as layers after layers kept on
accumulating, freezing before the water could roll down the complete slope. There were
steep falls on one side. Both these phenomena, peculiar to hilly terrain, were not very
discernible because of the darkness. The headlights of the vehicles exposed very little.
There were frozen nalas where the vehicle would skid, aligning itself in the direction of
the frozen nala, which tended to prove quite dangerous at times. At such places, the few
troops and officer available would get down, push the vehicle to keep it aligned to the
road and in turn slip down themselves on the frozen snow, most of the times face-down,
in an attempt to push the vehicle. Though the situation was quite grave, it sometimes
bordered on being humorous with everyone laughing spontaneously. At one place, the
BC, pushing the vehicle to keep its tail and aligned to the direction of road, fell down,
slipped a few feet down the frozen nala and landed up head down in a frozen khud about
five feet deep. But for the direction of landing, the slip and fall could have proved quite
dangerous. There was complete silence. The vehicle was gently stopped on the snow
itself, secured with pegs along the wheels and rescue operation commenced for the
ditch. There were several humorous remarks by the BC and the tension was relieved at
once, with troops working on the vehicle with renewed vigour and strength once again.

9. At another place, the recovery vehicle with the damaged vehicle behind it at suspension
toe slipped, but because of the dexerity of the driver, it was saved from going down a
nala by putting it on the left. The BC himself was in the recovery vehicle to give
encouragement and moral support to the driver, sharing all the risks which his troops
were facing. He did all that the troops did, while directing, controlling and executing.
The party with the vehicle, reached the unit location on the evening of the second day
after starting from a high altitude area. The problem of recovery of the vehicle being
resolved, the question of enquiry into the caused embarrassment to all those in
authority in the unit and also the officers and jawans of the sub-unit/battery.
Meanwhile, the inspection of the vehicle was carried out to assess the extent of damage.
It was found that the engine and chasis were intact and the rest of the items of the body
or fitment were damaged, either lightly or severely. To avoid embarrassment to the unit
and loss to the exchequer, as well as in view of the administrative difficulties, the BC
decided to have the vehicle put on road with the units’ efforts and at the earliest.
Meanwhile, the cabin-hood of the vehicle had been purchased for about Rs 650 and was
paid for by the BC, from his own pocket, thus setting an example to others. The JCO and
jawans were also keen to pay for other damages. The offer was appreciated but declined.
The Officer-in-charge of the local Army Workshop happened to be an officer with
commendable helping attitude, positive bent of mind and with an understanding of
peculiarities and problems of the area where such accidents were quite frequent and
possible. When approached to assist, he listened to the whole incident very
sympathetically and promised to assist in whatever way he could. This officer was a
contemporary of the unit in a previous station and had excellent relations and
interaction with the unit. Some items were offered by the workshop officer and replaced
accordingly. The vehicle was made roadworthy again within a fortnight and put on road
for duty. All the enquiries were dispensed with and there was no loss of face by anyone
at any level. It is pertinent to mention that it had snowed in that location as soon as the
recovery party came out of the hills.
QUESTIONS
1. What are the qualities of a good leader? In this case, how were they
applied?
2. Which factors contributed to motivate the troops to go ahead for such a
difficult task as recovering a damaged vehicle from such a difficult and
treacherous terrain and getting it repaired in such a short time?

10. 3. Which incidents indicate the importance of good interpersonal
relationships with juniors, peers and superiors and what is the
importance of good interpersonal relationships?
Case VI: Checking Out a Guest
A guest walked up to the front desk agent in an upscale hotel, ready to check out. As she
would normally do when checking out a guest, the agent asked the guest what his room
number was. The guest was in a hurry and showed his anxiety by responding, “I stay in a
hundred hotel rooms and you expect me to remember my room number?”
The agent then asked for the guest’s name, to which he responded, “My name is Mr.
Johnstein.” After thanking him, the agent began to look for the guest’s last name, but
the name was not listed in the computer. Because the man had a heavy accent and the
agent assumed that she had misunderstood him, she politely asked the guest to spell his
last name. He answered, “What? Are you an idiot? The person who checked me in last
night had no problem checking me in.” Again, the agent looked on the computer to find
the guest.
The guest, becoming even more frustrated, said, “I have a plane to catch and it is
ridiculous that it has to take this long to check me out. I also need to fax these papers
off, but I need to have them photocopied first.” The agent responded, “There is a
business center at the end of the counter that will fax and photocopy what you for it.
Haven’t you ever heard of customer service? Isn’t this a five-star hotel? With your bad
attitude, you should be working in a three-star hotel. I can’t believe they let you work
here at the front desk. Haven’t you found my name yet?”
The agent, who was beginning to get upset, asked the guest again to spell out his full
name. The guest only replied, “Here are my papers I want faxed if you are capable of
faxing them.” The agent reached to take the papers, and the guest shouted, “Don’t grab
them from my hand! You have a bad attitude, and if I had more time, I would talk to
someone about getting you removed from your position to a hotel where they don’t
require such a level of customer service.” The agent was very upset, but kept herself
calm in order to prevent the guest from getting angrier.
The agent continued to provide service to the guest, sending the faxes and making the
photocopies he had requested. Upon her return, the agent again asked the guest to

11. repeat his last name, since he had failed to spell it out. The guest replied by spelling out
his name, “J-o-h-n-s-t-o-n-e.” The agent was finally able to find his name on the
computer and checked him out, while he continued to verbally attack her. The agent
finished by telling the guest to have a nice flight.
Questions
1. Is it appropriate to have the manager finish the check-out? Or, should
the front desk agent just take the heat?
2. Would you have handled the situation in the same manner?
3. What would you have done differently?
4. Communication improvement is required for both of the parties
involved or any one of them? Justify your opinion.