The Passive Voice for Reporting and Services
Welcome back to The Art of Business English. Well, it's almost Christmas and this week I am going to finish up my two-part series into the Passive Voice.
Today, I will be looking at the Passive Voice for reporting and for talking about having or getting services done.
Below I have also included some popular Christmas episodes for you which you can look back on and check out if you haven't listened to them in the past.
Old Christmas Episodes of The AOBE
Watch the episode here
Reporting with passive verbs
- 1With reporting verbs and verbs of thinking or feeling we can use:
It + passive verb + that (e.g. agree, announce, argue, believe, claim, decide, disclose, expect, feel, hope, know, predict, recognize, report, say, suggest, think, understand):
Examples: It was felt that the facilities were in need of renovation. - 2Subject + passive verb + to-infinitive (e.g. ask, believe, consider, estimate, expect, feel, know, mean, report, say, see, suppose, think, understand):
Examples: Our sports facilities are said to be among the best in the country. (= people say our sports facilities are among the best in the country). This building is believed to be the oldest in the town.
Have/Get something done
We use have/get something done:
To show that someone performs a paid service for us. We use have + object + past participle:
- 1Examples: You’ll need to have your photo taken. (= someone else will take your photograph)
In informal English get + past participle can be used in the same way:
- 1Examples: I got my photo taken yesterday.
Need + -ING
To show that someone performs a paid service for us. We use have + object + past participle:
- 1Examples: You’ll need to have your photo taken. (= someone else will take your photograph)
In informal English get + past participle can be used in the same way:
- 1Examples: I got my photo taken yesterday.
Final thoughts
Well, once again that brings us to the end of this episode. Remember you can learn more about the passive voice in my two other previous episodes. You can listen to them here:
If you have any questions then please drop me a comment below or check out the links to other lessons in this post.
I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a happy new year. All the best.
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