Surviving Unplain Language

We are a group of people who write in plain words. That is our job. People who are in business or in the government pay us to make documents easier to read. We also train people to write documents that readers can understand.

We care a lot that everyone can get documents they can read. It is not fair when you get something that is too hard to understand. When that happens, we call it unplain language.

If you ask for plain language from businesses and governments, they will see that plain language is important. Maybe they will start to write in plain language, and that will be better for all of us.

In this part of our Web site, you will find:

• When you get something you can't read or understand ...
  Tips on what to do if you get a document in unplain language (PDF, 93KB). (Download free Adobe Reader for viewing PDF file.)
• Examples of unplain writing
  Samples of documents written in unplain language, and how we have made them plain.
• Why people use unplain language
  This explains why some people do not write plainly. As you will see, most of the time they do not do it on purpose.

Questions or comments? Contact Sarah Carr at sarahcarr@btconnect.com, Janet Pringle at owlwords@telus.net or Bertie Mo at bertiemo@yahoo.com.