English with Kirsty – episode 23
Just say “no”!
In this episode, I talk about polite ways of saying “no” in English.
You can listen to episode 23 here:
1. No thank you
2. No because
I won’t be able to do that today because I need to meet an important deadline.
I’m sorry but I can’t help you because this department doesn’t deal with that.
Unfortunately that’s not possible because
3. No but
I’m not free on Wednesday afternoon, but we could meet on Thursday morning.
I’m not available on that date, but one of my team could attend the meeting instead.
I don’t have what you’re looking for, but you could try asking…
We don’t sell that any more/we’ve run out of those, but you may be interested in…
I know that I won’t have any capacity this week, but we could set aside some time in January.
We don’t have the budget for that, but we could….
4. No but ask a question
Why do you want to do it that way?
What do you need that for?
5. Sometimes you need to be firm
As I’ve already explained, we don’t need … at the moment.
I understand your point but I am unable to .. at this time.
Finally, English people could use all of these phrases to mean “no”:
I’m not sure about that
I don’t think so
I’ll let you know
I might not be able to
I’ll be in touch
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