HAVE BEEN / HAS BEEN / HAD BEEN - Complete English Grammar Lesson with Examples

Hello lovely students and welcome back to English with Lucy.

Today I have a grammar lesson all about have been, has been and had been.

I receive questions about have, has and had been all the time.

I'm going to clarify nearly all of the ways we use them.

Now this is going to be quite a long video.

So before we start I'm going to tell you

exactly what I'll be talking about so that you know what to expect.

The lesson will begin with which subjects we use with have, has and had.

Then I am going to show you how to form positive and negative sentences and

questions using have, has and had been.

After that we are going to discuss the

pronunciation of these words and the use of contractions.

Really important part, do not miss it.

And then we're going to go over 4 of

their key uses.

We're going to discuss how to talk about

travel experiences.

That's a source of some really common mistakes.

We'll also discuss how to describe unfinished states and actions with an

additional focus on for and since because that gets a lot of you.

I'm going to show you how to talk about 2 past events or actions and then

finally we will focus on how to focus on the object of a sentence with the passive voice.

That might sound complicated but I'm going to make it really clear for you.

At the end of the video I'm going to give you some extra information about when we

use have been, has been and had been in other situations and then we will end

this lesson with a short quiz so that you can see how much you remember and retain

from this video.

I haven't done such an in-depth, long

grammar lesson on this channel before.

I want you to feel like you're in a

classroom with me going through the full process of learning about have been, has

been and had been.

Let me know if you like it.

Now let's start with some  tenses and constructions.

In this lesson I'm going to mention the

present perfect simple, the present perfect continuous, the past perfect

simple, the past perfect continuous and the passive voice and I'm not going to

explain these tenses and constructions in detail because the focus today is on

using have been, has been and had been.

However, if you want to learn more about

these tenses and constructions, don't worry! I've got you!

I've got you is slang for I'll look after you!

I've got your back!

I'll support you!

I have created a free pdf and in that pdf

I cover all of these tenses and structures in detail.

And I've also included everything, a full

summary of what we're going to discuss in this lesson and we end it with another quiz.

This pdf is virtually an ebook at this point.

It is so thorough and so in-depth and

you can download it for free.

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Okay first I'm going to talk about the basics.

We use have been and has been in the present perfect tenses.

I, you, we, they and plural nouns go with have been.

I have been, you have been, the books have been, my parents have been.

He, she, it and singular and uncountable nouns go with has been.

She has been, it has been, London has been, the bread has been.

Bread is uncountable.

We use had been with all subjects, nice

and easy, in the past perfect tenses.

I had been, he had been, our children had

been, the tea had been.

How can I not bring up tea?

I'm British.

All subjects in the past perfect tenses.

Now let's move on to positive and negative sentences and questions.

In positive sentences, the structure is subject + have, has or had been.

Nice and simple.

In negative sentences we put not between

have, has or had and been.

Subject, have, has or had not been.

In questions, we invert the subject word order and we put have, has or had before

the subject.

Have, has or had + subject + been.

Now I want to note here that we can use been, to be, as a main verb or an auxiliary verb.

As a main verb it expresses the state or action being described.

It is not followed by another verb and you will see this later in the video in

sentences like I have been to France.

As an auxiliary verb, it adds grammatical

information to a sentence.

It's followed by a main verb.

You will also see this later in the video in sentences like I have been studying

English for 3 years.

In this sentence, studying is the main verb.

Okay, we're doing well but there's more to do and before we get started with how

these words are used we need to go over the pronunciation.

Been is pronounced /biːn/ or /bɪn/.

/biːn/ with a long /iː/ sound, /bɪn/ with a

short /ɪ/ sound.

Both are correct but /bɪn/ is very common

in faster informal speech.

It's also very common for speakers to use

contractions with have, has or had been.

For example, I have been often becomes

I've been or I've been with the shorter /ɪ/ sound.

So listen out for the contracted forms

I've, you've, we've and they've.

The same thing happens to has been which

reduces to /z/ or /s/. For example, he's been, she's been and it's been and had been

which contracts to /d/.

For example, I'd been and he'd been.

There's an exception with the contraction of it had.

It had been which contracts to it'd, it'd.

Notice the extra schwa /ə/ sound there which

adds an extra syllable.

It'd, it'd.

Finally, we often contract a noun with have, has or had been.

For example, the books’ve been or London's been or our children’d been.

Okay, we're ready for uses.

Let's talk about the first and easiest

use of have been, has been and had been.

This might be the easiest but this is

where a lot of my students get confused and make mistakes.

We often use have been, has been and had been when talking about travel experiences.

For example, Will has been to London many times.

This means that Will has visited London

many times in his life up until now.

Note that it's been to London but it's

just visited London without to.

That's a common mistake, to insert a to

where it's not wanted after visited.

Here's another example.

I've been to France three times.

I have visited France three times in my

life until now and I might go again in the future.

Here are some more examples.

Has Verity been to Cardiff?

Yes, she has been to Cardiff. No, she hasn't been to Cardiff.

Have you been to Australia?

Yes, I have. No, I haven't.

So these answers are usually shortened to

Yes, I have. No, I haven't.

Please note that we can't talk about

specific times with have or has been to talk about general travel experiences.

If you want to say exactly when something happened, use the past simple.

It would be wrong to say I have been to Australia last year.

It should be I went to Australia last year.

Now I'd like to mention something that

lots of learners find confusing.

Have or has been versus have or has gone.

We use have or has been to say that someone went to a place and then returned.

We use have or has gone to say that someone went to a place and has not returned.

Look at these examples.

Alicia has been to Mumbai.

She went to Mumbai and then she came back.

Alicia has gone to Mumbai.

She will be back next week.

She went to Mumbai and she is still there.

You can also use had been when talking about travel experiences.

We use had been to say that we travelled or didn't travel to a place before

another event in the past.

For example, I had never been to the US

before I visited New York last year.

There are two past tenses here.

I had never been and I visited both refer to the past.

The sentence means that the first time in my life that I visited the US was when I

went to New York last year.

Here's another example.

I was excited to receive an invitation to their wedding in Barcelona.

I had been to Spain before, but only to Madrid.

This sentence means that I received the

invitation to the wedding in the past.

I visited Spain at some point before I

got the invitation but not Barcelona where the wedding was.

Okay, we're ready for usage number two.

Unfinished states and actions.

We use have been and has been in the present perfect simple to talk about

states that started in the past and continue up to the present.

For example, he has been a nurse for almost a year or he has been a nurse

since last March.

He started working as a nurse last March

and has had the job for almost a year.

He is still a nurse now.

We use have and has been + -ing in the present perfect continuous to talk about

actions that started in the past and continue up to the present.

For example, I have been studying English since 2021.

2021 was my starting point for studying English so I started in 2021 and I have

continued for 3 years until the present day.

You don't know if I will continue studying English in the future.

Using have been or has been doesn't give you any information about the future.

We often use the words for and since with the present perfect tenses.

When we use for, we're talking about the duration of the activity or the period of time.

So 3 years is how long I have been studying English.

When we say since we are talking about the starting point.

So I started studying English in 2021.

Here are some more example sentences.

William has been watching TV since midday.

William's been watching TV for 3 hours.

Presuming it's 3 in the afternoon.

In the first sentence, William started

watching TV at midday and he is still watching TV now.

In the second sentence, he started watching TV 3 hours ago and he is

still watching now.

Another example, we've been together for

7 years.

We've been together since 2017.

So we got together 7 years ago in 2017 and we are still together now.

That's actually true.

I can't believe 2017 is 7 years ago.

Okay, use number 3.

We're going to take a closer look at had been.

I'm going to take the sentences that we used to learn have been and has been and

show you how they're used with had been.

And this is going to help you see how the

meaning changes.

Let's start with our sentence about

studying English because it's nice and relevant for you.

Here it is with had been in the past perfect continuous.

I had been studying English for 3 years when I went to London last year.

There are 2 past actions here.

One continuous past action, I had been

studying English and a single finished action, I went to London.

Now I want to compare that sentence with our previous one, with have been.

I have been studying English for three years.

Here, there is one action that continues

up to the present.

We use had been or had been + -ing when

there are 2 past events.

The action with had been began in the

past and continued up to a more recent point in the past.

We use the past simple to talk about the action or event that happened second.

In this case, the more recent point was last year when I went to London.

We use the past perfect continuous for the action which happened first.

We don't know if the action of studying English continued beyond the visit to

London, but I hope so.

Never stop studying English.

I haven't stopped studying English.

Let's have a look at the other example

sentences and change them to had been.

We have William had been watching TV for

3 hours when he stopped to do some housework.

The action had been watching

began first and continued until William realised it was time to start the housework.

Another example, he'd been a nurse for 11 months when he quit his job.

In this case, he became a nurse and continued in the job for 11 months.

Then, he quit.

This is an example of the past perfect simple.

And the last example is a sad one.

We had been together for 7 years when

we broke up.

We were in a relationship for 7 years before we broke up.

I'm not referring to my relationship by the way.

Last lesson, I didn't wear my wedding

ring because it was having some maintenance and there were rumours.

Okay, let's move on to the fourth and final use that I want to talk about in

this video of have been, has been and had been.

They are used in the passive voice.

So, I buy lots of things online for my dog, Diego.

And when I complete a purchase, I get an email saying, your order has been received.

This sentence is in the passive voice.

In the active voice, it would be, we have received your order.

The website uses the passive voice

because we, the seller, isn't important to this situation.

The order is more important, so the focus of the sentence is on that.

After I've bought something, the shop sends my purchases to me.

I often get a message from the courier.

Notice the pronunciation of courier.

Courier with the /ʊ/ sound, courier.

I always want to say courier or courier, but it's courier.

Distracted by pronunciation, I get a

message from the courier saying, your parcel has been delivered.

Or, because I usually buy several things at once, your parcels have been delivered.

The parcels are more important than the company or person who delivered them.

Hence, the passive voice.

So how do we use had been in the passive voice?

This is quite advanced, but it's important that you know it because I'm

sure you will hear it.

We use had been in the passive voice when

there are 2 actions in the past.

For example, my van had been repaired by

the mechanic, so it was as good as new.

Both of the events or actions were in the past.

The first event that occurred is indicated with had been and the second

with the past simple.

So first, the mechanic repaired my car

and then it was as good as new.

Let's look at another example.

By the time we arrived at the hotel, all the rooms had been booked for the night.

Again, we have two events in the past.

First, people booked all of the rooms and

then we arrived at the hotel.

Very poor planning.

Okay, extra bits, extra info.

In this final section, I want to give you

some extra information about when you will see have been, has been, and had

been used.

I'm not going to explain these uses in

great detail, but I just want you to be aware of them.

We have 3 to go for.

And number one, have been after modal verbs.

We see have been, but not has been appear after modal verbs like might and must.

Using have been with different modal verbs could be a whole new video in itself.

So here are just a couple of examples.

Maria might have been in Ghana last month.

She goes every year in January.

Or he must have been at work when you

tried to call him.

Number 2, the third conditional.

You will also see have been after a modal verb in the third conditional.

For example, I would have been happy if you had come.

And we use had been in the third conditional too.

If I had been to Greenland before, I would have told you about it.

Number 3, has-been as a noun.

Can you notice anything weird with this one?

There is a hyphen between has and been.

A has-been, a noun, is a person who was

important, famous, or very good at something in the past but isn't anymore.

It's not a very nice thing to call someone, but you should recognise the  

word even if you don't use it.

Okay, quiz time.

I'm going to show you five sentences, and I want you to decide how to fill in the gaps.

Choose from have been, has been, or had been.

Are you ready?

Here's number one.

She ___ ____ waiting for her friends to arrive

for over 30 minutes.

I'll give you 5 seconds.

Has been, she has been waiting.

Why?

Because he, she, it and singular and uncountable nouns go with has been.

Number 2, Andy ___ ____a teacher for almost 50 years when he retired.

You have 5 seconds.

Had been, Andy had been a teacher for almost 50 years when he retired.

Okay, number 3.

____ you ever ____ to London?

5 seconds.

A nice question here, have you ever been to London?

Number 4, my bike ___ ____ stolen! How am I going to get home?

5 seconds.

Has been, my bike has been stolen. How am I going to get home?

This is in the passive voice.

And number 5, Kareem ___ never ____ to Mongolia, but he's planning to go next year.

5 seconds.

Kareem has never been to Mongolia, but he's planning to go next year.

How many did you get right?

Share your results in the comment section!

That brings me to the end of this video

about have been, has been and had been.

There is more to learn about these words

and the tenses we use them in, but this has been a really solid overview of some

common uses.

If you would like to learn more about the

grammar, the structures and to see a full summary of this lesson, I've

basically written the lesson notes with you.

Download the PDF.

The link is in the description box.

I really hope you've enjoyed today's lesson.

If you'd like to learn more with me, check out my B1, B2, and C1 courses.

The Beautiful British English Programmes.

Just visit englishwithlucy.com and

you'll see all of the information you need.

I will see you soon for another video.