Telephone English: How to take or give a message

Hi, there. My name is Emma, and in today's video, we are going to learn some more telephone

English. So if you haven't checked out my video on telephone English already, please

do before you watch this video because this video is covering the end of a conversation.

I've made one video that covers the beginning. So first, watch the beginning. And once you

finish watching, come and watch this video. Okay. So let's get started. I have my telephone

here. Let's finish this phone conversation.

So I want to ask you -- pick up your phone, everyone. "Would you like to leave a message?

Okay. So repeat after me. "Would you like to leave a message?" Good. If someone asks

you this on the phone, you can respond by saying, "Yes. Can you tell Emma that I called?"

"Can you tell Peter that -- and you can say your name here -- that Henry called -- that

Abigail called?" So your name goes here. The person you have the message for goes here.

So this is the person that you have the message for. So if you were calling me, Emma, and

you didn't get a hold of me, you want me to call you back. Maybe you talked to my mom,

and my mom says, "Oh, would you like to leave a message?" You say, "Yes. Can you tell Emma

that -- your name -- called?" Or, "Yes, can you tell Emma to call me tonight?" "Can you

tell Emma to call me later?" Okay. So let's try this. I want you to say either this or

this. All right? So everybody -- oops. Sorry. Pick up your phone. Pretend you're talking

to me. "Would you like to leave a message?" Now, you say --

or --. Okay. Good. Well done. All right.

The next thing I want to do, if I'm calling someone and leaving a message, after I say

my name and I say, "Can you tell So and So that Emma called", I want to leave a phone

number. So I can say something like, "He/She can reach me at 555-5555." There might have

been an extra five there. I don't know. This isn't my number, so don't try to call it.

This is an example. "She can reach me at this number." Okay?

All right. So after you give your number, maybe the person isn't ready. Maybe they don't

have a pen and paper, and they haven't written -- they can't write this down yet. So if they

need a pen and paper, they'll say, "Hold on. Let me grab a pen and paper." Okay? So let's

say this together to practice. "Hold on. Let me grab a pen and paper." Meaning, "Give me

a moment. I want to write this down."

All right. So I'm now going to say this. I want you to say this. Just to practice. "Yes.

Can you tell Frank that I called? Frank can reach me at 555-5555." Okay? Now, you say

--. Good. With these expressions, it's very important to practice. And you'll feel more

confident if you actually pretend to be on the phone. Don't ask me why, but when you

practice to do these things, you actually will feel more confident when you do them.

Okay. So then, what would happen is if I didn't have a pen and paper at the beginning and

I said, "Hold on. Let me grab a pen and paper", now, I have my pen and paper. I'm now ready

to take the message. So I can say, "Okay. What's your number again?" So if the first

time I didn't hear it, I wasn't prepared, I can say, "Okay. What's your number again?"

So repeat after me. "Okay. What's your number again?" Great.

So now, we are going to finish the phone conversation. Okay. So the person who just wrote down your

number and wrote down your name -- the person who took the message will now say, "Great!

I'll let her/I'll let him/I'll let Emma/I'll let Peter know you called." Okay? That's one

thing you can say. You can also say, "I'll pass on the message." "Okay. I'll pass on

the message." So you have a choice between this or this. So let's try that. I want you

to say this, okay? Great. Okay. Good.

So after this -- or actually, sometimes -- maybe you don't want to leave a message. Maybe you

just want to try to call back later. Okay. So if somebody asks you, "Would you like to

leave a message", and you don't want to leave a message, you can say, "No. That's okay.

I'll try again later." Okay? So let me ask you if you'd like to leave a message, and

you say this. "Would you like to leave a message?" Perfect. All right.

So this is almost the end of the call. Now, we just have to thank the person and say goodbye.

So you can say -- if you're -- you can either say, "Okay. Take care. Bye." Or you can also

say, "thank you. Goodbye." Very simple. So choose one of these. "Okay. Take care. Bye."

" Thank you. Goodbye." The second one is a little bit more formal. All right. Wonderful.

So you can now hang up your phone. Not "hang out", "hang up". Okay? So I would like to

invite you to practice these words by visiting our website at www.engvid.com. There, you

can do a quiz. You can do -- well, where you can really practice these different expressions.

So until next time, take care, and I will see you later.