BBLSP1 wrote:Maybe better here than in ‘Does Anybody Know?’
When composing a letter on my computer, I leave two blank line spaces before the signature section. This means that the position of the signature section will vary on the printed sheet depending on the length of the letter main body text. Is this correct?
Or, instead, should the signature section always be in a fixed position at the bottom of the letter sheet and hence with a varying gap between it and the end of the letter text?
Please, no hippy stuff about getting the message across is the only thing that matters.
![Very Happy :D](./images/smilies/icon_e_biggrin.gif)
A quick look through the first half of a several-inches-thick pile of letters and their enclosures on my desk (they're awaiting filing, in the shredder in many cases!) says that all the letters either have a small gap between the body of the letter and the signature section and a longer one between the signature section and the bottom of the sheet, or have the body of the letter ending close enough to the bottom of the sheet that the signature section fits with only small gaps both above and below it (so that it's impossible to tell which signature positioning they're using). So it looks to me as if the positioning you're using is at least the far more widely used one, and quite possibly universally or near-universally used.
Of course, the fact that some convention is widely (or even universally) used these days is no guarantee that it's correct... ;
-) But I think there's good reason not to leave a large gap between the body of the letter and the signature section, namely that it makes life at least a bit more difficult for someone who wants to tamper with the letter by adding extra text to it. If they can add it between the body of the letter and the signature section, they've just got to closely match the writing style, typeface and paragraph style (e.g. left / right margins and interline spacings) of the existing text; if they have to add it under the signature section, they also have to make it a sufficiently plausible postscript for the fact that it's not in the body of the letter not to arouse suspicion.
Gengulphus