No, that sentence should not end with a question mark.

June 28, 2007 in English, Language Gripes by Josh | 2 comments

I was at the post office today mailing a few items, when I saw a little placard that made me cringe. It showed a postal worker, holding her hand to her ear, as if she was listening. Below her picture was this text:

We’d like to know how you service was today?

Argh. No, that sentence does not need a question mark at the end. It should have a period, or if they were wanting to imply excitement, an exclamation point - but not a question mark. That’s a statement. Statements do not end in question marks.

I’m really surprised that made it through the editing process!

2 comments

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June 28, 2007 at 5:14 pm

Nils

Nils’s avatar

I think this may be a case of extreme high rising terminal ;-)

June 28, 2007 at 6:32 pm

Josh

Josh’s avatar

I’m not sure if that’s really what that is or not. I’ve seen such constructions before. Generally, it looks to me like what’s happened is, they have a question in mind, e.g.:

How was your service today?

But when they convert that to a statement, they forget to change the punctuation from that of a question to a statement, thus:

We’d like to know how you service was today?

Maybe you’re right though. Maybe it is a case of high rising terminal.