Sheet numbers, from memory
Without looking: which sheet and which delta carries each of your three changes? If you hesitate on any of them, find it now — on the call you will not have time.
What changes when it is spoken
Three losses, one gain
You lose the locator. On paper, “Sheet L5, Delta 2” ends the exchange. On the phone the reviewer may not have the sheet in front of them, so the locator has to become an offer: “that is on L5 at Delta 2 — shall I send you the sheet?”
You lose drafting time. The hedges you chose carefully in the letter have to arrive in real time, which means having three or four of them genuinely automatic rather than twenty available.
You lose the record. Nothing said on the call is on file. Anything agreed has to be written down afterwards, by you, and confirmed.
You gain the ability to ask. This is the compensation and it is worth more than the three losses. In writing, an ambiguous comment costs a round; on the phone you can simply ask what they meant and get an answer in ten seconds.
So the three moves change shape. Restate becomes confirm — you check your reading out loud before answering. Action stays as it is. Locate becomes offer — where it is, and whether to send it.
Language for the call
Four things you will need in the first two minutes
| Move | Say |
|---|---|
| Confirm before answering | Just so I have it right — you are asking for a dimensioned setback rather than a full survey? |
| Buy two seconds | Let me pull up L5 — one moment. |
| Locate and offer | That is Delta 2 on Sheet L5. Shall I send you the sheet? |
| Close with a record | So I will dimension the setbacks and reissue L0 and L2. I will confirm that by email today. |
The first move is the highest-value sentence in this lesson. Confirming your reading before you answer costs six seconds and eliminates the single most expensive failure in the whole process — answering the wrong question correctly and finding out three weeks later.
The last move is the second most valuable. A call that ends without a written confirmation has produced an agreement that exists only in two people’s memories, and one of those people reads forty sets a week.
Say it, do not write it
Rewrite each for the phone, using the word given. Say your answer aloud before you type it.
I do not understand what you are asking for. RIGHT
Look at sheet L5. DELTA
You said the wall was over four feet. STATES
We are not commissioning a survey. RATHER
Fine, I will change it. REISSUE
The reviewer calls
Three rounds, one per comment. Back to back, no notes between.
Task card
A plan checker from the City, working through your response letter
Handle all three comments on the phone and end with an agreed, recorded next step.
- Round 1 — comment 1. Straightforward. They just want to hear it confirmed. Do not over-explain.
- Round 2 — comment 2. They are unconvinced by your 3 ft 11 in. Use the even-if.
- Round 3 — comment 3. They ask a question you cannot answer from memory. Say so, and say when you will come back.
- Every round ends with what you will do and when you will confirm it in writing.
Did you confirm first?
How many of the three rounds did you open by confirming what they were asking? And did every round end with something you had committed to put in writing? Those two habits are most of what separates a one-round plan check from a three-round one.
Before the unit task
Homework. Assemble everything the letter needs: the three comments, your revised sheet numbers and deltas, the wall measurement and the manufacturer tables, and your rewritten general note. Write nothing yet.