The same notice, written twice. Version one: “Applicants are advised that submissions received subsequent to the stipulated deadline shall not be considered.” Version two: “We can't consider applications that arrive after 31 March.” Both are accurate. Both are polite. Only one of them will stop someone from missing the deadline.
That gap — between correct and understood — is where the argument about plain language versus formal prose actually lives. Not in taste, not in tradition, but in the small distance between what you meant and what your reader took away.
What Plain Language Is, and What It Isn't
Plain language is not baby talk, and it isn't a rule that every sentence must be eight words long. It is a promise to the reader: you won't have to read this twice. That promise sometimes requires a long sentence, a technical term, or a paragraph of context. What it never requires is decoration.
Formal prose, honestly defined, is the register we use when a situation calls for distance, record-keeping or ceremony. It has real uses. The trouble starts when formality is chosen by default — when a company writes to its own customers the way a court writes to a defendant, and nobody can say why.
Try this on any sentence you've written: cover the words that only decorate and see what's left. “We would respectfully request that you kindly complete the enclosed form” loses “respectfully,” “kindly” and “enclosed” before anything breaks. “Please fill in the form” survives.
When Simplicity Helps
Plain writing earns its keep wherever the reader has to do something, decide something or remember something. That covers more ground than most organisations assume.
- Instructions and procedures. A reader following steps has no spare attention for subordinate clauses.
- Customer messages. Bills, reminders, confirmations, apologies. The reader is not settling in with a cup of tea; they're checking their phone on a bus.
- Forms and error messages. “Invalid input” tells nobody anything. “Your postcode needs six characters” fixes the problem.
- Bad news. If someone has just been told they didn't get the job, they need to understand why on the first reading. Complexity reads as evasion.
- Anything translated, or likely to be. Long noun stacks and layered passives survive translation badly.
Simplicity also matters when the stakes are high and the reader is frightened. Medical letters, insurance decisions, tax notices — these are the moments when a clear sentence is a form of respect. On anything with real financial or legal consequences, though, style is the least of it: have the substance reviewed by someone qualified.
When Formal Prose Earns Its Place
Now the harder half. Formality isn't a vice. It carries information that plainness can flatten.
Where precision outranks ease
Contracts, terms of service and statutory notices exist to be interpreted later, possibly by people who weren't there when they were written. In those documents, a word like “shall” or a defined term in bold is doing structural work. Replacing it with a friendlier synonym can change the obligation. Style advice stops at the edge of legal effect; that's a job for a lawyer, not an editor.
Where the register is the message
A condolence letter written in brisk, cheerful prose can feel careless. A formal announcement, a citation, a retirement tribute: the formality is part of the care, and readers hear the effort. The same applies to some institutional apologies, where a measured register signals that the matter is being taken seriously.
Where jargon is compression
Between specialists, technical vocabulary saves time. Two engineers or two tax accountants can say in four words what would take forty. Plain language is a rule about audience, not a ban on vocabulary. The failure is using insider terms with outsiders.
Where hedged language is honest
Sometimes you genuinely don't know, and “this may affect your results in some cases” is more truthful than a confident sentence that turns out to be wrong. Simplify the structure, not the uncertainty.
Where Simplification Goes Wrong
Plain language has failure modes too, and they're worth naming before you adopt it as a house style.
- Flattening a real choice. If a decision has three options and two carry conditions, a crisp summary that drops the conditions isn't clarity. It's a misleading headline.
- Talking down. Short sentences aimed at an expert reader can read as contempt. Match the register to the person, not to a reading-level score.
- Losing the record. A casual email confirming a change to a contract may be perfectly clear and completely useless. Keep the plain version for the person, the formal version for the file.
- Replacing substance with friendliness. “We're sorry for the hassle!” is not an explanation. Warmth and clarity are separate jobs; do both.
A Reader Test You Can Run in Five Minutes
Before you settle on a register, answer three questions about the actual person who will read the page.
- What do they need to do next? If there's an action, the instructions should be plain and impossible to misread, whatever the rest of the document sounds like.
- What happens if they misread it? High consequence and little chance of a second reading — lean hard toward plain. Low consequence with a careful professional audience — you have room to breathe.
- Who is reading, and in what mood? A specialist at a desk and a worried person on a phone need different sentences for the same fact.
Then read your draft aloud. Formal prose that can't be spoken in one breath is usually formal by accident. If you stumble, your reader will too.
A Workable Default
Most writing doesn't need to pick a side. It needs a structure: plain where the reader acts, formal where the record must hold.
Send a plain covering note with a formal contract. Explain the policy in clear sentences and attach the terms unaltered. Write the apology warmly and the remediation precisely. Keeping the two registers side by side works far better than forcing one page to be a friendly letter and a binding record at the same time — that's usually where documents become unreadable.
And when you're unsure, ask the plainest question available: what does my reader need from this sentence? Very often the answer settles the register before you've written the second line.
Photo: Maximilianovich / Pixabay
