Dear all
blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah
Yours faithfully, yours sincerely, yours truly, regards 
Is there any hard and fast rule about which “greeting” should be used at the end of written communications? Or should one use different ones in different circumstances?
Gratefully for your assistance
Love and sloppy wet kisses
grimpixie
I always knew it as “Dear Sir” => “Yours faithfully” and “Dear Mr Smith” => “Yours sincerely” but this site suggests that’s a UK only thing…
…though I’m hoping to re-introduce the form:
I remain, Sir,
Your most Humble and Obedient Servant,
dylan_73, Esq.
The only rule I know is the same as Dylan_73’s - the two "S"s don’t go together (you don’t begin “Dear Sir” and end “yours sincerely”).
With deepest regard and affection,
Steve Wright
You must sign your first ever email “Virtually Yours”, so that all who read may have a jolly good laugh.
Same here, I am a silly foreigner and am always in trouble with this - especially with work-related emails and letters:
Admittedly it is not quite that bad most of the time but in fear of looking silly I now start all emails with a daring “Hello,” and close them with the spectacular “Best regards,”. There’s something about calling people “dear” that doesn’t sit right with me. “Here you go, dear, that’ll be 16 dollars…”? I dont know, maybe I can pull it off in 30 years’ time or so. “Yours truly” sounds a little too affectionate for my taste.
What about starting with “Yo, 'zup?” and ending with “peace,”?
Interesting link dylan - my wife (who is the kind of person who cares deeply about this sort of thing) tells me that the rule that she learnt is somewhat similar, i.e. that “yours sincecerly” is only to be used when you have a relationship with the person you are writing to, as you cannot be sincere with someone you don’t know…
Grim
A formal letter, say, one that you wrote to your bank, should look something like this:
Any “rules” are pointly invented ones. Frankly I can’t think of any conceivable reason why you can’t address a letter to “Dear Sir” and not also be “sincere”.
Nor can I see any reason why sincerity and faith are special cases that should have the reader’s attention drawn to them. Does the reader suspect insincerity? Come to that, why am I expected to address every letter to “Dear”? Is this not an anachronistic use? Do I really regard everyone I write to so fondly and formally?
Personally I almost always use “Yours”, without any adjective unless I’m particularly feeling it.
Yours authoritatively,
Working at a small law firm in the U.S., I got the impression that 100% of U.S. business letters start with “Dear ___.” I think that about 90% conclude with “Sincerely” or maybe sometimes “Sincerely Yours.” I’ve seen “Yours Truly” and “Cordially,” but much less frequently. Social letters tend to end with “Love” or “Your Friend,” but people seem to feel free to improvise.