‘Would you mind feeding the cat while I’m away?’ – Learn the language to ask someone a favour
TRANSCRIPT
William
Hello and welcome to How To, the series all about useful English. My name is William Kremer.
Today, we’re going to be looking at how to ask a favour – that is, how to ask someone to do something for you out of kindness or generosity. For example, you might ask a friend to help you with your English. Or maybe you’re going to go away and you want a neighbour to water your plants.
Now, on one level, this is easy. All you need to do is say:
EXAMPLE
Can you do me a favour?
William
‘Can you do me a favour?’ Or you could say:
EXAMPLE
Can I ask a favour?
William
‘Can I ask a favour?’ Say one of those things, and then say what you want the other person to do. ‘Could you help me with my English?’ ‘Can you water my plants next week?’ Now, this gets a bit more complicated because we tend to be very polite when we’re asking favours. So instead of saying ‘Can you do me a favour?’ what we might well say is:
EXAMPLE
Could I ask you to do me a favour?
William
‘Could I ask you to do me a favour?’
EXAMPLE
Could I ask you to do me a favour?
William
That’s more polite than saying ‘Can you do me a favour?’ Now, in the following clip, you’ll hear Catherine and Neil, who are neighbours. In this clip, Catherine checks that Neil isn’t busy and then she asks a favour. She’s going on holiday and she wants Neil to feed her cats while she’s away.
EXAMPLE
Neil
Oh hiya, how are you doing?
Catherine
Hi Neil, hi. I’m fine. Um, have you got a minute?
Neil
Er, yeah, sure.
Catherine
I’m not disturbing you, am I?
Neil
No, no no.
Catherine
OK, well, what it was, um, I don’t know if I told you that I’m going on holiday next week for a couple of weeks.
Neil
Oh right, cool – very nice!
Catherine
Yes, and I was wondering if I could ask you a massive favour, which is would you mind popping in and feeding the cats while I’m away?
Neil
Yeah, yeah that’s fine, sure. I mean, what sort of time do they need to eat ‘cause um I, sometimes I get home…
William
Don’t worry if you missed some of that: they were speaking very, very fast! But listen again to how Catherine asks her favour.
EXAMPLE
Catherine
I don’t know if I told you that I’m going on holiday next week for a couple of weeks.
Neil
Oh right, cool – very nice!
Catherine
Yes, and I was wondering if I could ask you a massive favour.
William
‘I was wondering if I could ask you a massive favour.’
‘I was wondering if I could ask you a massive favour.’ There are a couple of things to note about this. Firstly, Catherine asks her favour as an indirect question in the past continuous tense – ‘I was wondering if I could ask you.’
EXAMPLE
Catherine
And I was wondering if I could ask you a massive favour.
William
This is a very polite way to make a request. Now the second thing to note about what Catherine said is that word massive which means ‘really big’. When we ask favours we tend to exaggerate by saying ‘Can I ask you a massive favour?’ or ‘Can I ask you a big favour?’ or maybe ‘Can I ask you a huge favour?’
Now in the next bit of the clip Catherine tells Neil all about her cats’ eating habits – how often they eat, what they eat and so on. I’m not going to play that to you, but if you go to the How To webpage on bbclearningenglish.com you can listen to the whole conversation and read a transcript. Right now, I’m going to fast-forward to the end of the conversation.
EXAMPLE
Catherine
Just give me a call and I’ll show you where everything is.
Neil
Yeah that’s fine, sure, no problem.
Catherine
Ah sweetheart, thank you so much!
Neil
Where are you going?
Catherine
Vietnam!
Neil
No way! Fantastic!
Catherine
I can’t wait!
William
Catherine says, ‘Ah sweetheart, thank you so much,’ which is a very warm and affectionate way of saying thank you. As well as thank you, there are a couple of special things that you can say when someone has agreed to do you a favour. Listen to this:
EXAMPLE
Catherine
Oh thank you so much Neil, I’ll bring you something nice back to say thanks!
Neil
Oh, you don’t have to do that.
William
Catherine says, ‘I’ll bring you something nice back.’ She’s saying that she’ll bring a gift back from holiday to say ‘thanks’ for the favour. It’s quite common, if someone agrees to do a favour, to use the future tense to promise a reward. So for example, you might say:
EXAMPLE
Oh thank you so much – I’ll buy you a drink when I get back!
William
‘Thank you so much – I’ll buy you a drink when I get back!’ And here’s another ways of doing this:
EXAMPLE
Oh thanks so much – I promise I’ll return the favour sometime!
William
‘I promise I’ll return the favour.’ This means that you will do the same favour for this person in the future. So, for example, when he goes on holiday you’ll feed his cats: you’ll ‘return the favour’.
EXAMPLE
Oh thanks so much – I promise I’ll return the favour sometime!
William
Lastly, you might want to use this phrase:
EXAMPLE
Oh thanks mate – I really owe you one!
William
‘Thanks – I really owe you one.’ You’re saying that you owe your friend a favour. ‘Thanks – I really owe you,’ or maybe, ‘Thanks – I really owe you one.’
EXAMPLE
Oh thanks mate – I really owe you one!
Willaim
Now don’t forget to go to the How To webpage on bbclearningenglish.com for the script of this programme and some extra audio resources and a quiz. Goodbye!
Expressions from the programme
Asking a favour
Note that we tend to be very polite when we are asking favours, using longer sentence structures:
- Can I ask a favour?
- Could you do me a favour?
- Could you possibly do me a favour?
- Could I ask you to do me a favour?
- I was wondering if I could ask you to do me a favour?
Exaggerate the favour
We do this to make our friend feel important:
Could you do me
- a really big favour?
- a massive favour?
- a huge favour?
Thanking your friend
Don’t forget to thank your friend for offering to do you a favour!
- Thank you so much!
Add emphasis to your words by showing how important the favour is:
- You’re an absolute life-saver!
- You’ve saved my life!
After you’ve thanked your friend, you can say that you owe him / her a favour.
- I really owe you (one).
Or you can promise a reward.
- I’ll buy you a drink sometime (to say thanks).
Or you can promise to do the same favour for your friend:
- I’ll return the favour sometime.
- I’ll do the same for you one day. I promise!