BE 637: Did or Have? Past Tense Grammar for Business English

This is the Business English Podcast, Episode 637, Did or Have Past Tense Grammar for Business English. Welcome to the Business English Podcast from All Ears English. Get the English skills you need to achieve your dreams in global business. For a presentation, a meeting, or your office party, this is Real Business English with your favorite American hosts, Lindsay and Aubrey, coming to you from Arizona and Colorado, USA.

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Go to allearsenglish.com slash fluency score. That's allearsenglish.com slash f-l-u-e-n-c-y-s-c-o-r-e. Hey, Lindsay, how's it going? Good, Aubrey. How are you?

How's it going today? I am great. Have you gotten a lot done today? Oh my God. Well, I just started the day when we started recording, honestly. So not too much.

What about you? Some recording, but other than that now, yeah, I did get a lot done today. I had a very productive morning, but I have a question. This is interesting.

What would be different if I asked, did you get a lot done today? Oh, well, I would start to think that maybe the day was finished, right? Yeah. It would be strange for me to ask that question at 11am.

It would be weird because I'm just getting started. Yeah, there's a lot of the day still. That's the key. But at 5pm, I might ask you that, right? Because I'm probably wrapping up, I'm finishing up, going to work out or something, right?

Exactly. This is fascinating. We are talking about past tense grammar today. We got a great question on YouTube. Why are we using did or have? And we're going to break it down for you here.

All right, great. So this question, yeah, this question comes from our YouTube channel. Guys, we have a YouTube channel for All Ears English. So go ahead and type in All Ears English Podcast.

You will find the channel and be one of our many subscribers. Hit that subscribe button so you get updates as soon as a new episode comes out. We publish five days a week. Okay.

Awesome. Yeah. Yes. All right. Well, we publish five days a week on Allers English. So three days a week over here on Business English. Follow both the podcasts.

You'll never... You'll have a podcast every day. Exactly. Here's the question. Hi there. I'm Jessica from Italy. I've been listening to your podcast for years now, and it has helped me so much to level up my English.

Well, that's great to know. Yes. One question about this episode. In the role play, you said, did you finish your report yet? It sounded strange to me.

I would have said, have you finished your report yet? Could you explain this? Maybe it's a colloquial use of the past simple. Thank you. I appreciate your work so much.

Oh, this is such a great question about past tense grammar. Because depending on the context, these can have a very similar meaning and can be almost interchangeable, but they do imply something different. So it's not like either of these are incorrect, but what's different is the implication, right? So I'm excited to dive into this.

All right. So what do we mean by have you finished? Like what's the implication of that, Aubrey? Right. If you use have and say, have you finished, you're using present perfect tense.

This implies that there's still time to finish it. We ask this when the answer could be not yet. Yeah. But did you finish this? If you use did and say, did you finish?

You're using past simple grammar. And the implication is that it needed to be finished by now, by the time we're asking, we're expecting the answer to be yes. Yeah, there was some kind of a deadline, you mean? Yeah.

Right. It's very subtle. But just like when I asked you, have you gotten a lot done today? This would be asked earlier in the day, right? It's like, what have you done so far?

There's still more time in the day to do more. And if I use did, and I said, did you get a lot done today? It's finalized, right? It's the end of the day.

I'm asking what you got done. There's not time to do more. That's the difference between these two grammar tenses. Yeah. So neither of these is incorrect, but they just have different implications, right?

The subtext of what you're saying is going to be different. So let's go into a couple more examples, Aubrey, like have you contacted someone or did you contact someone? Exactly. Because it's not like this is just for that verb finish, right?

Any verb you use, you can choose did or have. you're using a different verb tense and it will have a different implication. So for contacted, if I say, have you contacted the client yet? Versus did you contact the client yet?

There is a difference, right? Have you contacted? It could be not yet. There's still time. Did you contact the client yet? There's a slight implication of it should have been done by now.

So it's the tone. So we're kind of, maybe we're showing a little more impatience. Or it's all about like, when was the deadline, right? I'm asking, I'll ask, depending on when this should have been done, I'll choose either have or did.

What about have you seen or did you see? Have you seen the finance report versus did you see the finance report? Yeah. And as you can see, these are pretty interchangeable.

It's often either of these are going to work. The implication is slight. It is subtle, right? Right. Yeah. So for the first one, have you seen the finance report?

Like we said, a pro tip here is the answer could always be not yet. So if you don't want the answer to be not yet, if like the time has passed, it should have been done by now. We don't want a not yet. Then we would say did instead of have.

Right. Have you seen the finance report? It could be like, oh, not yet. Didn't realize it was out. Yeah. Or have they signed or did they sign? Have they signed the contract yet?

Or did they sign the contract yet? Same thing, right? Same thing, right? Have they signed? Not yet. There's time still. And if I say, did they sign the contract yet?

I'm hoping the answer is yes. The time has passed. We're out of time. And I think it is pretty interchangeable at the same time, right? We interchange these.

There's a lot of flexibility you can have here, guys. Yeah, that is huge here for something like this. And this is, I probably get questions more about past simple versus present perfect than any other verb tenses because it is tricky to know.

which should I use? Often you'll see native speakers use one or the other, and it's not clear why they're choosing one or the other. And we've talked about this before, especially on the Oller's English podcast, we cover grammar often a little more over there, that often you have a choice. It is all about how important the time is, right?

The time is what matters. There's this slight implication that we would ask one when there's still time for something to be done. And the other one when time's up. I need this to be done by now, right?

But neither is wrong. It just is implying something about time expectations. Yeah, guys, make sure you're following the All Ears English podcast, by the way, our other show. Type in All Ears English into your search bar, wherever you're listening, whether it's Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and hit that follow button because we do cover grammar a bit more over there.

You're right, Aubrey. Yes, especially if you're wanting details. And we're not teaching grammar like a textbook, right? right? We're getting questions from students about real observations they have about grammar that native speakers are using.

And then we're going to break down these subtle nuances of how a verb tense could imply something, how the tone changes, rather than just breaking down like this is present tense grammar and this is past tense grammar, right? We want you to know how to use it at work and in your daily conversations, right? What do these different verbs imply? Right.

A lot of you are actually using English in your daily life. Therefore, it has implications on your relationships. So that's where we go with our teaching. Again, what's the tone?

And that matters so much for connection. Okay? Yes. Have you ever listened to native speakers and thought, I understand the words, but I still feel slightly lost.

That's because real English conversations include more than vocabulary. There's speed. There's connected speech. There are cultural references and casual phrases.

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That's allearsenglish.com slash F-L-U-E-N-C-Y-S-C-O-R-E. All right, Aubrey, let's get into a role play. We're co-workers talking about something at work. All right.

Yeah, let's do it. Want to start us out? Yes. Has Karen reviewed the proposal? Yes. She sent me her comments this morning. Okay, perfect. Did you send it to the client?

I'm making the last few changes now and then I'll be able to send it. Sounds good. Let me know once they reply. Okay. This is interesting. I'm excited to dive into when we would have used one or the other because I do feel it.

I feel the tone. I feel this slight implication of an expectation that something was already done when you used did, right? Did you feel it, Lindsay? Yeah.

It's subtle, but it's there. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's subtle, but it's there for sure. And it makes sense with the context too. If that's the next step, then that makes sense, right?

Right. To send it to the client. Yeah. Okay. So you started with, or I started, has Karen reviewed the proposal, right? Yeah. So it's interesting to think about why would you use present perfect instead of past simple, right?

Has Karen reviewed the proposal? Yeah. It's subtle, but if you said, did Karen review the proposal and use past simple there, there's the slight implication of it should be done. I'm expecting the answer to be yes.

Yeah. Yeah, for sure. Interesting. And then you said, yes, she sent me her comments this morning. And then you said, I said. And then you said, okay, perfect.

Did you send it to the client? Right? So this is really interesting. You could say, have you sent it to the client? And if so, there's this very subtle implication that if I say not yet, no problem.

Did you send it to the client? It is subtle, but there's an implication that you would. And like you said, that's the expected next step. So you might just use this grammar because you expect it to be okay, then that's surely been done yet.

So it's not so extreme that there's like this implied criticism or judgment of something. It is subtle. Yeah, very subtle for sure. More direct. It's more direct, I'd say.

That's a lot of it too. Because Past Simple is about a completed action in the past and present perfect when you say, have you sent it? Have they seen the proposal? That's more about it has an effect on the future.

It would be okay for it not to be done yet. It's this subtle implication that something would be finished or not. So often it is kind of interchangeable. You could use one or the other.

It's not a big deal if the time doesn't really matter. If there is a deadline and it should have been done by now, then that implication will definitely be there.

Yep. So think about context when you're making the choice between the simple past and the present perfect. Think about how your words are landing with the person in front of you, right?

If you are implying something, is that working or do you need to soften more or get more direct? right? Which direction do we need to go in? Exactly. I love this pro tip that if the answer could be not yet, and it's not a problem, it's not going to be a big deal, then you're going to choose present perfect.

Oh, have you done that yet? Has she received it? Whatever it is. If the answer could be not yet with no problem, no deadline has passed, no implication, go with present perfect.

Nice. Nice. All right. Good stuff. I know grammar can really trip us up, but guys come back to the relationship, come back to the context and the connection and you can't go wrong.

All right. Ask us any follow-up questions to support at allersenglish.com. If you want this, if you have a follow-up question from today, let us know. All right.

Yes. Awesome. I'm excited for you guys to not let grammar hold you back, right? When you are working, there will be all these little things, grammar things that you could let, you know, keep you from connecting, keep you from having that conversation.

So we want to share these subtle things, these small things. You can build confidence the more you know about grammar and which you should choose in which conversation, even if one isn't necessarily wrong or right, it's just about an implication. Yes, exactly. All right.

Good topic today. Thank you to our listener who asked that question. And we'll be back very soon. Back on the Business English Podcast, Aubrey. Awesome.

Thanks, Lindsay. See you next time. Okay. Thank you. Bye. Bye. Thank you for listening to Business English, a podcast just for you, the high achieving global professional.

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