Making business phone calls: Giving your name and contact details

🇯🇵 This is the standard tactful phrase for "not available right now". It covers meetings, breaks, anything, without giving the caller details.

💬 折り返し literally means "folding back". On the phone it means returning a call: 折り返します "I'll call you back."

💬 お願いできますか "could I ask for...?" is a polite request you can attach to almost any noun: お名前をお願いできますか "May I have your name?"

🇯🇵 Staff use this very formal "understood" with customers and clients. With coworkers you'd hear わかりました or 承知しました instead.

🇯🇵 This is less an apology than a polite cushion before asking something. Use it before requesting a name, a repeat, or a favor on business calls.

💬 The お in front makes it polite and refers to the other person's name. You never use it for your own name.

💬 Most words take お for politeness, but 電話 takes お too, as in お電話. Both mean the other person's phone.

💬 Read phone numbers digit by digit, with の (no) at each dash: (zero-kyū-zero no ichi-ni-san-yon no...). People often say (zero) rather than れい (rei).

🇯🇵 This is the standard way to close a business call or request, a polite "thanks in advance" with no exact English equivalent. いたします makes it a more humble version of よろしくお願いします.

💬 申し伝える is the humble form of 伝える "to convey". You use it when passing a message within your own side.

🇯🇵 This is the standard promise staff give before hanging up after taking a message. It's often followed by 失礼いたします "goodbye (formal)".

💬 The phrase literally means "I'll be rude", meaning "excuse me for leaving". You'll also hear it when entering or leaving a room.