Project-End Letter--Part 2

In layout, it should look like any other business letter. But it's geared toward those things that you kept track of during the actual indexing.

Start a record, and as you go, keep an ongoing list. Don't try to remember everything at the end. You will be pushed for time, and stressed out at the end of the project. You will be worried about if you have included everything, done everything right, formatted it correctly, and more. Don't stress yourself out further by not listing letter items.

You might find that, in the letter, you won't include every little thing you have listed. That's OK. Your list is just so you don't "draw a blank."

Another useful addition to your project-end letter is the format that you are sending the index file in. Is it in ASCII? Word? Which version of Word?

I also like to put an approximate length of the index.

One editor gave me an approximation of 700 to 900 lines for an index. According to Cindex, the completed index came in at 799 lines. So I included this information in the letter.

Another editor gave me total number of pages the index had to fit into, which was 22 pages. Since I had a sample page of their indexes, I could see a 9 font was bigger than what they used, and an 8 font was too little. Their sizing was in-between. So, this lead to the following scenario:

In a 9 font, the index was 24 pages, and in an 8 font it was 20 pages. Therefore, I felt we had a workable-sized index, and I included this information in the letter. That way, when she opened the index and saw it was 24 pages, she didn't panic that 2 pages worth of entries needed to be cut. All she had to do was adjust the font size down to their normal size. No panic-button got pushed.

You can include whatever other information you'd like to include. Each letter is usually individually crafted. There isn't a "form" letter.

In addition, some indexers may NOT include a project-end letter. There isn't an indexing law that says you have to.

But, in an earlier article, we mentioned the importance of good communication between indexer and client. I would rather over communicate in a letter (they DON'T have to read it if they don't have time), than not say anything at all.

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