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I want to say to my client:

I don't want to put myself in a situation when you Placed me order and I did not have the material.

Is it correct?

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  • Can you describe the situation in a little more detail? That might help clarify what you're looking for. Are you describing a situation where you don't want to take more orders than your business can handle?
    – Sawbones
    Commented Jul 29, 2015 at 17:46
  • Hi, Kafil Ahmad, and welcome to English Language & Usage. As matters stand, you are essentially asking site visitors to proofread and correct your example sentence for you, which is not the type of task this site exists to perform. As a result, your question may be closed unless you can identify a particular problem you see in your example sentence and ask for help with it. I suspect that the central problem is with the phrase "when you Placed me order." Please consider reworking your question to avoid its being seen as an off-topic request for proofreading. Thanks!
    – Sven Yargs
    Commented Jul 29, 2015 at 19:26
  • Kafil Ahmad, I recommend you get started with this site, which should better suit your needs.
    – ZX9
    Commented Jul 30, 2015 at 13:15

3 Answers 3

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Much better would be

I don't want to put myself in a situation where you've placed an order, but I don't have the material.

If you want to be slightly more formal, you might say

I would prefer not to put myself in a situation where you have placed an order, but I do not have sufficient material.

My preferred construction would replace the but for an and, showing even more clearly that placing an order and not having material are happening at the same time:

I don't want to put myself in a situation where you've placed an order and I don't have sufficient material.

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Instead I would use "I don't want to be (alternatively, use create) a situation in which you have placed your order and I don't have the material(s) I need" (this is applicable for near-future and present).

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  • Can I write like this " If you placed order and I would not have material."If you placed order and I would not be able to supply see the lnk pls english247.net/english-grammar-lesson-22-conditional-sentences
    – Kafil Ahmad
    Commented Jul 30, 2015 at 11:07
  • can I use conditional like this
    – Kafil Ahmad
    Commented Jul 30, 2015 at 11:09
  • @KafilAhmad, that doesn't read right... So you placed [an order] is past tense and I would not be able is (future) conditional. You could say if you placed and I was not able to--both past tense. Or if you were to place and I did not have. You could even say, in a different context, I would not be able to supply that if you placed an order.
    – ZX9
    Commented Jul 30, 2015 at 13:13
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First of all I would pray to God you will never have any similar situation in your business. I meant to say you will have enough material to complete your clients' orders. And for now, let me come to the point.

You wrote:"I don't want to put myself in a situation when you Placed me order and I did not have the material."

There are so many other options to say the same thing and everyone has a different way to express their feelings and concern. Let me tell you how I would say the same sentence (being a native-English speaker)

1-I don't want to put myself in a situation where you place an order and I am not able to complete your order or am out of material.

2- I would never put myself in a situation where my clients want to place an order and I am out of stock (material).

In the second sentence I am not targeting or talking to the specific client but I am telling him it's for all clients and it sends him a message that you don't want to break the trust of your clients.

3-I don't want to put myself in a situation where someone places an order and I am not able (or capable) to complete the order on time due to any unexpected issue.

There could be many other possible replacements.

Now let me tell you where you have made the mistakes or what's wrong with your sentence.

You wrote:"I don't want to put myself in a situation when you Placed me order and I did not have the material."

Let me break it in two different parts:

I don't want to put myself in a situation (it's completely fine till now),

when you Placed me order and I did not have the material (it's not a correct way to say because you are using the past simple tense, but you are talking in the present time)

We can replace them:"When you Place me an order (the present simple tense)" and I did not have the material (and I don't have the material (if you want to clear the air more then you can add this part) to complete the order)

In simple words you have used the past simple tense to describe a present situation, which you should have written in any present tense (which makes sense) and trust me your mistake is a minor mistake and I am sure you will improve it soon!

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  • I used past tense because I am imagining, studied herehttp://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/en/english-grammar/verbs/wishes-and-hypotheses
    – Kafil Ahmad
    Commented Jul 30, 2015 at 10:39

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