Everything You Need to Improve Your Writing Skills, Win New Customers, Keep Existing Customers, Strengthen Relationships, Improve Your Company’s Image, and Save Time and Money!
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Our catalog has been extensively revised. It had grown over the years but needed to be coalesced around various topics rather than become a miscellany of reports. So, we’ve created nine “packages” for people who wish to improve their writing, and many of these (but not all) are oriented toward claims professionals.

The aim of each package is to provide a concise array of materials that
helps you get an immediate grasp of a topic.

The Nine packages are:

1. Excellence in Claims Writing

2. Claims Correspondence

3. Claims Writing Issues for Executives

4. The Claims Writer’s Library

5. Testing Your Writing Skills

6. Posters: Reminders On Writing Effectively

7. Skill Building in Claims Writing

8. The Funny Side of Writing

9. Writing Within Special Claims Areas:

A. Auto
B. Homeowners
C. SIU
D. Disability
E. Liability
F. Underwriting
G. Independent Agents, Brokers, and TPAs

Other Services from the Communication Workshop:

Writing Seminars

Low-Cost 90-Minute Webinars

Package 1: Excellence in Claims Writing

Includes, reports, articles and tips on:

1. Letter Writing
2. Guidelines for E-Mail Messages
3. Business Letter Format
4. The Perfect Denial Letter
5. The Claims Professionals Friend – Before and After examples of actual claims letters
6. Seven Steps Toward Better Claims Writing

Package Price: $89 (all prices shown include postage)


Package 2: Claims Correspondence Issues

1 Formatting Policy Language in Denial Letters
2. Tips on Improving Reservation of Rights Letters
3. Expressing Mathematics in Claims Writing
4. Writing Better RE Lines
5. 300 Cliches to Avoid
6. Most Commonly Misused Words and Phrases in Business and Government
7. Salutations and Closings

Package Price: $44


Package 3: Claims Writing Issues for Executives

If you’re a manager, director or vice president of claims, you face special challenges to make sure you and your colleagues write well. These articles address many of these challenges:

A. The Return on Investment (ROI) for Writing Skills Training
B. Updating Form Letters: A Review of 40 Actual Claims Letters
C. Form Letters: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly
D. Improving Tone in Claims Letters
E. Tips on Organizing and Writing Minute Meetings
F. Poor Writing Skills: The Insurance Industry’s One-Billion-Dollar Headache
G. Twenty Tips on Assuring the Success of a Claims Writing Seminar
H. Seven Steps to Creating a Successful Writing Style Guide
I. Careless Writing and Bad Faith Lawsuits
J. Writing Persuasive Memos

Package Price: $119


Package 4: The Claims Writing Library

Here’s your own “mini-Library” of articles aimed at writing specific types of letters. Included are:

A. Replies to State Insurance Commissioners
B. Conquering Claims Writer’s Block
C. Tips on Writing to Plaintiff Attorneys
D. “Dear Claimant”: Tips on Improving Denial Letters
E. Dear Doctor: Tips on Writing Letters to Medical Professionals

Package Price: $24


Package 5: Testing Your Writing Skills

There’s nothing like a test to tell you precisely what your skill level is in a
Particular subject. This package feature numerous tests aimed at improving
All of your writing “muscles” and as a way of assessing your own deficiencies or those within an entire department. Many of these tests are applicable to anyone who writes on the job.

A. The National Claims Writing Test
B. The National Business Writing Test
C. Serial Commas
D. The National Apostrophe Test
E. The National Underlining and Quotation Marks Test
F. A Semicolon is Not a Small Colon
G. The National Subject-Verb Agreement Test
H. How’s Your Grammar?
I. The National Misplaced and Dangling Modifier Test
J. The National Noun-Pronoun Agreement Test


Package Price: $99

Package 6: POSTERS: Reminders on Writing Effectively

Suitable for Bulletin Boards, these 12 8 ½ X 11” 2-color posters and 6 Black and White posters provide instant reminders on key issues in writing.

Two-Color Posters Black and White Posters

• The Apostrophe Old-Fashioned Phrases
• The Comma Eliminating Wordiness
• The Hyphen Key Latin Words and Phrases
• Persuasion at a Glance Yiddish at a Glance
• Punctuation at a Glance Redundancy
• Grammar at a Glance Spanish at a Glance
• Spelling at a Glance
• Stop Sexist Terms
• Tips on Tone
• Hedging
• Capitalization (Package Price: $79 for all the posters)

Package 7: Writing Skill Building for Claims Professionals

A. Breaking up Lengthy Sentences
B. Breaking Up Lengthy Paragraphs
C. Forming Possessives with Singular Nouns Ending in “S”
D. Tips on Organizing Information
E. Using Active Language, Not Passive
F. Guide to Editing and Proofreading
G. Subordination of Ideas
H. Eliminating Wordy Phrases
I. Eliminating Old-Fashioned Phrases

Package Price: $79


Package 8: The Funny Side of Writing

The items in this package will not only make you and your colleagues laugh aloud, they will also serve as dramatic reminders that even small errors can cause lots of embarrassment!

1. Breaking The Rules of Writing
2. The “Cappie” Awards for Poor Claims Writing
3. The 25 Deadliest Words and Phrases in Claims Writing
4. Translating British-isms to “American”
5. The 15 Worst and Funniest Documents We’ve Ever Seen
6. 202 of the Worst Medical Malaprops We’ve Ever Seen
7. The Claims Writer’s Letter – Highlights (2003-2010)


Package Price: $89


Package 9: Improving Writing Within Claims Specialties

Tips, actual letters and critiques drawn from major claims specialties

A. Workers’ Compensation
B. Auto
C. Homeowners
D. Underwriting
E. Life, Health, Disability
F. Commercial
G. Underwriting and Loss Control
H. SIU

Each of the eight topic areas within Package 9 is sold separately for $39; All eight of these mini-packages are available for $169.
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Our Writing Seminars

• Request a free seminar agenda, bio, list of clients, and references.
• Each class includes our pre-course needs assessment, “The Writing Audit,” as well as follow up by phone, fax, and e-mail to make sure people stay trained and practice their skills.

Our one-day onsite writing seminars can be customized to your department’s specific documents and concerns. For example, we can tailor a seminar to
Claims professionals in the following areas:

• Property/Casualty
• Life /Health
• Auto
• General Liability
• Independent Adjustment firms and TPAs
• Governmental Pools
• Workers’ Compensation

For more information, call Gary Blake at (516)767-9590 or e-mail garyblake725@gmail.com
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Our Low-Cost 90-Minute Webinars:
Effective, Live Training Without Leaving Your Desk … at your convenience!

No special software needed.

Register 2 people … or 102 people. We’ll run the webinar on the day and time of your choice.

Includes one month’s follow-up by phone, fax, and e-mail for critiques of future writing samples.

Cost is only $179/person; discounts for multiple webinars available.

Here’s our list of 90-minute webinars:

1. Mastering Denial Letters
2. Mastering Reservation of Rights Letters
3. Answering Claims Complaints
4 Sharpening Auto Claims Writing
5 Improving Workers’ Compensation Letters
6. Improving the Tone of Your Letters
7 Organizing and Wording The Field Claims Reports
8 Writing Best Practices Guidelines
9. Writing a Departmental Style Guide
10. Improving Property Claims Writing
11. Improving Medical malpractice Correspondence
12 Writing Persuasive SIU Letters
13. Fixing Your Form Letters
14. Effective Writing for Support Staff
15. The Eighteen Immutable Laws of Punctuation and Grammar
16. Improving Homeowner Claims Correspondence
17. Improving Letters to Opposing Attorneys and House Counsels
18. Writing Precise Disability Letters
19. Improving Documentation Retention in Claims
20. Avoiding Bad Faith Lawsuits

To schedule a webinar or to receive an agenda for any of these webinars, call Gary Blake at (516) 767-9590 or e-mail garyblake725@gmail.com.


Visit our Web site: www.writingworkshop.com, and sign up for our FREE monthly e-zine: Gary Blake’s Claims Writer’s Letter

The Claims Writer’s Catalog Order Form

Package # Price Check the ones you want
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*Each area within package 9 is sold separately for $39; All 8 of these mini-packages (A-H) are available for $169.
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Total:

( ) Please send me the agenda for the following webinar(s): ______________________________________________

( ) Please send me information about the following seminar: _______________________________________________

Send to:
Name:_______________________Title:_____________Organization:_______________________
E-Mail:___________________
Address:_____________________________
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To receive your catalog order, send check or money order payable to
Gary Blake, Ph.D., and mail to The Communication Workshop, 70A Manor Dr., Great Neck., NY 11020.

Last modified: Dec. 6, 2010.