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Carol Rowles wondered: <<We are creating a form to be used to give
leads (potential customers, not actual customers yet) to loan officers.
We want to call it the Disburse/Disperse form. Which is correct.>>
Neither is correct, though disburse comes close. When you "disburse"
something, you hand it out and distribute it, and the word is most
commonly used for money; the word comes from the Latin for "out of your
bag (i.e., your purse)". In contrast, "disperse" means to spread out or
decrease the concentration of something; if you disperse a crowd, you
make them go their separate ways.
The simplest thing to do is name the form based on what the reader
hopes to accomplish with it. For example, give it a title "Contact
information for potential loan applicants", then refer to it in verbal
shorthand as the "Contact" form. See the basic approach? The first word
(contact) is a verb that tells the reader what they'll do with the
form; the rest of the title explains the contents of the form that will
support that activity and the context.
If the form also contains instructions on how to use the information on
the form, you could also try a name such as "Contracting potential loan
applicants". This focuses more on the activity (contacting), but is a
little more awkward to refer to; "the contacting form" sounds a bit
odd, whereas "the contact form" doesn't use the same verb form (contact
vs contacting) used in the title and is thus a bit more obscure.
--Geoff Hart ghart -at- videotron -dot- ca
(try geoffhart -at- mac -dot- com if you don't get a reply)
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