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Business Abbreviations

Here are twenty abbreviations often used in business. Some people adopt the following rule for punctuation of abbreviations:

  • if last letter of word and abbreviation are the same: no full stop (for example Ltd)
  • if last letter of word and abbreviation are NOT the same: full stop (for example Co.)
1 A.G.M. Annual General Meeting (of company shareholders)
2 A.O.B. any other business (at the end of a meeting agenda)
3 a/c account, as for bank account [eg: a/c no. 123456789]
4 c.i.f. cost, insurance, freight
5 c/o care of [on an envelope e.g: Mrs G Smith, c/o Mrs B Brown]
6 cc: copies to [at the end of a letter eg:
cc: TE, JMR, JSA]
7 Co. Company
8 e.g. for example [from the Latin exempli gratia]
9 E.G.M. Extraordinary General Meeting (of company shareholders)
10 f.o.b. free on board
11 f.o.c. free of charge
12 HQ headquarters (of a company or other organisation)
13 Inc.US Incorporated [after the name of a firm organised as a legal corporation]
14 LtdUK Limited [after the name of a firm organised as a legal company]
15 O.H.P. overhead projector
16 P.A. personal assistant
17 PLCUK Public Limited Company [for a firm whose shares are sold on the open market]
18 p.t.o. please turn over [at the end of a page]
19 v.a.t. value added tax
20 WP word processing (or creation of text by computer)