to whom it may concern phrase of concern 1. a formula placed at the beginning of a letter or document when the identity of the reader or readers is unknown. To the appropriate recipient for this message, as in I didn't know who was responsible for these complaints so I just addressed it “to whom it may concern.” This phrase is a formula used in letters, testimonials, and the like when one does not know the name of the proper person to address.

Hi Jamie, We use "whom" as a objective case of pronoun. It means we are emphasising on the person who is going to receive the letter, note or email. Other examples are: 1. To whom did you give your consent? (Who received your permission?) 2. For whom did you prepare this gift? (Who received the gift as a result of your preparation?) Hope this helps. Cheers, Lance

Hi Jamie, We tend to write "To whom it may concern" in letters. Usually, these letters are to an organisation or a group of people where we are not being specific to an individual, but rather to that group. So to give you an example, let's imagine I want to make a complaint to Microsoft and so I have already phoned them and spoke to one of their employees called Michael. I would write a specific letter afterwards and start with "Dear Michael, following our conversation on the phone I would like to thank you for your support" etc. However, let's imagine I never spoke with Michael and I wanted to write a letter to complain to Microsoft, I would say "To whom it may concern, I am not happy with my computer as it is giving me problems" etc. Can you see the difference? So basically, "To whom it may concern" refers to anybody who is reading the letter who may be able to help you, it's generally to whoever it may be relevant to. I hope this has gone some way to making you understand this - and apologies if there has been any confusion. Maybe someone else can also give other examples.

To whom it may concern. 可近翻译成”致对这封信/这件事有关的人“，通常写信的时候会用到。

Thanks for your help :)