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I am working on the following sentence :

je vous saurais gré des instructions que vous voudriez lui donner à vos services habilités pour que ....

I think there is a problem in it. I propose the first alternative :

je vous saurais gré des instructions que vous voudriez les donner à vos services habilités pour que ....

do I use lui ou les ?

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  • using les doesn't make sense neither – Random Jul 16 '15 at 10:07
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You should remove the lui or les pronoun and say :

je vous saurais gré des instructions que vous voudriez donner à vos services habilités pour que ....

or, more idiomatic in French :

je vous saurais gré de bien vouloir transmettre ces instructions à vos services compétents/habilités pour ...

because "bien vouloir transmettre" matches better the tone of "je vous saurais" expression.

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  • correct, but suppose I want to stick to my sentence do I use lui ou les ? – user1712 Jul 16 '15 at 9:52
  • @OSryx lui or les has not points there, you are already talking about "instructions" and you don't need a pronoun – Yohann V. Jul 16 '15 at 9:54
  • ah I can remove LUI or LES without having problem ? – user1712 Jul 16 '15 at 9:55
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    @OSryx: “Savoir gré de” must be followed by an action or an action-related substantive (something the person can agree with). What is relevant in this context is that the person agrees to the transmission of instructions, not to the instructions themselves). Your original formulation doesn't make sense. – Stéphane Gimenez Jul 16 '15 at 14:40
  • @StéphaneGimenez I took the following clause as a whole : "des instructions que vous voudriez donner" so it looks correct to me. In my mind it was je vous saurais gré + des instructions que vous voudriez donner = je vous saurais gré + de la transmission de ces instructions. Do you think the first formulation I gave is valid? – Yohann V. Jul 17 '15 at 7:17

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