Do you pay attention to letters starting out " To whom it may concern?"?

1) Figure out if I’m the person it concerns.
2) If so, read. If not, pass to the person it concerns.

@barumonkey that would make sense, but does the letter ever truly make it to the person intended?

If you are responding to something, use the name or title of the person who signed whatever you are responding to.

@brinibear: Yes. I just gave you my flowchart for how to deal with such letters, which I believe is quite common. If such letters didn’t have their intended effect, I’d expect people would stop writing them like that!

If it’s for a job, I hear it’s much better to personally address it. But I hear lots of stupid things, so don’t take note. But yes, I do read them.

I would start the letter as such:

Dear Sir, Madam or variation therefore upon…

If you are applying for a job, it is always better to find out who will be reading your letter. Barring the ability to do that, I like to steer clear of the ‘To whom it may concern’ even if I replace it with something equally impersonal like ‘Dear Human Resources Officer’.

Yes! I love those kinds of letters.