Even though it was not illegal for the bank to share

by **Luci** Sun Aug 05, 2007 7:09 pm

I also got this one right, but had many doubts between A and B. Here I chose at random

Can anyone explain why A is the correct option?

Thanks

by **dbernst** Tue Aug 07, 2007 9:56 am

Luci, the primary distinction between choices A and B is idiomatic. Choice B uses the unidiomatic failure of honoring rather than the idiomatic failure to honor.

-Dan

by **dr_o** Mon Feb 04, 2008 5:42 pm

can anyone please explain why E is wrong?
Thanks

by **RonPurewal** Fri Feb 08, 2008 5:30 am

dr_o Wrote:can anyone please explain why E is wrong?
Thanks

two things:
(1) incorrect idiom: 'promise of keeping' is wrong. the correct form is 'promise to keep'.
(2) change in meaning: the correct meaning is what appears in the original sentence, namely, that the failure to honor promises WAS the deceptive business practice. choice e, with its use of 'because', implies that the failure to keep promises LED TO (other) deceptive business practices. remember that you have to interpret words like 'because' very, very literally.

by **Sputnik** Fri Jul 11, 2008 2:10 am

Even though it was not illegal for the bank to share its customers' personal and financial information with an outside marketing company in return for a commission on sales, the state's attorney general accused the bank of engaging in deceptive business practices by failing to honor its promise to its customers to keep records private.
A. by failing to honor its promise to its customers to keep
B. by its failure of honoring its promise to its customers to keep
C. in its failing to honor its promise to its customers of keeping
D. because of its failure in honoring its promise to its customers in keeping
E. because of its failure to honor its promise to its customers of keeping

Hi Ron...

isnt by failing to honor ... ambiguous in A ...

doesn't it apply to the subject -- attorney accused X by doing something ???

by **eyunni** Thu Aug 28, 2008 1:14 pm

Same question as stated above. I interpreted it exactly like it is stated above: Attorney accused X by doing Y.

For (E), I interpreted it as: Attorney accused the bank[of...] because of its failure to honor its promise to its customers of keeping

failure of bank led to ---> accusation by attorney.

What is wrong with this interpretation? 'because' is used correctly here.

by **RonPurewal** Fri Oct 03, 2008 4:54 am

eyunni Wrote:Same question as stated above. I interpreted it exactly like it is stated above: Attorney accused X by doing Y.

For (E), I interpreted it as: Attorney accused the bank[of...] because of its failure to honor its promise to its customers of keeping

failure of bank led to ---> accusation by attorney.

What is wrong with this interpretation? 'because' is used correctly here.

first, see above: "promise of keeping" is wrong. i know that idiom errors are annoying because they aren't systematic, but you still have to know them.
second, "because of its failure to honor its promise to its customers of..." - ugh, 3-4 prepositional phrases in a row. that's just horrible, and awful, and wordy. it's just disgusting.
if you're a native speaker of english, you should be viscerally repulsed by the appearance of this sentence; it's just terribly wordy.
awful.
if you're not a native speaker, you should do the following: one day, do nothing except read through the correct answers to a bunch of sentence correction problems.
take note of the types of writing that DO appear, and those that DON'T appear, in those correct answers. in particular, you'll notice that ugly and wordy patterns, such as the "stacked" prepositional phrases that appear here, are never correct ... because they're just awful.
but do note that they'll usually be combined with some other fatal error, such as the idiomatic usage error mentioned above.

--

by **RonPurewal** Fri Oct 03, 2008 4:56 am

Sputnik Wrote:isnt by failing to honor ... ambiguous in A ...

doesn't it apply to the subject -- attorney accused X by doing something ???

the BEST answer to this question is:
"no, it's not ambiguous. they make the rules, and they say it isn't ambiguous; therefore, it isn't ambiguous."

but:
i would say it's unambiguous because "failing to honor its promise" can only possibly refer to the bank, not the attorney. the attorney can't honor the bank's promise (only the bank can honor the bank's promise), and the pronoun "it" of course can't refer to the attorney.
although a lot of attorneys aren't fully human. heh heh.

by **dir1118** Wed Sep 14, 2011 11:04 am

Hi Ron,

My question is why C is wrong, it seems C meet the both idiom,
failure to.. and promise to...
'its' refer to the bank

by **saptadeepc** Sat Sep 17, 2011 9:03 pm

dir1118 Wrote:Hi Ron,

My question is why C is wrong, it seems C meet the both idiom,
failure to.. and promise to...
'its' refer to the bank

Ron has given a beautiful explanation of the difference between BY VERBing and in VERBing here

the-organic-food-industry-t6929.html

It may help you

by **RonPurewal** Thu Oct 06, 2011 7:03 am

saptadeepc Wrote:
dir1118 Wrote:Hi Ron,

My question is why C is wrong, it seems C meet the both idiom,
failure to.. and promise to...
'its' refer to the bank

Ron has given a beautiful explanation of the difference between BY VERBing and in VERBing here

the-organic-food-industry-t6929.html

It may help you

nice, thank you.

by **davetzulin** Sun May 27, 2012 11:59 pm

RonPurewal Wrote:
Sputnik Wrote:isnt by failing to honor ... ambiguous in A ...

doesn't it apply to the subject -- attorney accused X by doing something ???

the BEST answer to this question is:
"no, it's not ambiguous. they make the rules, and they say it isn't ambiguous; therefore, it isn't ambiguous."

but:
i would say it's unambiguous because "failing to honor its promise" can only possibly refer to the bank, not the attorney. the attorney can't honor the bank's promise (only the bank can honor the bank's promise), and the pronoun "it" of course can't refer to the attorney.
although a lot of attorneys aren't fully human. heh heh.

this problem really shook what i knew fundamentally...

I, like the other two people, thought that "by honoring" was incorrectly referring to attorney. So if it isn't, then what is that prepositional phrase modifying?

"by honoring" can't modify the previous noun, so it must be modifying some verb. the only verb has as its "do-er" the attorney.

really lost here...

by **tim** Sun Jun 17, 2012 11:28 pm

"by failing" modifies "engaging". i don't like it either, but again, the GMAT makes the rules.. :)

by **aseem03** Sat Jun 23, 2012 5:00 am

RonPurewal Wrote:
eyunni Wrote:Same question as stated above. I interpreted it exactly like it is stated above: Attorney accused X by doing Y.

For (E), I interpreted it as: Attorney accused the bank[of...] because of its failure to honor its promise to its customers of keeping

failure of bank led to ---> accusation by attorney.

What is wrong with this interpretation? 'because' is used correctly here.

first, see above: "promise of keeping" is wrong. i know that idiom errors are annoying because they aren't systematic, but you still have to know them.
second, "because of its failure to honor its promise to its customers of..." - ugh, 3-4 prepositional phrases in a row. that's just horrible, and awful, and wordy. it's just disgusting.
if you're a native speaker of english, you should be viscerally repulsed by the appearance of this sentence; it's just terribly wordy.
awful.
if you're not a native speaker, you should do the following: one day, do nothing except read through the correct answers to a bunch of sentence correction problems.
take note of the types of writing that DO appear, and those that DON'T appear, in those correct answers. in particular, you'll notice that ugly and wordy patterns, such as the "stacked" prepositional phrases that appear here, are never correct ... because they're just awful.
but do note that they'll usually be combined with some other fatal error, such as the idiomatic usage error mentioned above.

--

Could u pls explain why "promise of keeping" is an incorrect idiom.
Acc to Manhattan SC notes ,
promise of (something)
and promise to (do something)...both are correct..
In this question the first case is being used..

by **RonPurewal** Tue Jul 03, 2012 5:50 am

aseem03 Wrote:Could u pls explain why "promise of keeping" is an incorrect idiom.

there's not really a "why" with idioms. in fact, that's what the word idiomatic actually means: if you trace the word back to its greek roots, it actually means something like "explanation/origin unknown".

Acc to Manhattan SC notes ,
promise of (something)
and promise to (do something)...both are correct..
In this question the first case is being used..

you should only use "promise of..." if it's followed by a noun. like, an actual noun, not an -ing form.

take heart, though, for this kind of thing is being tested less and less as the gmat evolves. in fact, you can be fairly certain that this kind of thing basically isn't going to be tested anymore, per what gmac has written in many recent communications.