ha vs hai

Maxie

Maxie

Ciao

Ha scritto sopra il suo name

How come it is  “ha not hai” if in the translation it has “You” in brackets. All these idiosyncrisies drive me a little crazy. I guess  English is the same. 

Sebongela

NicholasL23

NicholasL23

“Hai" is the conjugation for Tu, the informal “you”. 

“Ha” is the conjugation for lui/lei/Lei, which is “he”, “she” or the formal “You”.

In the example you gave, “ha scritto sopra il suo nome”, the “ha” refers to he/she (the person writing his or her name). It could also be translated as “You (formal) wrote above his name”, which might explain the (you). 

 

The full example that I think you're using is “Ha scritto sopra il Suo nome e i Suoi dati?” 

This is a customer service person politely asking a customer if he wrote his  name and information on the luggage. “Ha” and “il Suo”/"i Suoi" are all used because the person speaking is using polite, formal language.

caterina-rocket-italian-tutor

caterina-rocket-italian-tutor

Hi Sebongela, 

Thanks for your question! I wish I could add more on top of what Nicholas already stated...but I couldn't! :) 

As Nicholas mentioned, the sentence “Ha scritto sopra il Suo nome e i Suoi dati?” was using the formal/polite form (hence it's translated as You but conjugated as she/he).

Let me know if you have further questions, I'll be happy to help!

 

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