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I've got a pretty strong intuition for what's grammatically correct and what's not. My hunch here is that the following sentence is wrong. Can someone verify this for me, using a syntactical rule to back it up?

A representative will contact you shortly with your username and password. In the course of this contact they will explain the process of application, as well as answer any other questions you may have.

Cerberus - Reinstate Monica
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pulverize
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    That construction is correct. It is indeed a bit unusual, in that as well as is used to connect an elliptic clause, but it is not wrong or even uncommon. – Cerberus - Reinstate Monica Dec 11 '13 at 18:27
  • I agree with Cerberus, but can't explain the rule. – Mynamite Dec 11 '13 at 18:31
  • As I was looking around for something to support my position before posting this question, I saw a couple factoids tying "together with" to "as well as", suggesting their usage would be parallel. Walking through this, "[...] they will explain the process, together with answer any questions [...]" just sounds like nails on a chalkboard. – pulverize Dec 11 '13 at 18:36
  • I think it might be the fact that the second verb's tense is infinitive and the first is (i think) simple future.

    Or at least, the modifier that indicates future tense has been omitted in addition to the subject, which leaves the second half of the sentence feeling rather awkward. You're sure this is an acceptable omission in an elliptical clause?

     – pulverize Dec 11 '13 at 18:40
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    No, they're both infinitives; that's why it's grammatical. Will is not "simple future"; it's a modal auxiliary verb, and all modal auxiliary verbs must be followed by an infinitive form of the next verb; like must+be in the previous clause. The rule that reduces conjoined clauses by removing repeated constituents is called Conjunction Reduction, by the way; and it works with as well as just as well as it works with and, or, or but. – John Lawler Dec 11 '13 at 18:52
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    It all boils down to “They will explain and answer” — which sounds perfectly fine. – tchrist Dec 11 '13 at 19:40
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    Often "a pretty strong intuition" may be helpful, but a good dictionary is better anyway. (ODO) and also; and in addition: a shop that sold books as well as newspapers – Kris Dec 12 '13 at 05:46
  • I believe that you will see everything clearly once you realize that "as well as" can be a conjunction, as @Ledda answered. See also: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/as%20well%20as – Damkerng T. Dec 12 '13 at 08:08

2 Answers2

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This is a perfectly fine construction. "As well as" is a conjunction, and a coordinating one at that. It works just like and.

A representative will contact you shortly with your username and password. In the course of this contact they will [explain the process of application], as well as [answer any other questions you may have].

Here, the conjunction joins the two phrases "explain the process of application", and "answer any other questions you may have" and gives them the same importance syntactically.

The most important thing to remember is that conjunctions can only join two phrases of the same type. If the two phrases that I bracketed were conjugated differently or had different word class types (one was just a noun, the other an adverb) then it would be incorrect.

Ledda
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It’s inappropriate to use that comma after application, but everything else is fine.

tchrist
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Brian
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