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can anyone please explain me is it correct to say "I have lunch at 1 pm". My doubt is if it is correct then how can we use a specific time expression with present perfect tense? If it is wrong to say "I have completed my homework yesterday." which implies specific time expression with present perfect tense. I have doubt in using time expressions with present perfect tense. i will be thankful if any one gives me relevant info.

RAVI VARMA
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    I think you may be directed to English Language Learners but the present tense is used for habitual actions, so I have lunch at 1 pm is perfectly correct but it means usually or every day. I have completed my homework yesterday is incorrect but this is a different tense - the tense of your first sentence is present, not present perfect. – JD2000 Jan 18 '20 at 06:19
  • so "I have eaten lunch at 1 pm". is a correct statement in present perfect tense? – RAVI VARMA Jan 18 '20 at 06:22
  • "I have eaten lunch at 1 pm" is correct? – RAVI VARMA Jan 18 '20 at 06:25
  • I think you're asking the wrong question - it is grammatical but it does not mean I had lunch at 1pm. – JD2000 Jan 18 '20 at 07:05
  • So I have eaten lunch at 1 pm. is grammatically correct – RAVI VARMA Jan 18 '20 at 07:15
  • My only doubt is "at 1 pm" is specific time and can we tag this time frame with present perfect tense or not? if yes please explain. There is a lot of difference in "I have lunch at 1 pm" and "i have eaten lunch at 1 pm" the first one is simple present and second one is Present perfect tense. and my English teacher asked me not use specific time frames with present perfect tense. – RAVI VARMA Jan 18 '20 at 07:21
  • Yes we can, but it doesn't give you the meaning I think you want. If you put I am having lunch at 1 pm in the past, it has to be I had lunch at 1 pm. I think you are misusing these tenses and should start with something simpler. Your teacher will just be trying to introduce things in a logical order. – JD2000 Jan 18 '20 at 07:35
  • These two constructions are very different. The first uses the verb have in a fairly plain meaning. There are two usages this phrasing would work for (1) to have lunch (works for any meal or meal-like sitting), meaning to eat the midday meal; since you use it in the present tense, the meaning would be habitual--you have lunch daily at 1pm or (2) the use of have for schedules, "I have yoga class at 3:00pm". This would be about an upcoming event--you have it now in that it is scheduled now. – Mike Graham Jan 18 '20 at 08:03
  • On the other hand, in "I have completed my homework", have is used as an auxiliary verb, to change the tense. To use the same tense for the lunch example, you would say "I have had lunch." As a matter of usage, it happens that "I have had lunch at 1:00" would not imply you did it today, but imply you did it ever. The simple past tense works better ("I had lunch at 1:00") just as it works best for the homework example ("I completed my homework yesterday"). – Mike Graham Jan 18 '20 at 08:05
  • again you confused me. "I have had lunch " is perfectly ok. But "I have had lunch at 1 pm" is incorrect as per me as it is referring specific time in past. I require only a clarification regarding usage of "specific time expression" in present perfect tense as it s not permitted to use such exact time expressions( 1pm,8 am, 6 pm, 5 am) in present perfect tense. – RAVI VARMA Jan 18 '20 at 08:16
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    “I had finished the work on friday” / “I have finished the work” and I didn't phone Peter this morning / I haven't phoned Peter this morning – Mari-Lou A Jan 18 '20 at 08:38
  • What are you trying to say? And in what context? – Hot Licks Jan 18 '20 at 13:45
  • There is no context. I was asked in competitive examination to find out error in sentence "I have eaten lunch at 1 pm" and i marked "at 1 pm" as error as specific time frame has been tagged to a sentence in present perfect tense "I have eaten lunch". Have I identified it correctly or I am wrong? If wrong please clarify me. I will be thankful to you – RAVI VARMA Jan 18 '20 at 14:21
  • There is no error in that sentence but I think the person who has set the exam is thinking of it as an incorrect version of I ate lunch at 1 pm, so I suspect your answer will be marked as correct. You don't seem to have taken on board that it is not grammatically incorrect but does not mean the same as I ate lunch at 1 pm, so it would be wrong IF you used it to mean I ate lunch at 1 pm. That is the situation the person who set the exam must have had in mind. – JD2000 Jan 18 '20 at 15:32
  • You don't have doubts; you have questions. You're copying the usage of doubt from some other language into English in a way that does not apply. You also cannot use explain the way you have: the predicate frame requires that things be explained to you, not that they be explained you, which is ungrammatical. Please visit our sister site for [ell.se]. – tchrist Jan 18 '20 at 15:48

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You could say:

Over the past ten years, I've eaten lunch at 1 pm.

Or even:

Recently, I've been eating lunch at 1 pm.

If it's just about a single past action and you have a finished time phrase, use the past simple:

I had lunch at 1 pm.

If it's habitual, present simple would do:

I have lunch at 1 pm.

And no, we CAN'T use the present perfect with a finished time word:

Wrong: I've seen him yesterday.

Apollonian
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  • So finally the statement "I have eaten lunch at 1 pm" is wrong? – RAVI VARMA Jan 18 '20 at 11:57
  • It can be correct if you look at my first example. The time phrase could be implied. – Apollonian Jan 18 '20 at 12:17
  • There is no context. I was asked in competitive examination to find out error in sentence "I have eaten lunch at 1 pm" and i marked "at 1 pm" as error as specific time frame has been tagged to a sentence in present perfect tense "I have eaten lunch". Have I identified it correctly or I am wrong? If wrong please clarify me. I will be thankful to you – RAVI VARMA Jan 18 '20 at 14:18
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    @RAVIVARMA I have eaten lunch at 1 p.m. makes sense as a general description of an event that could have taken place once or several times in the past. It's not an error. I have seen him yesterday has the same grammatical form, but while it's arguably syntactically correct, it's semantically incorrect simply because we don't use that specific type of phrase. We might say I am always seeing him the day before I exercise (making use of a habitual previous-day reference), but the specific phrasing of I have seen him yesterday is simply (and perhaps arbitrarily) not used. – Jason Bassford Jan 18 '20 at 15:33
  • @ravivarma in that case, yes. You could have identified the mistake in two ways, pointing to the time phrase or the tense. You went with the former. – Apollonian Jan 18 '20 at 15:59
  • Sorry to say that I could'nt still appreciate your clarification. As a rule in present perfect I followed specific time frame are not to be included (I still think "1 pm" as specific time in past) so I taught better to use simple past "I ate lunch at 1 pm". – RAVI VARMA Jan 18 '20 at 16:03