Lance Corporal Abbreviation

Not entirely sure on what the abbreviation of Lance Corporal is - is it ‘LCpl’ or ‘L/Cpl’? Have seen discrepancies in sources.

Typically we just use LCpl. The ‘/‘ tends to be an Army thing.
Cdt, LCpl, Cpl, Sgt, FS and CWO are the RAFAC Cadet abbreviations!

SMS uses L/Cpl - just to throw a spanner in the works. I tend to switch between the two with no real reason.

What we need is a modern Gunner… Preferably someone between the rank of Lance Corporal and Warrant Officer inclusive so that we can be fairly certain that they’ve got it right :stuck_out_tongue:

Gunners write it down as L/Bdr…

LCpl
Cpl
Sgt
FS
WO

Only when people don’t know better. LCpl is the abbreviation. There are no Army ranks with a slash in them.

I always laugh when people write “L/Cpl” and “C/Sgt” but then write “CSM”/“WO2”. Surely that should be “C/S/M” or “W/O/2” if you are going to do that sort of thing?

2 Likes

Heck, people still get confused by Fg Off vs F/O; Sqn Ldr vs S/L and FS/ Flt Sgt…

We’re years away from getting this stuff right across the board.
Thankfully, I have yet to see anything like W/Off…

Though F/O, S/L etc go back at least to WW2 (you’ll see them on lots of official documents) and are common still in things like warning in/out books.

That is true; but they’re not correct anymore, nor have they been for a long time.

seems the question has been answered but for me without the above i would go

LCpl

I choose to apply the following approach

Officers are abbreviated as such
ABC DEF

ie Flt lt, or Sqn Ldr - Officers always have two parts to their title and so abrviation is a shortening of both

While the “ranks” are always

ABC

ie Cpl, FS WO - these may or may not be two parts (Corporal and Sergeant Vs Flight Sergeant and Warrant officer) but are always abbreviated into a single group of letters and never with a /.

this works neatly across the RAF ranks too, LAC, SAC etc (rather than L/AC, Lg AC or other style!)

Flight Sergeant is the one I see most variations
FS
F/S
F/Sgt
Flt Sgt
but applying the approach above only one is correct

there are of course exceptions
Chf Tech and OCdt two which come to mind which are the opposite of this approach!

I disagree with Chief as that is generally abbreviated to CT within our sphere of work. And the only people who seem to write it as Chf Tech are those in non engineering trades who get very confused by the rank as a whole.

OCdt is a wierd one because it isn’t technically an officer rank. Nor is it enlisted. So doesn’t break the double word officer rule :wink:

I had wondered that, but I think you’re applying far too much logic logic to things!

Consider the upper echelons of the officer ranks - AVM and ACM for example, which would appear to follow your OR’s system. I don’t think that there’s any actual rhyme or reason to how it’s done.

agree but in my experience i only meet up to Grp Capt and wouldn’t need to consider AVMs often enough.

certainly it is not a fixed rule, but a quick best guess for the Cadets to consider as a starting block to work from

Gp Capt :wink:

2 Likes

Acting Pilot Officer? I’ve seen both APO and A/Plt Off

1 Like

That’s maybe because they are new to cadet forces. The UAS uses APO.

I appreciate that, just another one that is written multiple ways. I use APO as the UAS does but I’ve had a letter from HQRAFAC that used both in the same letter! Made me giggle, but in sure I’ve used both LCpl and L/Cpl in the same email

PO is Petty Officer APO is Acting Petty Officer

Grrrrrrr

1 Like

That would be a promotion! :wink: