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Who you call what. The choice that decides your verb endings, your clitics and, in Portugal, whether you have just been rude.
The control text · practical
Bom dia. No dia 12 deste mês, foi debitada da minha conta uma cobrança de R$ 89,90 que eu não reconheço. Cancelei esse serviço em maio e guardei o comprovante. Estou pedindo o estorno do valor e a confirmação, por escrito, de que a assinatura foi encerrada. Se não houver retorno até sexta-feira, vou registrar uma reclamação no Procon. Fico no aguardo.
Where the two part
Brazilian · the base
Você is the neutral default and carries no distance at all. Tu is regional and usually takes a third-person verb in speech. O senhor marks real respect or real hierarchy.
European · the contrast
Tu is the ordinary intimate form with a second-person verb. Você is not neutral — to a stranger it can read as presumptuous or cold — and the safe formal move is the bare third person or o senhor.
10 options
Você pode verificar essa cobrança e me dar um retorno?
The tellSecond-person meaning, third-person verb, no te or ti anywhere near it.
The safe default across all of Brazil, for a stranger and a colleague alike.
In Portugal it is not neutral, so it does not travel.
Podes verificar essa cobrança e dar-me uma resposta?
The tellThe verb ends in -s. That ending is doing all the work; the pronoun is usually dropped.
Correct and unremarkable in Portugal, and required for DAPLE. Also correct in Rio Grande do Sul.
In most of Brazil the full agreement sounds bookish or foreign, even where tu itself is used.
Você pode verificar? — grammatical, and not neutral
The tellNothing on the page marks it. The cost is entirely social.
Worth knowing exactly because it looks like the safe option and is not.
Depending on who you say it to, it reads as talking down, or as keeping someone at arm's length. Avoid until you can hear the difference.
Tu pode verificar isso pra mim?
The tellTu with a você verb. Ungrammatical by the book and completely ordinary in Rio and the North.
If you want to sound like Rio rather than like a course, this is the form that does it.
Marked wrong in every written context in both countries, and unusable in either exam.
BR O senhor poderia verificar essa cobrança?
EU O senhor importa-se de verificar esta cobrança?
The tellA noun phrase used as a pronoun, with a third-person verb.
Unambiguously respectful in both countries, and the right choice for age, office or a first approach to an institution.
It builds distance. Used with someone who expected informality it reads as coldness or sarcasm.
A gente cancelou esse serviço em maio.
The tellSingular verb, plural meaning. A gente is we.
Dominant in spoken Brazilian; nós in conversation can sound formal.
Barred from formal writing, and its singular agreement infects everything downstream — possessives, adjectives, the lot.
Cancelamos esse serviço em maio. — pronoun dropped, ending carries it
The tellA verb ending in -mos, usually with no pronoun in front of it.
Correct everywhere and required in writing. In Portugal it also survives in speech.
In Brazilian conversation it can sound careful, and the -mos ending is where agreement errors cluster.
BR Vocês podem confirmar por escrito?
EU Vocês podem confirmar por escrito?
The tellThe one address form the two countries agree on completely.
Free: the plural is settled, which means only the singular has to be decided.
None, and the absence of a cost is worth noticing — the whole problem is singular.
Vós sabeis — liturgy, oratory, and the far north of Portugal
The tellA verb in -ais or -eis.
Worth recognising in older texts, in scripture and in set phrases, which is where you will actually meet it.
Producing it in modern speech or writing is an error, not an elevation.
BR Solicita-se o estorno do valor e a confirmação por escrito.
EU Solicita-se o reembolso do montante e a confirmação por escrito.
The tellNo pronoun anywhere. The se construction removes the person entirely.
The genuine escape hatch: it sidesteps the whole tu/você problem and is correct in both countries.
It is cold by construction, and used with a person rather than an institution it reads as evasion.