Collins COBUILD Advanced Learner's English Dictionary - service

(services, servicing, serviced) Frequency: The word is one of the 700 most common words in English. Note: For meaning 14, 'services' is both the singular and the plural form. 1. A service is something that the public needs, such as transport, communications facilities, hospitals, or energy supplies, which is provided in a planned and organized way by the government or an official body. Britain still boasts the cheapest postal service... We have started a campaign for better nursery and school services... The authorities have said they will attempt to maintain essential services. N-COUNT: usu with supp 2. You can sometimes refer to an organization or private company as a particular service when it provides something for the public or acts on behalf of the government. ...the BBC World Service. ...Careers Advisory Services. N-COUNT: oft in names 3. If an organization or company provides a particular service, they can do a particular job or a type of work for you. The kitchen maintains a twenty-four hour service and can be contacted via Reception... The larger firm was capable of providing a better range of services. N-COUNT 4. Services are activities such as tourism, banking, and selling things which are part of a country’s economy, but are not concerned with producing or manufacturing goods. Mining rose by 9.1%, manufacturing by 9.4% and services by 4.3%. N-PLURAL 5. The level or standard of service provided by an organization or company is the amount or quality of the work it can do for you. Taking risks is the only way employees can provide effective and efficient customer service... N-UNCOUNT 6. A bus or train service is a route or regular journey that is part of a transport system. A bus service operates between Bolton and Salford. N-COUNT: usu n N 7. Your services are the things that you do or the skills that you use in your job, which other people find useful and are usually willing to pay you for. I have obtained the services of a top photographer to take our pictures... N-PLURAL: with poss 8. If you refer to someone’s service or services to a particular organization or activity, you mean that they have done a lot of work for it or spent a lot of their time on it. You’ve given a lifetime of service to athletics... ...the two policemen, who have a total of 31 years’ service between them... N-UNCOUNT: also N in pl, oft N to n 9. The Services are the army, the navy, and the air force. In June 1945, Britain still had forty-five per cent of its workforce in the Services and munitions industries. N-COUNT: usu pl 10. Service is the work done by people or equipment in the army, navy, or air force, for example during a war. The regiment was recruited from the Highlands specifically for service in India. N-UNCOUNT 11. When you receive service in a restaurant, hotel, or shop, an employee asks you what you want or gives you what you have ordered. A five-course meal including coffee, service and VAT is ?30. N-UNCOUNT 12. A service is a religious ceremony that takes place in a church. After the hour-long service, his body was taken to a cemetery in the south of the city. N-COUNT: also no det 13. A dinner service or a tea service is a complete set of plates, cups, saucers, and other pieces of china. ...a 60-piece dinner service. N-COUNT: usu n N 14. A services is a place beside a motorway where you can buy petrol and other things, or have a meal. (BRIT; in AM, use rest area) They had to pull up, possibly go to a motorway services or somewhere like that... = service station N-COUNT 15. In tennis, badminton, and some other sports, when it is your service, it is your turn to serve. She conceded just three points on her service during the first set. N-COUNT: oft with poss 16. Service is used to describe the parts of a building or structure that are used by the staff who clean, repair, or look after it, and are not usually used by the public. He wheeled the trolley down the corridor and disappeared with it into the service lift. ADJ: ADJ n 17. If you have a vehicle or machine serviced, you arrange for someone to examine, adjust, and clean it so that it will keep working efficiently and safely. I had had my car serviced at the local garage... Make sure that all gas fires and central heating boilers are serviced annually. VERB: have n V-ed, be V-ed, also V n • Service is also a noun. The car needs a service... The company sends a service engineer to fix the disk drive before it fails. N-COUNT: usu sing, oft N n 18. If a country or organization services its debts, it pays the interest on them. Almost a quarter of the country’s export earnings go to service a foreign debt of $29 billion. VERB: V n 19. If someone or something services an organization, a project, or a group of people, they provide it with the things that it needs in order to function properly or effectively. Fossil fuels such as coal, oil and gas will service our needs for some considerable time to come. VERB: V n 20. see also active service, Civil Service, community service, emergency services, in-service, National Health Service, national service, public service, room service 21. To be at the service of a person or organization means to be available to help or be used by that person or organization. The intellectual and moral potential of the world’s culture must be put at the service of politics. PHRASE: PHR n, usu PHR after v 22. You can use ‘at your service’ after your name as a formal way of introducing yourself to someone and saying that you are willing to help them in any way you can. She bowed dramatically. ‘Anastasia Krupnik, at your service,’ she said. CONVENTION c darkgreen]formulae 23. If you do someone a service, you do something that helps or benefits them. You are doing me a great service, and I’m very grateful to you... PHRASE: V inflects 24. If a piece of equipment or type of vehicle is in service, it is being used or is able to be used. If it is out of service, it is not being used, usually because it is not working properly. Cuts in funding have meant that equipment has been kept in service long after it should have been replaced... PHRASE: usu PHR after v, v-link PHR 25. If someone or something is of service to you, they help you or are useful to you. That is, after all, the primary reason we live–to be of service to others. PHRASE: v-link PHR, oft PHR to n