Question

Neither the manager nor the Cashier were able to report on the Company's progress.

• A. Neither the manager nor the Cashier were able to
• B. Neither the manager or the Cashier were able to
• C. Neither the manager nor the Cashier could able to
• D. Neither the manager nor the Cashier will able to
• E. Neither the manager nor the Cashier was able to

Hint:

With "neither...nor," make the verb agree with the nearer subject.

Answer 1

Answer: (E)

Step 1: Identify the subject structure.
The sentence uses the correlative pair "Neither...nor" to join two subjects: "the manager" and "the Cashier."

Step 2: Apply the agreement rule.
When a sentence begins with "Neither...nor" joining two singular nouns, the verb must be singular and it should agree with the subject nearer to it, which here is "the Cashier" (singular). The original sentence uses "were," a plural verb, which is incorrect.

Step 3: Find the correct verb form.
The verb should be changed from "were" to "was" to agree with the singular subject "the Cashier": "Neither the manager nor the Cashier was able to."

Step 4: Check the other options.
Option (a) repeats the plural verb error. Option (b) wrongly replaces "nor" with "or," which breaks the correlative pair "neither...nor," and it also keeps "were." Option (c) uses "could able to," which is redundant and ungrammatical, since "could" already expresses ability and does not need "able to" after it. Option (d) makes the same redundancy mistake with "will able to" and additionally shifts the sentence into future tense without reason. Only option (e) corrects the verb to "was" while keeping the sentence structure otherwise intact.

Step 5: Conclude.
The correct choice is "Neither the manager nor the Cashier was able to," option (e).