hi Alan !!
Can you explain the meaning of this sentence please?
Test No. [color=blue]incompl/elem-5 “Finish/End”, question 8
You could tell the time by him because he always … work at exactly the same time every day.
(a) ends
(b) ended
(c) finish
(d) finished
Test No. [color=blue]incompl/elem-5 “Finish/End”, answer 8
You could tell the time by him because he always finished work at exactly the same time every day.
Correct answer: (d) finished
Thank you in advance Iza
Hi,
This means that you knew exactly what the time was because he stopped work at the same time every day - in other words when you saw him stop work then you knew it must be for example 5.30.
Alan
Thank You very much Alan :-).
It might be because of the fact that in this sentece the modal auxiliary verb “could” is used thus indicating past tense.
Dear Alin:
I’m new in this forum and this is the first question I ask becuause I was confused when correct answer was finished! “he always” in the present , so, why did we choose “finished” which is a verb in the past…?
Thanx in advance, wish you a nice day…
Niveen
Hi everybody
Yes, the word ‘always’ is very often found in a present tense sentence. But it can also be used with other tenses.
As Rich7 mentioned, the word ‘could’ is also the past tense of ‘can’.
For example, maybe we’re talking about someone who worked in our company in the past. He retired last year, so he’s not here (in the company) now. In that case, you can talk about what he always did every day when he worked here. And that would all be in the past.
Does that help?
Amy
Dear Amy:
your answer is very helpful, I’m now convinced, Thank You…
All the Best,
Niveen.
Hi Torsten and the all forum mates,
I did the test and I got 6 right out of 10. I couldn’t understand the rule for number 8. It is past simple withouth specific point in time, rsrs, why?
Once again the lessons are very useful because we keep learning without going to school.
See you,
Aurora
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Dear Alan,
Thank you for the clear explanation.
Aurora
Hi all, I too have a question.
The word “could” doesn’t neccessarily indicate events in past, is that right? I often found in conversations with native speakers that it rather indicated the probability of something. That is “could” could be used in a situation that contains some uncertainty, and “can” expresses a higher probability of the event.
Hi everybody,
I have the same question as that of Kzie. Is there anyone can explain it for us? How to recognize when “could” refer to probability or the past tense form of “can”?
ou could tell the time by him because he always finish work at exactly the same time every day
Hi Sajjad Pasha,
You keep posting this comment but I’m not sure what point you are trying to make.
Alan
I still confused about it, so I try to imagine the situation by making this short conversation.
A: Still remember Jack?
B: Of course, who can forget that guy! You could even tell me the time to go home by him.
A: Yeah, he always finished work at exactly the same time everyday.
Is it right? Is that what you mean? Thanks b4
You could tell the time by him because he always … work at exactly the same time every day. What does,by him’’ mean in this sentence?
Hi Saneta,
‘By him’ suggests ‘by watching him’ because when you see him, you know what the time is. It’s similar in construction to 'telling the time by the sun - when the sun shines on a particular point on a sun dial.
Hope that helps
Alan
“You could tell the time by him because he always finished work at exactly the same time every day.”
i did not understand the sentence. can we tell time by someone?
Hi Alan,
I understand the sense of the sentence I mean, why “by him” and so on, but I still don’t catch, why the correct answer is finished - past simple and not present simple. Is the explanation of Yankee right in this case. Can’t be both answers correct in that case, if someone mean that this sentence relate to the present?
On the other hand, if we use present simple, then the correct form of the verb might be “finishes” and probably therefore the correct answer here is “finished”. I think that’s the main reason here and not “could” or something else.
Am I right?
Yes, very helpful 
thanks for your explanation