¿Has estado aquí antes?

Question

My husband often has to ask this and we aren't sure how to say it in a way that would be understood, regardless of which Spanish speaking country they are from;

He wants to ask: Have you been here before? (speaking of our home or office)

So it it:

¿Has estado aquí antes?

& is there a formal and informal way to say it?

Thanks,

Rachel

Answer 1

That is the informal way of saying it. If you want the formal it would be ¿Has estado aquí ante?

Not really: "antes" is an adverb, and "ante" is normally either a preposition or a noun in most places ("ante" as an adverb is obsolete). You better not say "ante" here, it wouldn't make sense to most people.

Informally: "¿Has estado (tú) aquí antes?" To make it formal: "¿Ha estado (usted) aquí antes?"

So in these 2 ways to say it, the only thing that makes it formal is dropping the s on Has? - RachelC, AGO 8, 2009

Answer 2

answer:

No. There are two obvious possibilities: "Are you the person who spoke before?" = "¿Eres (es usted) la persona que hablaste (habló) antes?" or Are you the person/one to whom I spoke before/earlier? = "Eres (es usted) la persona con quien hablé antes?"

samdie Aug 8, 2009 4:21 PM.

I copied the above from my email and re-posted Samdie's answer which I accidentally deleted when I tried to edit a comment on that answer. So I am re-posting his/her answer. Sorry bout that. Rachel

So the above is pretty much word for word translation. You can't always translate that way tho can you? thanks - RachelC, AGO 8, 2009

was this posted in the correct thread? - 0074b507, AGO 8, 2009

It was in a different thread (I don't remember what the title was). - samdie, AGO 9, 2009

Aparently you didn't really delete the post. It's still in the original thread. - samdie, AGO 9, 2009

Answer 3

oops. I wanted to edit a comment I made and I think I deleted the previous posters question. This new way of posting is somewhat awkward and clumsy. Sorry to sound critical but you shouldn't be able to delete people's post should you?

Rachel

Answer 4

That is the informal way of saying it. If you want the formal it would be ¿Has estado aquí ante?

You accidentally rewrote her sentence again. Has should be ha. - Fredbong, AGO 8, 2009

Or, maybe antes = ante changed the meaning? - Fredbong, AGO 8, 2009