Log inSign up

À cause de la confusion, vous aviez raté le rendez-vous.

À cause de la confusion, vous aviez raté le rendez-vous.
Because of the confusion, you had missed the appointment.
From Lesson 172:The pluperfect tense formation (j'avais fait)·French

Questions & Answers about À cause de la confusion, vous aviez raté le rendez-vous.

Why is it aviez raté instead of avez raté?
Aviez raté is the plus-que-parfait (pluperfect) tense, meaning "had missed". It is formed by using the imperfect tense of the helping verb avoir (vous aviez) plus the past participle of the main verb (raté). If you used the passé composé (vous avez raté), it would mean "you missed". The plus-que-parfait is used here to emphasize that this happened before another event in the past.
Why does this sentence use À cause de instead of Parce que for "because"?
Parce que must be followed by a full subject and verb (for example, parce qu'il y avait de la confusion). À cause de is a preposition used directly before a noun (in this case, la confusion). They both relate to "because", but you must use à cause de when pointing to a noun as the reason.
Could I say grâce à la confusion instead?
No, because grâce à (thanks to) is used only when the cause leads to a positive outcome. Since missing an appointment is a negative result, you must use à cause de (because of / due to), which is used for negative or neutral causes.
Can I use manqué instead of raté for "missed" here?
Yes! Both rater and manquer can mean "to miss" an event, a train, or an appointment. Rater is very common in everyday spoken French, while manquer is a bit more formal. You could perfectly well say vous aviez manqué le rendez-vous.

Learn À cause de la confusion, vous aviez raté le rendez-vous and more in French

All course content and exercises are completely free — no paywalls, no trial periods, no signup needed.

  • ✓ Practice with interactive exercises
  • ✓ Track your progress with spaced repetition
  • ✓Learn at your own pace — completely free
Start learning French →