Breakdown of Ele perguntou se a reclamação foi vista pelo assistente.
ser
to be
ele
he
por
through / by / for / because of
perguntar
to ask
Questions & Answers about Ele perguntou se a reclamação foi vista pelo assistente.
How does the word se work in this reported question?
In reported speech, se translates to 'if' or 'whether'. We use it to report yes/no questions. If the original direct question was something like 'Was the complaint seen?' (which has a simple yes or no answer), we use se to connect it to the reporting verb perguntou.
Does se require us to use the subjunctive mood here?
No, it does not! While se triggers the subjunctive in hypothetical 'if' statements (like 'If I were rich...'), in indirect questions where it means 'whether', we just use the normal indicative mood. That is why we see the standard past tense foi here.
Why is the word for 'seen' spelled vista with an 'a' at the end instead of visto?
This sentence uses the passive voice (foi vista = was seen). In the passive voice, the past participle acts like an adjective and must match the gender and number of the subject receiving the action. Since a reclamação (the complaint) is feminine and singular, the participle becomes vista.
Why do we use pelo before assistente?
In a passive sentence, the person actually performing the action is introduced by the preposition por (by). Because assistente is being treated as a masculine noun in this context, por merges with the word o (the) to form the contraction pelo (by the).