Comfort letters (also called letters of awareness, letters of support, letters of responsibility and letters of patronage) are a hybrid between a guarantee and making no commitments at all. Comfort letters are often given by a parent company to a lender in relation to a credit facility being granted by the lender to the parent’s subsidiary. They are usually used where the issuer is unable or unwilling to give a guarantee, but wishes to give some comfort to the lender. The purpose is to give some comfort to the recipient of the letter by specifying certain moral or legal consequences or commitments. There are several circumstances where the issuer of a comfort letter is unable to give a full guarantee, for example where there are restrictions in its constitution or in other contracts, or because of regulatory grounds.

The law provides protection to employers against competitive activities of employees and ex-employees by the use of confidentiality clauses and restrictive covenants in employment contracts.