Meaning & use
foul up
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Meanings
verbtransitive or intransitiveinformal
To make a mistake or do something badly, often causing confusion or failure.
Grammar: Can be used with an object: 'foul up the schedule' or without: 'everything fouled up'.
Patterns
- foul something up
- foul up something
- foul up
I fouled up the order and sent the wrong size to the customer.
The computer system fouled up again, so we had to write receipts by hand.
nouncountableinformal
A mistake or confused situation, especially one caused by poor organization.
Grammar: As a noun, it is usually written 'foul-up' and is countable: 'a foul-up', 'several foul-ups'.
Patterns
- a foul-up
- a major foul-up
- bureaucratic foul-up
The delay was caused by a foul-up in the booking system.
There were several foul-ups before the concert finally started.
Word forms
| third person singular | fouls up |
|---|---|
| past tense | fouled up |
| past participle | fouled up |
| -ing form | fouling up |
| plural noun | foul-ups |
Common combinations
- foul up the plan
- Bad weather fouled up the plan for a picnic.
- foul things up
- He tried to help but only fouled things up.
- a major foul-up
- The missing tickets were a major foul-up.
Synonyms and how they differ
- mess up
- Very similar and also informal; 'mess up' is more common in everyday speech.
- bungle
- More formal and suggests clumsy handling of a task.
Opposites
Word family
- foul-up noun
- A mistake or confused situation.
Commonly confused: foul up or foul?
foul up vs foul
'Foul' alone can mean bad-smelling or against the rules; 'foul up' is about making a mistake.
Practice
The new software ______ the payroll, so no one was paid on time.
Choose one answer.
'Fouled up' means caused a mistake or failure, which fits the payroll problem. 'Fouled out' means removed from a game, and 'fouled off' and 'fouled in' are not standard phrasal verbs.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “foul up”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.