We use the past perfect simple to talk about what happened before a point in the past. It looks back from a point in the past to further in the past.

· I hadn't known the bad news when I spoke to him.

· I checked with the supplier and they still hadn't received the contract.

· She had already told him before I got a chance to give him my version.

· The company has started the year well but was badly hit by the postal strike.

The past perfect simple is often used when we report what people had said/thought/believed.

· He told me they had already paid the bill.

· He said he believed that John had moved to Italy.

· I thought we had already decided on a name for this product.