Four-fermion processes with a particle lost in the beam pipe are studied at
LEP to perform precision tests of the electroweak theory. Leading higher-o
rder QED corrections to such processes are analyzed within the framework of
the structure function (SF) approach. The energy scale entering the QED SF
is determined by inspection of the soft and collinear limit of the O(alpha
) radiative corrections to the four-fermion final states, paying particular
attention to the process of single-W production. Numerical predictions are
shown in realistic situations for LEP experiments and compared with existi
ng results. A Monte Carlo event generator, including Exact tree-level matri
x elements, vacuum polarization, higher-order leading QED corrections and a
nomalous trilinear gauge couplings, is presented.