Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 15 · 2026-11-10

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

In many countries, paying for things using mobile phone (cellphone) apps is becoming increasingly common. Does this development have more advantages or more disadvantages?

Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience.

Student answer (Band 5.5)

Paying using your mobile phone is very common nowadays. It gives us hassle free transaction with just a click of your thumb. It lessens the time you need for paying instead of falling in lines. Additionally, you can do shopping on your mobile phones and pay it instantly as well. However, you are at risk for cyber security. Your personal and bank details has a tendency of hacking.

Because of the continuous technology advancement, shop owners made shopping effortless for everyone. From clothings, bags, shoes even the daily commodities, now are available at online shopping since you can do online shopping so as the payment. To alleviate the hassle of spending time going to mall and walk for long hours just to find and purchase the things that you need or wanted followed by a long queue before successfully paying your items.

Although comfort being the major advantage of paying using mobil phones. There are also major risks that arises by using it. One of these is the tendency to hack your personal details along with your bank information. Which is the usual cases that is happening nowadays. Theft is becoming more easy to do using technology with out tracing the real culprit. Even if you are from another country you could do hacking effortlesly. You have to be vigilant to all website that you are doing the payment transaction to avoid risk of cyber security.

With all the advantages and disadvantages of paying using mobile phones, I believe we as a user should be remain vigilant when we are paying using our mobiles phone to avoid cyber security risk and to protect ourselfs from the people who tend to do harm. We can still enjoy our online shopping at home without the hassle of going out and paying on a long queue for as long as we check the legitimacy of the website that you are using.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.5

The response addresses both sides of the question by describing convenience and speed as advantages, then identifying cybercrime and the theft of personal or banking details as disadvantages. Your final paragraph also gives a position: users should remain vigilant, while still enjoying mobile shopping. However, the answer does not clearly decide whether the advantages or disadvantages are greater; the conclusion mainly recommends caution rather than directly weighing the two sides. Several points are repeated, and the risks are asserted more than explained—for example, the claim that theft is easier through technology would be stronger with a specific example or explanation of how this affects users. State your comparative judgement clearly and develop each main reason with relevant support.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 6.0

The response has an overall structure, moving from an introduction to advantages, disadvantages and a concluding paragraph. Linking expressions such as “Additionally,” “However,” and “Although” help signal relationships between ideas. The main progression is understandable, but some connections are awkward or unclear. The second paragraph is a long, incomplete construction beginning “From clothings, bags, shoes…” and does not clearly connect its list to a complete main clause. The opening also previews both sides, while later paragraphs repeat similar points about convenience and cyber risk. Use clearer topic sentences, divide the long sentence into complete statements, and ensure each paragraph develops one distinct point. This would make the organisation more consistently easy to follow.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.5

You use relevant vocabulary for the topic, including “transaction,” “cyber security,” “bank information,” “legitimacy,” and “vigilant.” These choices make the main subject clear, and there is some attempt to use more specific language than basic everyday terms. However, several expressions are inaccurate or unnatural, such as “falling in lines,” “a tendency of hacking,” and “hacking effortlesly.” Some wording is also repetitive, particularly “paying using mobile phones” and “online shopping.” Spelling and word-form errors, including “clothings,” “mobil,” and “ourselfs,” reduce precision. Build a more reliable range of collocations for payments and online security, and check spelling and word forms so that your meaning is expressed naturally.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.5

You attempt both simple and more complex sentence forms, including a conditional structure in “for as long as we check the legitimacy of the website” and a contrast introduced by “Although.” The overall meaning is usually recoverable, but errors occur in sentence formation, agreement, articles and verb patterns. For example, “Your personal and bank details has” should use a plural verb, while “Although comfort being the major advantage…” is not a complete, correctly formed clause. “Which is the usual cases” is also an incomplete sentence with faulty agreement. The long construction in the second paragraph makes the grammatical relationships difficult to follow. Practise writing complete clauses and checking subject–verb agreement, then use complex structures only when their parts are clearly connected.

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