Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 17 · 2026-07-24

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

In the future, people may no longer be able to pay for things in shops using cash. All payments may have to be made by card or using phones. Do you think this will happen one day? Why do you think some people might not be happy to give up using cash?

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

 

Student answer (Band 5.5)

There has been an upsurge in privately owned vehicles which is the major cause of traffic jams in many parts of the world. It is mainly due to poor public transportation services and limited parking space inside cities. This problem can be mitigated through robust public infrastructure and ample parking space for the commuters.

The major cause of traffic congestion on the roads are due to poor public transportation services. It is mainly due to lack of cleanliness and not being punctual on time, which means public need to deal with foul odour, Additionally, It is important to be on time otherwise office workers, students reach late on their destination. Another reason of traffic jams in cities is limites parking space, which means people have to parked their vehicles on the road, which reduces the lanes of road and it also affects the smooth traffic flow.

To deal with these problems the central government should invest heavily in robusting public services. They need to bring advance sanitation system to improve cleanliness of public transportation and should impose a hefty fines for missing punctuality. The administration should start a campaign to educate people about the problems caused by increased congestion. For instance, In JAPAN the government has increased its spending by three times into public transportation to reduce the traffic jams, after 5 years they find that the public prefer to travel in public transportation due its cleanliness and punctuality.

To conclude, the problems of traffic congestion is mainly due to limited parking space and poor public services , this can be mitigated by increasing parking space and imposing heavy fines those who violate these rules.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 5.5

The response is completely off-topic. The prompt asks about the future of cash payments and why people might be reluctant to abandon cash. However, the essay discusses traffic congestion, private vehicles, and public transportation infrastructure. Because the response fails to address any part of the actual task instructions, it cannot be assessed for task achievement in relation to the prompt. According to IELTS criteria, a response that is completely unrelated to the task must be penalised heavily, as it does not address the requirements of the prompt at all.

Coherence and Cohesion — Band 5.5

The essay is organised into paragraphs, and there is some attempt at logical progression within the context of the topic chosen by the student. Cohesive devices such as 'Additionally', 'Another reason', and 'To conclude' are used, though they are sometimes used mechanically. While the paragraphing is sufficient, the lack of relevance to the actual prompt means the coherence is undermined by the fact that the ideas do not support the task requirements. The flow is logical in its own internal context, but it fails to serve the purpose of the writing task.

Lexical Resource — Band 6.0

The vocabulary is adequate for expressing ideas about traffic and urban planning. There are some attempts at less common vocabulary, such as 'mitigated', 'robust', and 'congestion'. However, there are also errors in word choice and collocation, such as 'robusting public services' (should be 'improving' or 'strengthening') and 'missing punctuality' (should be 'lateness' or 'lack of punctuality'). The range is sufficient to communicate the student's chosen topic, but the lexical control is inconsistent.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 5.5

The student uses a mix of simple and complex sentence structures. There are frequent grammatical errors, such as subject-verb agreement issues ('The major cause... are due to'), incorrect verb forms ('people have to parked'), and punctuation errors. While the meaning is generally clear, these errors are frequent and persist throughout the text. The range of structures is limited, and the control over complex sentences is weak, which prevents the essay from reaching a higher band score.

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