Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer
Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Barron's Writing · 2026-09-27
IELTS Writing Task 1 question
You are planning a business trip to another city. You will have some free time to do some sightseeing while you are there.
Write a letter to a friend who lives in the city you will visit. In your letter:
• explain the purpose of the trip.
• ask about things to do and see in the city.
• invite your friend to do something with you during your visit.You do NOT need to write any addresses.
Begin your letter as follows:
Dear ____
Student answer (Band 5.5)
Dear Puru, I am planning a business trip to your city, I had decided to visit many places. I am coming with my manager for business purpose. I might not have much time to visit many places but you have to come and guide me. I am much interested to see different kind of views, places and quite excited to see and meet people living there. It will be my first business trip so i am feeling little nervous, after i arrived there you have to give me and give full good company otherwise i will get monotonous. Our team is not familier about that city so i request you to guide properly so that we can enjoy our trip perfectly. Also, When you get chance to visit our city let us know. We will help you as much as we can. So, Lets meet after 5 days in your city. Thankyou
AI examiner evaluation
| Criterion | Band |
|---|---|
| Task Achievement / Task Response | 5.5 |
| Coherence and Cohesion | 5.5 |
| Lexical Resource | 5.5 |
| Grammatical Range and Accuracy | 5.0 |
| Overall | 5.5 |
Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.5
The response covers all three bullet points required in the task instructions. The student explains the purpose of the trip ("planning a business trip to your city... with my manager for business purpose"), asks about things to do and see ("quite excited to see and meet people living there", though phrased slightly indirectly), and invites the friend to do something ("you have to come and guide me", "Lets meet after 5 days"). However, the tone is overly demanding and direct rather than friendly, which affects the appropriate register for an informal letter. Ideas are presented but remain somewhat underdeveloped and lack smooth transitions. Overall, the task is addressed, placing this comfortably at Band 6.0.
Coherence and Cohesion: Band 5.5
The letter lacks proper paragraphing, presented as a single dense block of text, which significantly hinders the structural flow. While there are basic cohesive devices used such as "after i arrived" and "Also", the overall arrangement feels mechanical and disjointed. Referencing is occasionally unclear, such as the sudden shift to discussing the friend visiting the student's city without smooth contextualization ("When you get chance to visit our city let us know"). The progression of ideas is somewhat abrupt, moving rapidly between purpose, sightseeing, demands for company, and future reciprocity. This lack of clear paragraphing and paragraph progression limits the score to Band 5.5.
Lexical Resource: Band 5.5
The vocabulary used is adequate for the task, but it is basic and repetitive. Examples include common words and phrases like "business trip", "visit many places", and "good company". There are some lexical inaccuracies and awkward collocations, such as "give full good company" instead of keeping me company, and "get monotonous" instead of getting bored. The student attempts to use less common items like "familiar" (spelled "familier"), but spelling and word-choice errors are noticeable. The range is sufficient for basic communication, earning a Band 5.5.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0
The response contains a mix of simple and complex sentence forms, though many sentences suffer from comma splices and run-on structures, such as "I am planning a business trip to your city, I had decided to visit many places." There are frequent grammatical errors, including tense inconsistency ("had decided" instead of have decided), missing articles, and awkward modal usage ("you have to come"). Punctuation and capitalization errors also appear, such as lower-case "i" and missing apostrophes. Although the meaning remains understandable, the density of errors keeps the performance at a Band 5.0 level.
See this exact question answered at other band scores. The same prompt compared across bands.
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