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 let a friend stay at your apartment while you were away on a trip. When you returned home, you discovered that a valuable possession was broken.

Write a letter to your friend. In your letter
• describe the broken possession.
• explain why it is important to you.
• explain what you would like your friend to do.

You do NOT need to write any addresses.

Begin your letter as follows:

Dear _________,

Student answer (Band 5.5)

Dear Bani,

I hope you are doing great. i am glad you stayed at my home for a week. i am writing this letter to let you know that when i came back to home i see my laptop was broken and its not turn on.

my laptop is vital for me you know i am working as a ios developer in IT company and this laptop is given my company. when i leave the company i need to return the pc to them as a it otherwise i need to pay the amount of that system which i cant afford because it's a mac system and its cost around 2 lac.

i request you please repair my laptop or provide me the cost that i need to fix it. i hope you can understand my condition.

best wishes

joy

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.5

The response covers all three bullet points required in the prompt: you described the broken possession (your company laptop that will not turn on), explained why it is important (it is a Mac system used for your work as an iOS developer, costing around 2 lac), and explained what you would like your friend to do (repair it or cover the cost). The tone is appropriately semi-formal for a letter to a friend. However, the length requirement has not been met, as the response contains only 140 words, falling short of the 150-word minimum. This under-length aspect negatively affects the task achievement score.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 6.0

The letter maintains a clear purpose throughout, and the progression of ideas is generally easy to follow. You start with greetings and the bad news, move on to the importance of the laptop and your company policy, and conclude with a direct request. Paragraphing is used to separate these distinct ideas. However, cohesion is limited and occasionally mechanical. Furthermore, the lack of capitalisation for pronouns like 'i' and the missing punctuation marks (such as commas and full stops) make the logical transitions between sentences feel slightly disjointed.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.5

The vocabulary used is adequate to convey the message, featuring some job-related terms such as 'ios developer', 'IT company', and 'mac system'. However, the lexical range is somewhat limited and repetitive. There are also notable inaccuracies in word choice and phrasing, such as 'when i came back to home i see my laptop was broken and its not turn on' instead of 'turned on', and informal expressions like 'cost around 2 lac'. These errors and the restricted vocabulary prevent the response from reaching a higher band.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0

You attempted a mix of simple and complex sentence forms, such as conditional and relative clauses ('when i leave the company i need to return the pc to them as a it otherwise i need to pay...'). However, grammatical accuracy is weak. There are persistent punctuation and capitalization errors throughout the text, notably the consistent failure to capitalize the pronoun 'I' ('i am glad', 'i am writing'). Additionally, there are run-on sentences and tense inconsistencies ('when i leave' instead of 'when I leave' or 'when I left'), which cause some distraction for the reader.

See this exact question answered at other band scores. The same prompt compared across bands.

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