Band 7.0 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 7.0 · Cambridge IELTS 13 · 2026-08-05

IELTS Writing Task 1 question

You recently organised an all-day meeting for your company, which took place in a local hotel. In their feedback, participants at the meeting said that they liked the hotel, but they were unhappy about the food that was served for lunch.

Write a letter to the manager of the hotel. In your letter

• say what the participants liked about the hotel
• explain why they were unhappy about the food
• suggest what the manager should do to improve the food in future

You do NOT need to write any addresses.

Begin your letter as follows:

Dear Sir or Madam,

Student answer (Band 7.0)

Dear Sir or Madam,

I am writing to express my disappointment regarding the recent all-day meeting that we held at your hotel, Residency Inn. The decorations and lighting arrangement were really amazing. Also, everyone praised the hotel's interior and theme. Unfortunately, the lunch was the most disappointing part of the day.

Participants were upset about the food because it was too salty and lacked flavour. Moreover, it had unpleasant smell such as burned food. In addition, many guest had to buy their food from somewhere else after the meeting because they were starving.

I would appreciate it if you could look into this matter and find the root cause behind this problem. Furthermore, I would advise you to always taste the food before serving to your guests to improve the food quality in the future. It will also helps to prevent similar situations.

Thank you for your time, and I look forward to hearing a positive response from you.

Yours sincerely,

Reena

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 7.5

The response successfully addresses all three bullet points of the task. You clearly identified what the participants liked (decorations, lighting, interior, and theme), explained the issues with the food (salty, lack of flavour, unpleasant smell), and provided a constructive suggestion for improvement (tasting food before service). The tone is appropriate for a formal letter of complaint. The ideas are relevant and well-developed, ensuring the reader understands the situation clearly. To reach a higher band, you could expand slightly on the impact of the poor lunch on the professional nature of the meeting to add more depth to the complaint.

Coherence and Cohesion — Band 7.0

The letter is logically organized with a clear introduction, body paragraphs, and a conclusion. Each paragraph focuses on a specific aspect of the task, which helps the reader follow your argument easily. You used cohesive devices such as 'Moreover', 'In addition', and 'Furthermore' to link your ideas. However, the transition between the positive aspects and the negative feedback could be smoother. The paragraphing is appropriate, and the overall progression of ideas is logical and easy to follow throughout the letter.

Lexical Resource — Band 6.5

You have a sufficient range of vocabulary to convey your message clearly. Phrases like 'look into this matter' and 'root cause' are appropriate for a formal complaint. However, there are some minor inaccuracies, such as 'unpleasant smell such as burned food' (should be 'an unpleasant smell, such as that of burnt food') and 'many guest' (should be 'many guests'). While the vocabulary is adequate for the task, incorporating more precise collocations or sophisticated adjectives would elevate the quality of your writing to a higher band level.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 6.0

The letter contains a mix of simple and complex sentence structures. While the meaning is always clear, there are several grammatical slips. For example, 'it had unpleasant smell' is missing an article ('an'), and 'It will also helps' contains a subject-verb agreement error ('help' instead of 'helps'). Additionally, 'many guest' should be pluralized. Despite these errors, they do not impede communication. To improve, focus on proofreading for basic subject-verb agreement and article usage, as these frequent minor errors prevent the response from reaching the 7.0+ range for grammar.

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

Browse more IELTS Writing model answers or get your own writing scored by the same AI examiner.