Letter

Band 7+: You recently had a holiday visiting your friends and family. You were very pleased with the trip, but there was a problem with the arrangements. Write a letter to the travel agency. In your letter: say what you liked about the trip explain what the problem was suggest how the travel agency could improve their service

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Dear Ameera,

I hope this letter finds you well. it’s been a while since we last spoke. I am writing to express my dissatisfaction regarding the Homage travel agency I used for my recent trip.

Recently, I travelled to Ghana to visit my family because my younger brother just graduated, so we had to celebrate. All the family members were present, it was interesting and we played lots of fun games.

The main reason I utilised the agency was because of the positive reviews I read on the internet. Although the services provided by the customer service officers were top notch, the delays were much including the depature time which was scheduled for 10:00am was later moved to 1:10pm, and this made me feel down in the dumps.

Despite the fact that my experience was disheartening, I will love to recommend them to you because their services are mostly satisfactory, and they have lots of discounts available to customers especially during peak times.

I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Best regards,

Aisha.

Word Count: 174

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Overall Band Score

(+/- 0.5)

Vocabulary Complexity:
B2 - Upper Intermediate
Opt for even more advanced words when appropriate.

Grammar Mistakes: N/A

Vocabulary Repetition:

because: 3

Try using synonyms for the above words

Task Response

The letter addresses all parts of the task effectively. You described the destination and activities, explained the issue (delays), and provided a clear recommendation. The tone is appropriate for a letter to a friend. To improve and reach a higher score, ensure that the explanation of 'what went wrong' is more substantial. While you mentioned a delay, the transition to recommending the agency despite a 'disheartening' experience feels slightly contradictory; providing a more nuanced reason for the recommendation (e.g., balancing the flaws against the benefits) would create a more cohesive response. Additionally, watch for minor typographical errors such as 'depature' and inconsistent capitalization (e.g., 'it's' at the start of a sentence).

Coherence & Cohesion

The letter is organized into logical paragraphs that follow the prompts provided in the task. The progression of ideas is clear. However, some transitions between sentences could be smoother. For instance, the transition from describing the family celebration to the issues with the agency feels a bit abrupt. Using more cohesive devices to link the purpose of the trip with the service issues would improve the flow.

Lexical Resource

You have used some good idiomatic expressions and vocabulary, such as 'top notch' and 'down in the dumps.' These add a natural tone to an informal letter. To reach a higher band, try to avoid repetitive phrasing and ensure that the vocabulary used is consistently precise. For example, 'the delays were much' is slightly awkward; 'there were significant delays' would be more natural.

Grammatical Range & Accuracy

The letter demonstrates a mix of simple and complex sentence structures. However, there are several grammatical inaccuracies that affect the overall polish. There are issues with capitalization (e.g., 'it's' instead of 'It's'), run-on sentences (e.g., 'All the family members were present, it was interesting...'), and awkward phrasing in the sentence regarding departure times. Pay close attention to punctuation, particularly the use of commas to separate independent clauses, and ensure subject-verb agreement and tense consistency are maintained throughout.

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