You are organising an executive event for the company you work for. Write a letter to the person in charge of a venue that you are considering for the event. In your letter: - ask about available dates - ask what services the venue provides - ask about the costs
Sample Response
Dear Sir or Madam, I am writing to inform you that we are considering your banquet hall for our annual dinner party that we are planning to organise at the end of October 2025. Therefore, I would like to obtain some information to finalise the bookingfinalise the process of reserving this venue. First of all, please notify me of the availability of the venue as per our schedule. Can we book itavail of it on the evening of 28th or 29th October? I would also like to know about the servicesservice you offer including the dinner menu, power backup and decoration. As it is a prestigious event for our company, could you arrangeyou should follow an appropriate themesome decent theme for the decoration and provide a buffet menu. My recommendation is to use a professional interior decorator and use white flowers and colourful balloons for the decoration. Finally, please forward me the estimated costs we will incurexpenses that will incur to hire the venue and useavail the services. Please send it to my email addressSend it to my email address - [email address]. Previous experience with your company was outstanding but this time, I am expecting more innovative design and high quality of services. Yours faithfully, Fahad Sultan
Why this response received Band 6.5
The response’s strongest feature is complete task coverage: it asks about two dates, relevant services and estimated costs while giving useful context for the event. Its main limitation is register and precision, as several requests become directives and some collocations are unnatural, while the single-block format reduces readability. Prioritise courteous question forms, concise specifications and separate paragraphs for availability, services and pricing.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Achievement
The letter clearly covers dates, services and costs and explains the event, but the directive wording about decoration is less appropriate for an initial formal enquiry.
Turn the design preferences into polite questions or requests and ask whether the quoted cost includes catering, decoration and power backup.
Coherence and Cohesion
The content follows a sensible sequence from dates to services and costs, but presenting the whole letter as one paragraph weakens the separation of its three enquiries.
Use one short paragraph for each required area and place the previous-experience comment with the closing request.
Lexical Resource
Vocabulary is adequate for a venue enquiry, but phrases such as “avail of it,” “decent theme,” “forward me the expenses” and “high quality of services” are awkward.
Use natural formal phrases such as “book the venue,” “suitable theme,” “send me an estimate” and “high-quality service.”
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
A range of sentence forms keeps the message clear, although article, agreement, relative-clause and verb-pattern errors recur in several requests.
Revise forms such as “the services you offer,” “expenses that we will incur,” and “My previous experience was outstanding.”
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IELTS General Training Writing Task 1
You are organising an executive event for the company you work for. Write a letter to the person in charge of a venue that you are considering for the event. In your letter:
- ask about available dates
- ask what services the venue provides
- ask about the costs
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.