On a recent holiday you lost a valuable item. Fortunately, you have travel insurance to cover the cost of anything lost. Write a letter to the manager of your insurance company. In your letter: - describe the item you lost - explain how you lost it - tell the insurance company what you would like them to do
Sample Response
Dear Sir or Madam,Dear Sir/Madam I am writing to notifyinform you that I recently lost my digital camera while on holiday in Vietnam. The camera is a black Canon 70D70d and cost $1,550$1550 when I purchasedbought it new last month. It has a resolution of 20 megapixels, a 67-millimetre Canon lensa Canon 67 millimeter lens and was in a brown leather case with my name on it. I lost it when I was having coffee with my husband in the backpacker districtarea of Ho Chi Minh City. I believe the coffee shop was called Highlands Coffee and it was on Pham Ngu Lao Street. We had been at the coffee shop for approximatelyaround 45 minutes when I noticed it was missing. I would like to make a claimI am entitled to make a claim for the value of the above-mentionedabove mentioned item and request that you send me details ofon what I need to do to proceedin order to proceed. I look forward to hearing from you soonat your earliest convenience. Yours faithfully,Yours faithfully John Smith
Why this response received Band 7.5
The letter’s strongest feature is its precise, relevant description of the camera and the clear formal request, while the sequence of events and claim purpose are easy to understand. Its main limitation is organisation: the greeting, body, and closing run together without paragraph breaks, which weakens readability. The highest-priority improvement is to separate the purpose, loss circumstances, and requested action into clear paragraphs.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Achievement
The letter clearly establishes its purpose, covers all three bullet points, and supplies specific relevant details in a suitable formal register.
State the desired claim outcome more directly, such as reimbursement or replacement, rather than only requesting procedural details.
Coherence and Cohesion
Information follows a clear sequence from item description to loss circumstances and the claim request, but the entire letter is presented without paragraph breaks.
Divide the response into distinct paragraphs for the purpose, the loss details, and the requested action.
Lexical Resource
Vocabulary is precise and appropriately formal, with effective details such as the model, lens, location, and claim terminology.
Refine occasional conventional wording by using a more concise phrase such as 'the item described above.'
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
A varied range of complex sentences is handled accurately, and grammatical errors are rare and non-impeding.
Add the expected punctuation and line separation after the greeting and before the closing to polish presentation.
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IELTS General Training Writing Task 1
On a recent holiday you lost a valuable item. Fortunately, you have travel insurance to cover the cost of anything lost. Write a letter to the manager of your insurance company. In your letter:
- describe the item you lost
- explain how you lost it
- tell the insurance company what you would like them to do
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.