Use the greeting, sign-off and paragraph plan below for this semi-formal letter, write it on a 20-minute timer, then compare it with a band-8 model letter.
You should spend about 20 minutes on this task.
You have been a member of a sports club for five years but have decided to leave.
Write a letter to the club secretary, Mr Quinn. In your letter
Write at least 150 words.
You do NOT need to write any addresses.
Begin your letter as follows:
Dear Mr Quinn,
GoPrep wrote this practice question in the style of the exam. It is not an official IELTS question.
A letter to a named person ends Yours sincerely, followed by your full name.
Spend the first few minutes planning, then write.
0 words of 150 minimum
Your answer stays on this page only. Copy it before you leave.
Write your own answer first, then compare: how it answers the exact question, what each paragraph does, and which phrases you could borrow.
Dear Mr Quinn,
I am writing to let you know that I have decided to leave the Westside Tennis Club, and I would like my membership to end on 31 December.
I have thought about this for some time. The main reason is that my work schedule has changed, and I am now travelling a lot, so I can rarely get to the club more than once a month. It feels wrong to keep a place when I am hardly using it. I have also moved to the other side of the city, which means the journey now takes an hour. I do not want to leave, but I think this is the sensible decision.
I want to thank you and the club for everything it has given me over the past five years. I made some very good friends here, I improved my game enormously with the coaching, and I have so many happy memories of the summer tournaments.
If my circumstances change, I hope I may be able to rejoin in the future. In the meantime, I will gladly come back as a guest.
Yours sincerely,
Marcus Webb
| Phrase | Meaning |
|---|---|
| I'd like to explain what happened. | open an explanation politely |
| The reason is that | introduce a cause |
| That's why | link a cause to a result |
| I hope that makes things clearer. | polite closing |
| I realise this may have caused some confusion. | acknowledge a misunderstanding |
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