Thank-You Letter to Restaurant for Birthday Party

You celebrated your birthday with some friends last week in a restaurant. It was a great success and you and your friends enjoyed the evening very much. Write a letter to the restaurant to thank them. Mention the food, service and the atmosphere. Also suggest any improvements to make things better.

Annotated response

8 correction notes

Dear Sir,

some friends and I had dinner in your restaurant to celebrate my birthday. I am writing to thank you for the great evening that we had.

All my friends remarked afterwards on the standard of the food and service that we received. All the food was very tasty and well presented. Our waiter, whose name was James, was fast and friendly and our bad jokes! The restaurant itself was warm and friendly and the atmosphere showed that all the diners there were enjoying their evening.

suggest one improvement. One of my friends is a vegetarian and he felt that the choice for vegetarians was little small. If you could , it would be your restaurant.

would like to thank you for my highly enjoyable birthday dinner.

Yours faithfully,

Rebecca Ahlinder

Overall assessment

Why this response received Band 7.5

The letter fully achieves its purpose, covering the food, service, atmosphere, and a clear improvement suggestion in an appropriately warm, polite register. The strongest aspect is the confident, natural control of grammar and organisation; the main limitation is a slightly narrow vocabulary range with occasional awkward word choices such as 'put with well' and 'little small'.

IELTS criteria

How each score was decided

Task Achievement

8.0

The letter directly thanks the restaurant, clearly addresses every bullet point with relevant detail, names the waiter to personalise the praise, and offers a plausible vegetarian-menu improvement in a consistently suitable register.

Coherence and Cohesion

7.5

Ideas progress logically from opening purpose through food, service, and atmosphere to the improvement suggestion and closing thanks, with effective paragraphing and cohesive devices, though transitions are occasionally simple.

Lexical Resource

7.0

Vocabulary is generally adequate and natural for the purpose, but the range is somewhat limited and there are slips such as 'the choice for vegetarians was little small' and 'put with well'.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy

7.5

A good variety of structures is used with strong control, including relative clauses and complex sentences, with only occasional minor errors that do not impede meaning.