Letter: You stayed at your friend’s house when you participated in a conference

IELTS General Writing Task 1 with sample answer.

You should spend about 20 minutes on this task.

You stayed at your friend’s house when you participated in a conference in California. You left a briefcase with important documents in your room.

Write a letter to your friend. In the letter:

  • thank your friend for the stay
  • describe the briefcase
  • ask him/her to return it to you by post

You should write at least 150 words.

You do NOT need to write any address.

Begin your letter as follows:

Dear _ ,


Sample Answer:

Dear William,

Hi there! It always delights me to write you. Hope you are doing good and all your family are doing fine. I’m pretty sound in spite of working hard. Anyway, the reason I’m writing is about my briefcase that I left at your home.

It was my great pleasure to be your guest for one week in California.  The hospitality and all the support I got from you and your family is very appreciating. Because of these supports, I was able to finish the conference successfully, and even more I was able to do some personal shopping and visit the Oakland Museum of California. However I left another briefcase by mistake and brought the one which I took with me when I arrived in California. It is a brown briefcase and most probably is kept on the wardrobe.

You don’t mind finding the briefcase, do you? It would be so nice of you if you post it to address and, I’ll receive it with postage fee. No more today. But one more thing I would like to request you that please do visit my country with your family. It would be great fun for us.

Hope to hear from you soon. Keep tune.

Lots of love,
Ian Maxted.