Letter of complaint CAE

Question

Hello everybody. This year I will be sitting the CAE exam and I want to take it with a minimum of 90%. I've written this letter because I want to improve my writing skills as much as possible. It would mean a lot if you could spend some time checking this letter and give your advice and recommendations. I would also appreciate it if you could mark this letter using percentages. Thank you in advance!

Here is the task:

Question
Read this extract from a letter you have recently sent to a friend:

.... Oh, and by the way, don't go to Barry's Restaurant for your birthday. We went there last night - the service was awful and the food was a disaster! I complained to the head waiter but he asked me to put it in writing ...

Write your letter of complaint to the restaurant manager. (220-260 words)

Dear Sir or Madam,

I am writing this letter to express my utter disappointment in the treatment me and my wife received in your restaurant last night.

When we first arrived we were shocked to find out that the table we had booked in advance was already taken by somebody else, so we had to sit just in front of the toilets. We demanded an explanation from our waiter but we were left surprised by his rather gruff reply.

Secondly, we didn’t have a lot of meals to choose from. In fact, only four different meals were available at that time due to a lack of products and we were obliged to change our minds and order steak instead of lobster.

Furthermore, I would also like to complain about the incompetence of your staff. There was pepper all over my wife’s dish even though we had mentioned that she was allergic. On top of that, your waiter even tried to put the blame on us, claiming we had never informed him about my wife’s allergies.

Clearly, the biggest problem was the staff. They need to be better trained in dealing with customers and need to be taught some manners.

I sincerely hope that the next time we visit your restaurant, all of these issues will have been tended to and that we would have a better experience.

Yours faithfully,

Alex Nedev

Words: 231

Tanit · Accepted Answer

Hi,

I cannot comment on grammar errors/ style and register improvements but wanted to say I enjoyed your letter. In a way, it looked quite similar to some letters of complaint I've read in textbooks for the CAE.

One comment, If I may. I was taught that you should conclude a letter of complaint asking for some form of compensation (for instance, a free meal, or a full/partial refund). If the matter is serious, you could also "threaten" the recipient (e.g. tell him you'll go and see a lawyer, you'll seek the help of a consumers' association, you'll spread the word about how badly you were treated, etc.).

Good luck with the CAE!

Dave Phillips · Answer

TanitHi,I cannot comment on grammar errors/ style and register improvements but wanted to say I enjoyed your letter. In a way, it looked quite similar to some letters of complaint I've read in textbooks for the CAE. One comment, If I may. I was taught that you should conclude a letter of complaint asking for some form of compensation (for instance, a free meal, or a full/partial refund). If the matter is serious, you could also "threaten" the recipient (e.g. tell him you'll go and see a lawyer, you'll seek the help of a consumers' association, you'll spread the word about how badly you were treated, etc.).Good luck with the CAE!

Great advice Tanit.

Thats what we tend to do as natives also.

Alex11sf · Answer

Thank you guys <img class='emoticon' style='Width:19px;Height:19px;' data-delaysrc='https://uat-englishforward-forums-backend.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/Emoticons/1.gif' src='https://uat-englishforward-forums-backend.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/Emoticons/1.gif' alt='Emotion: smile'/> I've never heard anything about the compensation part but it definitely makes great sense! I will most definitely include it in my next letter of complaint.

Anonymous · Answer

First sentence: "me" is incorrect--should be I. Also, believe "my wife and I" would be preferable.
Second paragraph: Perhaps a personal choice, but I would redundancy and unnecessary words. If table was taken, it was obviously be taken "by somebody else".
Third paragraph: Throughout, I would pare my words to the number needed to convey my concern. It does not matter what the cause of the menu limitations; one simply expected a greater range of choices than was available.
Likewise in paragraph 4, there appear to be more words than necessary to express dissatisfaction with the staff. It would probably suffice to say something like: Despite alerting the waiter to my wife's allergy to pepper, her dish came laden with pepper. Further, the waiter denied that there had been a request for no pepper (or something similar).
Paragraph 5: I cannot address whether the staff or well trained or not. Instead, I would address the issue as the dining experience would have been more enjoyable if the staff had been more considerate and attentive to our service.
Finally (and I apologize if I'm being overly critical), I would not suggest that I will return to the restaurant. Instead, I would couch the idea as "if" I ever return to your restaurant. . .
I disagree completely with the concept of requesting, demanding, suggesting, etc. recompense for a negative experience. If the management is sensitive to your complaint, some form of reimbursement will likely be forthcoming. If they are not so inclined, they would likely be more amenable to constructive commentary than to out and out disparagement.
My thoughts, but I could be wrong.

Letter of complaint CAE

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