B2 First · Writing · Part 2
Emails and letters pitched at the right tone for the reader.
Everything here follows from one question: who is reading it. The task always tells you — a friend, a manager, an organisation you have never dealt with — and the register, the greeting, the sign-off and the level of directness all follow from that answer. Getting the reader right is most of communicative achievement on this task.
The other half is completeness. These tasks usually bury two or three things you must do — thank, explain, request, apologise, suggest — inside a short prompt. Underline them before you start. A fluent, well-written email that answered two of the three required points scores badly on content, and content is the criterion that costs candidates most.
At B2 the reader is most often someone you know — a friend, an exchange partner, a teacher you are on good terms with — and the register sits at the informal-to-neutral end. 140 to 190 words, which is short enough that a long opening pleasantry costs you a content point later.
Match the reader named in the task. A friend takes contractions and informal phrasing; an organisation takes full forms, a formal greeting and no idiom. Consistency matters as much as the level itself — drifting between the two is penalised.
No. You are marked on the body of the text, and layout furniture is not required. Spend the words on the content points instead.
