Is this admission fraud? AIBU to report it?

Doubt the child just told the story my bet is it came out during sustained questioning by OP

Yes that is admissions fraud, our local very popular school said very specifically don’t do this at an open evening, because if we find out, your kid will lose their place. If this child and their parents don’t actually live in the closer house, it will probably come to light at some point, and it’s better for the child if that happens now instead of after school has started.

This happened to someone I know and their place was rescinded , I actually felt so sorry for the boy

This school is in the next town to me. If they were reported to the council then they’d have to prove they’d sold their house. Is that what you mean? Personally if I was applying for a school with this policy, I wouldn’t want to chance it.

It’s very competitive to get into this school. They can withdraw places if there is fraud.

Yeah OP you've basically done the same thing.

Also what this woman has done is legal

That was my understanding too. You're not supposed to move back and forth between properties to game the system. It's certainly against the spirit of the rules - whether this family have done just enough to adhere to the letter of the rules is harder to say.

Bucks did use score as a key oversubscription criterion many years ago, but it changed to distance some time around the early 2000s. Every authority with a grammar school system has its own rules and arrangements for the 11+ exam and admissions, so what happens in one area will not necessarily be the case in another.

Quite. She can afford to do it. You may not like it, but I imagine the parents desperate for a place who couldn’t afford your house don’t find it fair either.

All my money is on number one:

He's...a vindictive bastard (and there's a huge backstory regarding his relationship with his ex wife)

It would seem that many people don't have the imagination to see that different authorities could have different rules about a) allocating grammar places, and b) different rules about fraud.
OP, there have been several admission experts (as in consistent detailed advice over many years) on this thread, and not all of them have declared as such, who say report.

I’m just pointing out that some authorities do not automatically consider renting as disposed of in the same way that selling the property is.

yes fair - I can see that some areas are stricter on this. However, I'm yet to see one that says that you must sell your property, and renting it out will not be sufficient, which is the claim being repeatedly made all over this thread.
The strictest policies seem to say that renting while you still own another property may be considered a flag for fraud / will require further justification.

Op I really sympathise with you, I was in this EXACT same situation 10 years ago, with my son and his best friend. Son got a higher mark in 11+ than friend and our house was in the catchment for distance, so going by previous years we would be likely to get a distance criteria place.
Friend lived just a bit further away and wouldn't have got a distance place.
Friends mum then rented a 2 bed flat for a family of 6 , even closer to the school! I felt so upset, as like yourself, I felt it would be so unfair if friend got a place and my son didn't as we had genuinely been living there for 10 years prior to application!
However, in our case, the bf mum did admit to me that this was her plan and was very apologetic about it but explained she had to do whatever she could for her son's sake, which I did understand, despite feeling so upset for my son, that he was being leap frogged by his friend when my son had got a higher mark AND genuinely lived closer to the school.
However, happy ending, they both got places! Hopefully this will happen in your case too!
I did consider reporting this to the school, but I couldn't have lived with myself, thinking that I had tried to deprive a child of a place, and caused trouble for bf mun who was actually a very nice person.
So I had patience, despite my pain in this situation.
I totally understand how upset you are OP, and I do hope both kids get places in this scenario.
Even though, I felt so upset at friends mum I tried my best to not allow this to affect the boys friendship or my own friendship with the mum.
I'm glad I had patience as things worked out in the end for all.
Although I was so upset with friends mum, I had to admit that I would have done the same, if head not been in the distance catchment.
Most parents would do anything and everything for their children, and I'm sure both mothers in this case are the same

The grammar school my kids went to did that except the catchment area was the whole city. The only way distance came Into it was if two kids had exactly the same mark for the last place and then the nearest got the place.

And that is exactly how schools in many parts of the country still operate. Not everywhere, however. In Bucks there is a qualifying score and every child who gets it is deemed equally eligible for a.grammar.school place. Who goes to which school is then largely determined by distance criteria (there are other categories which are taken into account before distance, but score is not one of them).

I just looked up Buckinghamshire and it says this:

1. The property must be occupiable 52 weeks a year, with no planning/contract restrictions that limit occupancy.
2. Importantly: If you have a second home, they expect you to sell it or lease it out (with a proper tenancy) if you’re going to use a different address for school admissions.

• If you move to a new address, you must provide evidence so that the admissions team can accept that as your child’s normal address.

• Evidence required includes things like:
• Solicitor’s letter for property purchase
• A signed tenancy agreement (minimum 12 months) if renting

www.buckinghamshire.gov.uk/schools-and-learning/schools-index/school-admissions/school-admissions-guides-policies-and-statistics/guide-to-moving-up-to-secondary-school/understanding-the-terms-we-use/

Yep. They're all 'buying' their way in.

What if its true, she has these relatives she needs to help and realised in doing so she could do it in a way that helps her kid. Why not?

Both things could be true at once?

I see you point on "morally" but tbh if I were her my loyalty would lie with my children over the other applicants.

It’s possible. More likely is that the score is age standardised. So the same score requires a lower raw mark on the exam papers for summer born children.

Well there was no need for you to pay over the odds for a house in the catchment area. Is it any different?

I was wondering this.
He's either a vindictive bastard (and there's a huge backstory regarding his relationship with his ex wife) or he is extremely moral (and there's a huge backstory...etc).

Wasn’t your argument that disposed of included renting. I’m just pointing out that some authorities do not automatically consider renting as disposed of in the same way that selling the property is. There will be an investigation to see whether it’s an attempt at fraud.

Moving across the country and renting while your house is on the market most likely will be fine. Moving from the edge of the catchment area to a closer local property for no obvious reason unlikely to fly.

I believe there are two pass marks for here, one for if you’re an autumn-winter birthday and one slightly lower for the spring-summer children. I’m not entirely sure if that’s true! My own child is in year 5 and a summer born, so I probably should find out!

This is absolutely correct in Buckinghamshire. Renting a property while continuing to own another is considered address fraud, and the schools in the county will consider the owned property as your main residence whether you do or not. You have to have sold it, renting it to anyone, whether family or not, does not count.

At least 2 secondary schools in our area (not grammar) are oversubscribed. As part of the application process we had to provide a council tax bill from the previous year. I dont know how it worked of you had moved into the area in the interim period.

The C of E school has a pretty small catchment area and yet I see hordes of kids arriving by train each day so im not sure if they are siblings or got in via a different criteria.

Interesting. I started out my teaching career in one along time ago. We crunched the raw marks by age to create a score that was then put in order for all children in catchment. If you were from the furthest reaches of the catchment but got a high score you were in.