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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

AIBU to be angry about attendance charge from school

562 replies

HidingInTheBathroom · 07/02/2014 15:36

I am very upset at the minute. Received my fine today for taking my children out of school four days before they break up for Christmas.

Me and my husband have received a £60 fine for each child for each parent.

We are being charged more for being a couple. Which I think is wrong. The last week of school they only watch films and went to a pantomime. Oh and had a school disco. The holiday was far more educational than watching films and family time is hard to come by with work.

When I have requested a meeting with the head teacher I have just got a mouthful of abusive from the receptionist.

OP posts:
PiperRose · 07/02/2014 18:06

Exactly Misspixietrix Smile.

maddy68 · 07/02/2014 18:11

I'm guessing that the other family asked in advance and had their absence authorised otherwise they round be facing the same consequence. It makes no difference if they are 'friends of the school' as it is not the school that fines, it's the authority
!

DontmindifIdo · 07/02/2014 18:12

Echt - to be fair, every prep school we spoke to when first thinking about if we'd go state or private had longer school days with more teaching time daily. For the schools we looked at, I think the DCs get about the same or more teaching hours over the year than state schools, even allowing for the longer holidays.

ladyquinoa · 07/02/2014 18:18

I think it's crazy that you can't take a child out of school for an educational holiday. Life us more then school.

IneedAsockamnesty · 07/02/2014 18:24

Did you inform the school you were recording the call before it started? If not you have broken the law

No she has not,it is perfectly legal to record conversations without informing anybody as long as the recordings are for your own none commercial use and not for disclosure to a third party.

It is also not prohibited to use a transcript of a recording for a complaint or for court.

However op You must have known about the fines,it's quite simple if you don't like how state schools operate then deregister

Honeysweet · 07/02/2014 18:33

maddy, but the school would have to inform the authority? And if the authority were not informed, no fine would be demanded?

ageofgrandillusion · 07/02/2014 18:33

If i were the head i would fine you extra for wasting her/his time on what is clearly a black and white issue. One does rather wonder what this country is coming to when grown adults are incapable of processing and accepting very simple rules. Shock

FudgefaceMcZ · 07/02/2014 18:35

If two people parked illegally but were married, do you think they should only get one fine because they have vowed to only have sex with each other '4evar'? Your relationship isn't really relevant to your legal responsibilities to your children. I don't get why you think being in a couple should entitle you to lower costs than a single parent, who already probably has higher costs and a harder life. Is that really what you're saying?

ChocolateWombat · 07/02/2014 18:36

Loads of great posts on here especially early on. As someone else said, it is encouraging to see the majority telling the OP that if you break the law, there will be consequences. And I think people are right to be shocked that some see having a holiday in term term so important they tell their children to lie and teach them that is okay.
There have been loads of threads about if fines are right or not, but this isn't really the Q here is it.
The OP is angry about being fined. I don't think anyone would be pleased. She writes about the receptionist and is considering going to the school to complain about rudeness, because she wants to complain to the school about something. She wants to be able to feel like someone else is in the wrong, rather than her. Some people are just like this. Whenever they are in trouble, it is never their fault. It is the rules or someone else's fault. It's about not being able to take responsibility for ones own actions and their consequences.
On a wider scale, this kind of approach to life causes massive problems in society.

candycoatedwaterdrops · 07/02/2014 18:37

I knew it wouldn't be long before someone dragged up 'rights'. You do not have a human right to have a term time holiday without paying the fine.

phantomnamechanger · 07/02/2014 18:40

well said wombat

TeaOneSugar · 07/02/2014 18:41

We took dd out for the last three days before Christmas, she missed a party, carol concert and one performance of the Christmas play.

I had the form signed last school year so no fine.

Misspixietrix · 07/02/2014 18:42

candy I'm an advocate for HR. In this case I'll pass thankyou! Grin.

ChocolateWombat · 07/02/2014 18:45

Thankyou.
I think it's really important to teach our children to take responsibility for their actions and we do it by showing we do it ourselves.
We all mess up, and rather than saying we didn't do it or blaming someone else, we need to just put our hands up and admit it. And move on.
I really don't want to teach mine to blame others, or to lie to avoid consequences.

clam · 07/02/2014 18:46

Look, OP, you're not going to get away with this. Just pay the f*ing fine, before it goes up even further.
The fact that you believe another family haven't been fined is irrelevant (for a start, they may have been but are just not sharing). You have been, so get on with it, and bear it in mind for the next time you consider breaking the rules, regardless of what you (and we) might think of them.

Katz · 07/02/2014 18:57

OP - Training days were taken out of the school holidays, teachers lost 5 days holidays when they were introduced. Training days aren't days of schooling lost children have as many days schooling now as they did begone they were introduced in the 1980s.

Katz · 07/02/2014 19:01

Also children are in school for 190 days a year, that leaves 275 days to take holidays, day trips etc

ChocolateWombat · 07/02/2014 19:01

The different responses on this thread remind me of the reactions I saw when attending a speed awareness course last year.
I had driven at 37 in a 30 zone and been caught on camera so paid £90 and had to go to the speed awareness course to avoid the points.
Everyone there had done between 35 and 39 in a 30 zone. There were some who said that where they had been caught, should have been a 40 zone, so felt annoyed at being caught. Others said theybhad been caught by a Policeman hiding in a side road and thought that was outrageous. Others said it was all just a revenue raiser for government. Another said that other people travelled faster than them down that road and they hadn't been caught so it wasn't fair. None of these people were prepared to accept they had done wrong or deserved the fine.

Most people simply put their hands up and said 'Fair Cop'. They knew they had been speeding, knew they shouldn't be and although they didn't like being caught, accepted that being at the course was the consequence of their actions.

We know the law and its consequences. We might not like the law, but we are under it. The OP has broken the law and is facing the consequences. Just get on with it.

TheGruffalo2 · 07/02/2014 19:08

I stand corrected sock. That is useful to know! Maybe I'll record conversations I have with pupils' parents, then they can't claim I haven't told them something or that I was impolite at a later date.

Pooka · 07/02/2014 19:12

Teachers strike is not the head teacher or schools fault. The teachers do not have anything to do with fine.

IamInvisible · 07/02/2014 19:17

floggin Forces' families are supposed to be shown discretion under these rules, but I requested DS2 have an hour and 20 minutes off school in September, at the end of the day missing football that he couldn't even play, because DH was going away for 4 months. If DS had stayed at school he would have missed him going. It went down as an unauthorised absence!Shock. I was told off twice by the HT about it because 'every hour counts in education'!

Since then one of DS2's teachers had an accident and needed a term off. They waited a week until they got a supply teacher in. This week another teacher has been on a course all week, they haven't had a supply teacher. I did query it, and apparently school policy is they don't get supply teachers in for planned abscences any more. They would like the kids (16/17/18) to be mature enough it undertake the work independently. I get that, but surely the curriculum needs teaching and they just can't take a week off here and there?

It smacks of double standards to me!

WhiskyTangoFoxtrot · 07/02/2014 19:20

Typo alert:

"Also children are in school for 190 days a year, that leaves 175 days to take holidays, day trips etc.

Fixed that for you.

Katz · 07/02/2014 19:22

Thanks whiskey. iPad error! Somehow my fingers aim for the right numbers but hit the wrong ones! Grin

Argawarga · 07/02/2014 19:25

IamInisible ,, I think your DS's school is being hypocritical. It 's a case of valuing what is public while privately taking the piss. The pomposity of the HT is gobsmacking. If it's not too far in the past, I'd drop a line to the chair of governors about this inconsistency.

IamInvisible · 07/02/2014 19:32

Arga That letter went Recorded Delivery this afternoon!

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