Cost of holidays during school holidays is outrageous...

[MarieKondo]

We can only go on holiday during school holidays. DD’s school is crazy strict about holidays during term time so paying the fine isn’t an option. Are there any tricks when booking that I don’t know about or is this just life for the foreseeable future? One option I’m looking at is literally half the cost if you could go 2 weeks earlier. 😤 any suggested websites or other ideas?

It's possible, you just need to put the work in.

We often go to the US at Easter, we book flights pretty much as soon as they are released. Fly drives tend to be cheaper than booking flights and car hire separately. Look at different airports (both departure and arrival). For Europe we do the same - track EasyJet booking dates and book as soon as released. Make sure you make use of any loyalty schemes - Avios for BA flights, hotel loyalty schemes, sign up to them all as and when you use them.

In the summer we tend to do group holidays - it's cheaper to book a massive house for several families split between us than it is to each individual family booking accommodation, and the quality tends to be better with better facilities the bigger you go.

Make sure you always have school term dates in your diary for quick decisions when deals are released. Make use of INSET days tagged onto holidays.

All schools are "crazy strict" about it as they aren't allowed NOT to be

Not true.
Our Primary school have always been fine about me taking the DC out during term time.
Eldest DC's previous secondary school authorised term time holiday.

Depends where you go. We looked at Spain for July. £1500 for a week self catering. We've just paid £1600 for a week all inclusive to Cyprus in April. That's via Jet2

People need to change their perspective on holidays to be honest. Holidays aren’t ‘hiked up’ for school holidays though. That’s their standard price. They need to reduce their prices in term time to encourage people to go otherwise no one would go. Parents need to stop taking it personally and if you can’t afford it you can’t afford it. Try a U.K. holiday instead or camping

Surely it's the Local Authority who imposes fines on parents, not the actual school? I understood that if you refuse to pay the fine (which is per parent per child) then it will be referred to court, same as if you refused to pay your council tax? So not paying just escalates the offence. I could be wrong about this...

And taking your children out of school? Fair enough if anyone wants to, but then you have to educate your children yourself, you won't get offered another place. Which would help with going on holiday within term times, so always a silver lining!

We only go to stay with relatives in Scotland and that is no beach holiday (generally raining / freezing) but their half terms tend to run a week before ours, so nothing is excessively busy. It's pretty much all we can afford in the holidays!

To get a beach holiday abroad in the school holidays there are two ways to get a slightly better deal. One is to book very early as soon as the following years holidays come out. The other is to go last week of August which is slightly less popular and therefore a little cheaper.

If the holiday you want is half the price during school term then surely it makes financial sense to go in term time and pay the fine. Is it still £60 per child, per parent per week?

We always went in the Oct. half term and flew from northern English airports - works the other way round too. The other thing we do is have our own tent now caravan. You can find very reasonable sites even in the summer holidays in the UK. We had 2 weeks right on the coast with beautiful sea views and an outdoor pool for £450 last year.

Its expensive. I'm married to a teacher so had ten years of it before we even had kids, and will still have it once the kids leave school!

Eldest DC's previous secondary school authorised term time holiday

Previous might be the key word, schools aren't allowed to authorise term time holidays except in extreme situations

We need to fly on 25th or 26th May which is close on £600 each. If we could fly 1 week earlier it would cost under £300 each. Supply and demand sucks.

Our daughter is in a Welsh primary school, and they seem quite laid back. Each year I keep telling myself we will stick to school holidays, but then decide the cost saving is worth missing a week at the start of July, and fill in a holiday request form. Depending on attendance you are allowed up to 10 days off.

The rules are slightly different in Wales. Headteachers can still authorise leave at their discretion.

Of course paying the fine is still an option!
You inform the school of your plans (or "ask," if you prefer), they decline and say they can't authorise it and you go anyway and pay the fine when/if you receive it in the post.

We’re extremely lucky to have access to a holiday home in Southern Spain (not a stealth boast, it’s not ours!) so we just pay for flights, and the difference in the flights cost even just flying the day before school holidays start can be a saving of anything from £200 - £800.

We always take DS out of school a day/two days max before the long Summer holidays start and have never been fined or had any issues. They finish school at lunchtime on the last day of term anyway so he’s missing a day/day and a half max when there are no proper lessons going on anyway so he’s not missing out on anything important!

I’m work in education too so paying the fine isn’t an option. If I had a regular job then I’d happily take holidays whenever and pay the fine. Although it does piss me off that the government feel I would be breaking the law by choosing to not send my child to school for a few days. DD occasionally has the odd INSET day which doesn’t match up so can sometimes make that work but it’s rare!

May half term is usually high as it's the bank holiday too so other people want to go then not just people with school age kids.
It's late to be booking May half term flights for a good price, the flights will have been out since June 18.

try flying to a non tourist airport like Milan prices much cheaper and driving to lake como; the italian riviera or even just south of venice Choggia or similar

I am sure flying to barcelona would be similar or Lyon

These debates are always interesting.

You realise that the price of the holiday during term time is the standard price, not jacked up to take advantage of you.

The cheaper prices during off peak times are to get people to go, otherwise there would be far fewer people travelling/staying.

This allows holiday firms/airlines/resorts to spread the large fixed costs that they have to cover. If you paid a single price all the time your holiday in peak times would be far, far more expensive.

Buy a flight in advance to somewhere warm but less well known so cheaper, and an Airbnb.

If you’re happy to take them out of school then just pay the fine. The school won’t care if they’ve got an otherwise good attendance. It’s not them that send the fine but LA

Surely, surely this isn't a shock?! School holidays are absolutely peak time to go away.

We don't and won't take our DC out of school for holidays. We:
Book in advance to take advantage of child free places etc
Book Sun Holidays or through Breakfree which do "local newspaper deals" - caravan holidays. Often only around £400 for 5 of us for a week in May half term
Go for short breaks when there is a Friday or Monday INSET day
Go the last week in August / first week in September
Avoid places like Centre Parcs
Use voucher codes (e.g. mumsnet has some for cottages or Hoseasons)
Travelodge, Premier Inns and YHA
Camping / glamping / AirBnb

There are lots of ways to make it more affordable.

IME it is worth devoting a few hours to shopping around, trying different combinations. PP mentions £1000 for a caravan for a week - if you have the time to try various combinations of dates, including the exact same dates booked at a 3 night plus a 4 night break, or look for privately owned caravans on the same site, or via an agent like Breakfree / Hosessons using a voucher code, it is nearly always possible to save significantly on that kind of headline price. When we booked Disneyland we saved £1400 off the price from the original site we looked at by taking a slightly different hotel package and departing from a different airport, then booking our flights separately and using Quidco. Yes it was time consuming (I spent perhaps 6 hours over 3 evenings,) but since a penny saved is a oenny earned it's a good hourly rate!

NHS and other public sector jobs often have schemes to prebuy vouchers for Thomas Cook etc or use a special booking link to save.