Are school fines for holiday still a thing

[imfineimreallyfine]

So schools still fine for a holiday and if so how many sessions have to be missed to qualify for a fine?

Were thinking of a week at the start of the summer holidays but the week before is so much cheaper. If it's less than a week to avoid a fine we could go mid week.

Any info on the latest for this? I don't really want to call sick if I can avoid it as the children will be excited and will probably say something anyway.

Yes. The government are having a crackdown on attendance (90 page document has been released for schools for September). Our council is fining again & our Trust is focussed on it.
You can be fined when 10 sessions (5 days) has been taken - can be within a 12 week period although the council may look at your overall year attendance when deciding whether to fine. Sneaky way round it is to attend registration on Monday am and then pick up after so 9 sessions off. 😉

Yes fines are definitely likely IMO.

Yup. Back with a bang!

Go midweek before end of term and call them in sick

I would

Just don't post holiday photos on social media - which you would t want to do for your house insurance sake anyway

Post them randomly during school holidays "what a lovely holiday we had" as no one can say what /when / where then ...

Put in 'school attendance fine' and it will take you to your local council. The fine can be £60 a day to each parent. It depends on if the school flags it up.

Is it up to the school to escalate the non attendance then?

Don't phone them in sick, don't try and hide it, the truth will come out and you'll just look like a dick. Be upfront with school about when you're going and why, they might approve it, they might not, just factor a potential £60 fine into the cost of your holiday (and even with that it'll probably still be cheaper than going in the school holidays).

FWIW, DC school has just approved my friend's term time holiday on the grounds that even with five days off their DC attendance would still be above the threshold required for a fine (currently 92% in our LA) and she's going to take her out of school anyway so why create negativity by declining it? They did state that if the child's attendance was to drop between now and July then the decision would be reconsidered. We have also had our term time holiday approved with an email from DH manager saying that the week have booked is the only solid block of leave/full week available to him, it was approved on the grounds that we wouldn't be able to go away elsewhere in the year.

Check your local authority rules. In our area fines are issued after 4.5 days have been missed. So as others have said you can collect child after registration AM or PM to reduce the amount of sessions missed. The fine is not up to the school. It is issued by the local authority. Headteachers can only permit absences in certain situations and unfortunately a cheaper holiday is not considered a valid reason. They won't authorise it but that doesn't mean you can't go, you will just need to factor the fine into you holiday costs.

The LA set a threshold for attendance and school has to forward details of any children who exceed it. You still might not get fined though, it depends on whether the absences are authorised or not and on any extenuating circumstances. Someone I know was due to go away in the holidays to see family in their home country, their flights were changed by the airline and the new flights were two days before half term began returning one day after school resumed. School refused it, they went anyway, details were passed to the LA. The LA declined to issue a fine as they accepted it as extenuating circumstances even though school had said it wasn't, all they did was issue a letter reminding them of the importance of attendance.

Pretty sure ours fine after 8 missed sessions,across a 10 week period.

@Ponoka7 it’s not £60 a day anywhere that’s complete nonsense. It’s £60 per parent per absence. Fines almost always are for more than 9 sessions.

So maybe just easier to call them in sick. If you tell them
You're in holiday and they refuse will be obvious if they are then sick the same
Times

Don't call in sick for the last week of term. You would be acting as if you think the school are completely stupid. It is disrespectful to the teacher too who may have planned activities based on certain groups. Furthermore your child wont be able to come home with all their books etc as these get collated up along with work from the wall etc.

Just be polite. 'I am taking Jonny out, I realise this is likely to be unathorised.'

@LilacPoppy theyre just fixed penalty notices so technically they could really if they wanted to.

of course it’s not £60 a day🙄…..my DD was told to expect to pay £60 for a 6 week trip to Australia….. in the end she wasn’t fined at all

I thought this is what staff expected parents to do - call in sick like an u spoken rule

It's not £60 a day. Its £60 per 'offence'. Per child and per parent though. So £240 for two kids in a two parent household.

If this still works out cheaper than going the following week then you won't lose financially.

But don't lie. Just tell the truth and suck up the fine.

Yes.

I'm so glad I live in Wales. Its really not a thing here. Nearly everyone takes their kids out for a week in term time. Never heard anyone jeing fined. We are taking them out for 4.5 days next week, just to be sure they can't fine us, as it has to be 5 days.

I think it depends on the school. My school have always been very reasonable. I have had holidays agreed on by school or if not agreed officially, they have agreed unofficially. However these were only long weekends so my DD only missed a couple of days. I am planning to go away after the 11+ for a week in October and I am expecting it will be fine.

I think it's worth being honest about it.

We had to go abroad - family illness - which meant taking the kids out of school for the last week of term.

I went to the headmaster and said, "Look, we're going to do this - so what do you need me to say to you that causes us all the least hassle and cost? I mean, it if it costs us money, fine. But I don't want you to get grief about it from the LA, and I'd prefer that we didn't kick off a whole bureaucratic process that'll cause grief for us."

And he said, "Write me a letter in which you say <keyword>, <keyword> and <set phrase>, and I'll approve it. I hope everything goes well."

Admittedly this wasn't for a holiday - but I find that reasonable people tend to respond to reasonable circumstances. And even if the head doesn't think the request is reasonable, it's better to be upfront about it and pay the fine than to try and pull a fast one in order to save a few quid, especially if the fine is cheaper than booking flights a few days later.

It helps, incidentally, if your kids' previous attendance record is pretty spotless.

Yes they are still a thing. I would either take the fine or call in sick.