This is a long story so I’ll try to keep it concise! I’m looking for a solicitor in Leeds, Yorkshire that specialises in claims against private schools. Or for advice from any parents who have been in a similar situation to ours.
We have had ongoing problems with Moorlands School at Weetwood LS16 this year and are looking into legal action.
They state that a clause on their contract means they can get rid of any child for any reason so long as they give a terms notice. This clause means they don’t have to pay costs or credit parents for any financial losses caused by a child having to change schools suddenly.
History: We moved our son (now 12) to Moorlands for year 4 with the intention of keeping him there 5 years, until the end of year 8. Moorlands is an independent primary/prep school so provision went to year 8. He sat Common entrance 11+ and was due to stay and sit 13+ over two years.
At the end of year 6 we were called in to see the head as there were problems with small class numbers going through from year 6 to year 7. The head was meeting with parents individually to persuade them to keep their child in Moorlands for the 2 year Prep Schools Baccalaureate course in y7 &8. I repeated our intention to support the school and commit to the final 2 years. I asked the question “What if my son is the only child in year 7?” and the head assured me the year would go ahead with just one child! As it happened, a class of 5 made up year 7. During Y7, the school dropped the prep schools bac certificate without even telling us. But it still meant that our son would gain Common Entrance at 13 over the 2 year course.
However, just before Easter 2014, I had a call from the head to say they had already decided to close for year 8. This meant that our son’s class must find other schools, ie leave Moorlands a year early, half way through their common entrance course. The Moorlands decision came very late, after all the other schools had closed for applications. We reacted well and were very reasonable about the situation. We understood the school were in financial difficulties and needed to ditch the years that had the lowest pupil numbers, 7 & 8.
As we are both self employed this sudden need to find a new school so late in the academic year meant we had to take time off work unpaid to visit schools and take our son for entrance exams, taster days etc. We had to take him out of Moorlands some days for these visits. It was a very stressful time for us and our son. We had to cancel our summer holiday (mid July) because the start date for the new school’s year 8 was 30th June and we didn’t want our son to miss out by keeping him back until September. (The new school’s term time overlapped with when Moorlands were on summer holiday.)
We had always paid full fees at Moorlands and so wrote a long letter to the chair of governors to complain and request an unspecified amount to be offset against our final terms fees in lieu of lost income, missed days (whist on school visits), stress and inconvenience. I paid £1000 of the final terms fees and expected them to offer maybe £500 off, which we would have been happy with. Then we would have settled the remaining balance.
Our request was denied on the grounds that Moorlands had met their contractual agreement of giving us 1 terms notice of having to leave. As far as we could see, they simply wanted to get as much money as possible from us before our son left. There was no fairness or acknowledgment of our losses. The outstanding amount was around £2300, but Moorlands refused to make any allowance to us. Their written response did not address the matters we raised, it just said they were not able to give us a discount because they had given us a term’s notice.
Moorlands gave special dispensation to two families who were allowed to take their sons out of the school in the aftermath of the announcement – they were not forced to give the required term’s notice of leaving (They left for local state schools). Moorlands also made special arrangements for another child to be moved down into year 6 (instead of year 8) so she did not have to leave a year early.
At the end of the summer holidays we had still not reached agreement or had any further correspondence from them, so as it had been a while I just paid the remaining balance of £2300 to close the whole matter. A few days after this (early September) I started going through a pile of junk mail that had accrued over the holidays. In that pile, in a plain brown envelope, I found a county court judgement! Moorlands had instructed their solicitors, DWF, to sue us for the outstanding balance over the school holidays. But they hadn’t told us. We had not had any contact from Moorlands since June when I received an email reminder about the fees.
As the balance had already been paid, I contacted the court to discuss the judgement. Staff informed me that despite my payment, the school had not informed the court that the matter was closed. I complained to the school and they blamed DWF for not informing the court.
Today, 23rd Sept, I phoned the court again. They still have not been informed of our previous payment! They gave me a phone number for DWF and I left a complaint message and emailed Moorlands again.
Due to the way we have been treated we would like to discuss whether it’s possible to recover the fees we paid for Year 7. Had there been a possibility of our son being ejected from the school during the 2 year course we would never have kept him there! He could have gone to high school for year 7.
We feel that we were far too reasonable and understanding towards Moorlands and that they have taken advantage of our good will.