Applying for primary schools and appeals

[Emzun]

Hi all. I'm really trying to get some information. I am currently going through the appeals process to try and get my daughter into a primary school but feel I have been failed from the start by the admissions team.
How do you know how and when to apply for a primary school place. In January a friend asked which schools I had applied for. I responded by telling her that I hadn't applied. I assumed that I would receive a letter telling me what I needed to do. (first and only child) I googled it and found something on line so I registered and found I only had a few days left in which to apply.
This put me under some pressure so I spent time researching ofsted reports and chose my schools. I thought that there was an obligation to give me one of my chosen schools. I now know how stupid this was but I honestly had no clue. Is my case the norm or should I have received some sort of letter informing me of what to do and how the allocation process works?
Needless to say I am now in a position where I have been allocated the one school I desperately did not want.
Any information will be gratefully received. Thanks

Your council has no duty to send you a letter telling you how to apply for school places - until you apply, how do they know you have a child of (or coming up to) school age? Or that you're not planning to home educate or send them to a private school?

I don't think you have a valid complaint about your application, it's entirely up to the parent to research and apply for school places on time.

Now you've been allocated a school you're not happy with, though, you can join waiting lists for schools you would be happier with and see whether a place comes up at one of those before September. Depending on where you live, there's normally a fair amount of movement before term starts.

Where I am, information leaflets are sent home via pre-schools and there are notices up all over the place - on community noticeboards, in libraries, in the local paper etc. And of course parents talk about the school applications coming up. As PP says the council don't have a record of every child coming up to school age - so they can't contact each person directly. The information on-line (for my LEA at least, I assume the same everywhere) is the same as the information leaflet, so you haven't missed out on anything, and it does clearly talk about not necessarily getting a place at a school you have named and choosing preferences sensibly.

I suspect your grounds for appeal on the basis of insufficient information won't stand up unless you can show your LEA has done none of the above. As PP says, your best move is probably to put yourself on waiting lists for as many schools as you can/want.