change of address after reception allocation - how does it work?

[bluesky124]

Hello all,

Our son has been allocated a place in a good school recently. Just before the allocation was announced, we moved to a new place, which is not far from our old place.

We are happy with the allocation based on our old address and wont like to change it if possible. Can someone please advise what is the usual course of action of the councils in these circumstances.

Many thanks

Check your LA website.

Generally you need to call them to advise of your change of address.

You will need to provide 3 months worth of bills to show your current address when you go to fill in the forms before term starts (or at least you do in my borough) and if your address is different then you could have problems especially if the school is oversubscribed.

Thanks for your reply. I could not exact answer to my query on surrey county website. This is what the LA website says:

"If you provide evidence to our Admissions team before 14 February 2014, your new address will be used in the initial allocation of school places on 16 April 2014. If you move after 14 February 2014 your previous address will be used for initial allocation purposes on 16 April 2014. But your new address will be used for waiting lists after the initial allocation date."

On the basis of what you have said there will not be a problem, you have moved and you moved well after the cut off date in January, so the correct procedure was to use the old address for school place allocation, which has happened.
The only problem is if the address you were in was a short term let, which may well cause some raised eyebrows at the LA and some pointed questions about the previous rental.

admission, I was secretly wishing for getting a reply from you also, thank you so much. We lived for four years at our previous address, in fact our son was born in our previous rented house :)

I am thinking about calling the council admission office tomorrow to further clarify the situation. Do you think I should notify them change of address asap or should wait for some time.

Notify them ASAP. If you delay it may look like you are trying to hide something. As you have been there 4 years I doubt you will face any problems.

I think some areas may be different. In our admissions guide under the statement you have quoted there is the following additional comment:

Please note that any offer of a place will be made on the basis that the information provided will still be current at the start of the term that your child will be due to take up the place. If, for example, an agreement expires prior to this, we will require further verification at a later date, even if this is after a place has been offered.

So in your case the address they allocated your school based on would not be the one that your child will be in in September so they could reallocate the place -in my area not yours obviously.

No, even in your area they could not reallocate the place (assuming you are in England). The Admissions Code is very specific about the circumstances in which an offer can be withdrawn. A change of address is not grounds for withdrawing an offer. Any LA or school that foolish enough to withdraw an offer based purely on a change of address is clearly in breach of the Admissions Code. Getting the offer reinstated should be straightforward.

So should that statement not be in the admissions guide? It is in the current RBWM one?
When they say -even after a place is offered-it suggests that the place could be taken away? am I reading it incorrectly?

The wording only says they will require further verification, not that the place will be taken away automatically. I think all they are doing is saying that a change of address will lead them to check that you didn't apply from a short term let in order to get a place at a popular school, for example. That is valid. If the second sentence said, "If, for example, an agreement expires prior to this, we will withdraw any offer that has been made based on the original address" that would be wrong.

To put it another way, the LA cannot remove a place simply because you have moved. However, if the move reveals that you used a false or misleading address on your original application they can remove the place. I think that is all RBWM are saying.

I see. Thank you very much. That is clearer.

just for the benefit of anyone else reading this thread in future, I have confirmed with the LA admissions helpline that due to any address move after the date of application, LA can't force anyone to drop admission allocation if they are happy with the allocation as per the old address. All I have to do is to inform the relevant school about the change of address. Thank you so much all, for such a meaningful and helpful discussion.