super worry about my daughter school

[Fandango12]

Hi,

my family and myself (2 kids, 5 years and 15 months) has recently moved in Bristol where we bought a new property in a very good area (we do love it). The agency estate reassured us the property would be ready by the end of august. We then made an in year application using the address of the new property. Luckily we did have a good place offer for our daughter. For unforeseen circumstances (i.e. uneven common areas) the developer didn't let us in and apologise offering a temporary accommodation which is quite fare from the actual school. He is paying for it. We are hoping to go into our new house very soon, hopefully in a few weeks. We gave the new address to the school which passed it on to the school admission office which contacted me querying about this new address. I sent then the exchange contract and the agency estate letter confirming that we bought the property and I offered to get a letter form the developer to prove that we are living in a temporary accommodation for the above reasons and that we are going back in a few weeks if possible
We obviously are not cheating but I'm still panicking a bit Should I be worry? Do you think we have done anything wrong and what can then happen? It would seem a non sense to me to send my daughter to a school near to the temporary accommodation for then trying to move her close to where we bought our property. Am I right?

I don't think you have done anything wrong.

Thank you very much…I'm so worry! I know it could sound silly but I do not want my daughter to have any problem or her place to be put at risk by this I'm also a bit cross with the agency estate……

You need one of the admissions experts on here.
Can I clarify, had you exchanged contracts/completed when you applied for the school? I'm not really sure but I thought you had to have actually moved to the area before you could apply for the school.

I am not one of the experts, but my understanding is that as long as you have been honest about what stage your house purchase was at, you shouldn't have a problem. If (big if!) a mistake has been made, and you shouldn't have been offered the place, that makes it the council's fault and not yours.

Whereas if you withheld information from the council, and made an application confirming that you actually lived at the address in question, then you might have a problem.

Thank you, everybody for the reply.
Our situation is slightly peculiar: we lived in a different area ( about 3 hours form Bristol until july 2014) and we bought the property as we wanted to live in that specific spot of Bristol. we were promised the property would be available not later the end of august (I sent this letter to the School office yesterday as a proof along with the exchange). So when we applied for the school I owend the property but was living in Bristol yet.|(the ap[plication was done within the 6 weeks from when my daugehtr was supposed to start year 1) The application was done after buying the property though and not before! we cannot afford to pay the morgage and to rent a property close to the area of the school.
Once the developer told us the property was not ready mainly due to uneven common area I wanted to die!!! He then offered to pay a temporary accomodation. By the way at that time (end of august I was not offered a place in that school). We then moved to the temporary accomodation (end of august,we were told for a few weeks) and on the 2nd of september the school rung us offering a place and we accepted!
I have read the policy yesterday night again and I realise it says to apply once you live in that house/flat, but If I moved from a different city it makes sense to apply as soon as tehre is acontract for iether rent or for salerent or do I have to wait? why? My understanding of the aim of the policy is to discourage or avoid cheating (people ginving either false addresses or renting something for a bit and then moving out). We have not done that: we genuinly bought a property (we do no have anything else in Bristol)and we are paying for it! So what were we supposed to do? Applying again using the address of the temporary accomodation (knowing we would be there for a few weeks!) and then (a few weeks later) applying againg for a different school or worse moving bakc to our area? Is this not what the school admission is trying to prevent or discourage. I know our case is perhaps debatable, but I still think the policy is extremely rigid and perhaps does not take in to account cases like us. Sorry for the long message, but really stressed and worry...keep thinking about the fact that we'd love to be in our house and It'd have sorted all problems out!

I seem to remember other threads on here saying you can apply after exchange. Which is what you did.

And this would be the case applying in the normal admissions round.

However outside of the admissions round you can apply for an in year transfer to any school who can offer you a place if they have one. You could live anywhere. It's only if they are full with a waiting list that where you live really matters because the admissions criteria determine where on the list you go.

I would have thought they'd be reasonable about this but they might want to check up on the situation again later to see what's changed.

Just checking some facts...

• you owned the house on 2nd September (or earlier, if they took until 2/9 to communicate an offer from the waiting list of a place that came up earlier)
• you can't live in it and are being provided with alternative accommodation

I think you can make the case that the house is your main residence (in particular, the main residence of your child), despite the fact that you have never lived there. As you say, you are in temporary accommodation (as you would be in case of flood etc).

In which case, the 2nd September offer was based on your main address and should stand. It would be different if you bought a perfectly habitable house in one part of the city but rented a flat next door to the school, for example.

you are doing nothing wrong. You have accepted a place which has been rightfully offered. Dont worry