Help! Primary admissions disaster - advice please!

[maidename]

Hoping those in the know can help.

We moved into a London borough from another one on the tenth of February. The new borough's admissions information states that as long as you send documentation of move before the 13th February the application will still count as an on time application. So we applied from old borough before the deadline on the 15th January but for six schools in new borough as advised by the new borough. We sent documentation to new borough on the 12th. I called on the same day to confirm they had received it and they found my email and confirmed and the guy I spoke to said it was fine I did not need to do anything else. I got an email from them on the 16th of February confirming they got My documentation. So I assumed all was fine and I did not hear from them since.
Then today I get an email from the old borough informing me they are sorry they cannot offer me any of my choices but offered me a school in the old borough. So it seems new borough has not registered my move? There is no way my son can attend the school offered in the old borough as its a 45min drive if you are lucky during this the school rush hour sometimes an hour if there is traffic. What in the world do I do? I mean can I even appeal if they don't have my new address or did not at the time of decision? Should I make a late reply with new address so at least I am on the waiting lists immediately even if I still appeal as waiting for that any places that come up before appeal with of course be taken up by those on the waiting list. The letter said I was automatically put on the waiting list but obviously if they have not registered my new address that will not help because I it is miles away.
Gosh last thing I wanted was to get involved in an appeal process! Seems an agonizing experience. And wait for that matter! I will of course call the council tomorrow but I suspect I am not the only one that will be calling. And to make thing worse I am off on holidays tomorrow for three weeks where time difference is seven hours. Shoot me already! That will be a nice relaxing holiday!

The first thing is to contact your current borough and find out if they are making an offer. It could be that the offer from your old borough is a mistake and that a correct offer is in the pipeline. If not you need to appeal on the basis that a mistake has been made. Your new borough has acknowledged receipt of your documentation so it is clear that something has gone wrong. Even if they treated you as a late applicant they should have used your new address.

So in the morning you should ring the admissions team at your current borough and ask them if they are offering you a place. If the answer is not, ask them for an explanation. Make notes of the conversation then send a summary to them in an email. You can use that as evidence of what was discussed if necessary.

Thank you prh47. (You have helped me before;-)

I thought there must be some mistake and old borough just does not know. But have not heard anything from new borough at all and since we applied online on the pan London e-admissions website which I would imagine is to have all the information centrally and avoid problems like this, I am thinking they just never got round to updating their records as this would have to be done manually so I have simply fallen out of their system. I will definitely be calling them. But if they have made a mistake and not added me will they be able to do that without having to go through the appeal? I imagine they have allocated all the places now.

If you are lucky they will realise their mistske and offer the place you would have been offered without going to an appeal. Unfortunately they might just admit the mistake and make you go to appeal anyway before giving you the place.

Have you given up all links to the old house? I wonder if it's possible that someone thought you may be playing the system to get into a more preferred school? If that was the case they may use your old address? I am not saying you are doing that, I am just trying to work out what could have happened.

Apologies, new to this and posted in the wrong place!!!

But if they have made a mistake and not added me will they be able to do that without having to go through the appeal

They can and they should but I'm afraid my experience is that most LAs will force you to appeal.

Luckily all sorted now. I spoke to the council and was first told that the person who was supposed to update their system probably had not done this and I should send in my documentation again and be put on the waiting lists. However I refused and kept on reiterating that the council must had made a mistake and I had proof that I had done all I was supposed to. So he got my details again and promised to deal with it. Somebody else then called back saying they had investigated and yes I had done what I was supposed to do and apologized several times saying they deLt with thousands of applications so some were bound to slip through the net. I was then offered my first choice there and then. So an amazing outcome and so much easier than having to appeal etc.
I think at the end of the day the appeal process is expensive and bothersome for them so if they can avoid it and know they messed up they will. I suspect they must even hold some places to allocate to 'mistakes'as there would have been no place to give me had they allocated them all.
So I guess best thing if you know you are in the right to persevere. If I did not I would have been put on waiting lists.
Thanks for your replies!

They DONT keep places back just in case someone makes a mistake. If no one else drops out you may well find your dc in a class of 31!

Glad it is sorted.

They absolutely do not keep places back though. How would that even work? The class will just be 31 (or no one will get a place off the waiting list until at least 2 decline)

Hallelujah here is a LA that knows when it screwed up, and thanks to the power of MN, with a parent forearmed with knowledge, forces their hand to correct their mistake.

If the parent had been less forceful, I wonder what the outcome would have been?

That's good news. We've seen a few reports this year of LAs admitting mistakes and allocating places without needing an appeal. I hope this trend continues.

We had similar....but the borough phoned up, unprompted, themselves, to tell us they'd made a mistake. I was quite impressed that they'd do that, actually. I think we sometimes forget that the school allocation people are not evil. They basically want to do a good job and make a best fit situation for as many people as possible.

I wonder whether budget cuts and lack of school places has made it more likely that LAs will admit if they've made an obvious mistake. It must me cheaper not to have to go to an appeal you are going to lose anyway, and it's a legitimate way of increasing some classes over 30 which frees up places elsewhere for unplaced children.