Moving house between admissios deadline and announcements

[AEJPM]

We're moving house (from London to Farnham, Surrey) sometime this summer. We haven't been able to find anything we like to buy yet so are planning to move to a rented house while we continue our search. The rented house is in the catchment of the school we'd like our daughters to go to, and we'd hope to find a house to buy in the catchment too but the catchments are very tight and the house we buy may be a few minutes further away. If we apply in Jan from our rented address and then find somewhere to buy before April, will we need to reapply with the new address, or does it just matter where you are on Jan 15th when you actually apply? What if we move between April and September (2017) when they'd start school? We don't want to get a place at the right school and then have to lose the place by moving at the wrong time! Thanks!

We moved between application deadline in January and the allocation date. i think it may vary slightly between LAs so check the new LA policy about when then can accept unforseen/change of address changes.

You will need to apply to the LA you are living in at the time of application even if you are applying for schools in another LA. Then once you have moved, you contact the new LA and the old LA and tell them you have moved and they will transfer the application, they may need proof of new address. For our new LA, so long as we gave them the new address by 21 March which was the day they started to allocate the places they accepted our application on time. We applied for schools in the new area in January then thankfully sold our house and moved before the end of March. We got our first preference in the new area.

I think if you actually want to change your preferences you have to do a new application, but i would just speak to the new LA and check their policy, they should also be able to give you cut off dates (i.e allocation date).

The risk you run is that the LA thinks that you rented purely to get a place at your preferred school. This would allow them to treat your application as intentionally misleading and remove any place that was offered. I would strongly recommend talking to the LA about what you are doing and making sure you get everything in writing. After any phone call send them an email giving your understanding of what was discussed as otherwise you won't have a written record. You will need this evidence if the LA says one thing to you and then does something different.

Thanks - yes my concern is that it will look like an intentional plan to get into the right catchment even though it isn't - I'd much prefer just to buy somewhere now if we could find the right place!

Our LA says we need to keep them informed of changes to address all the way up to start date in September 2016! We are in a similar situation to you as we moved from London to Trafford and are renting, so we either need to stay put until September or buy a house that is still nearer than where we live now (or at least within the last admission distance which I haven't yet found out, guessing the department is fairly busy this week and we haven't found a house yet so it's a moot point!).

Wow - so potentially we'd need to stay wherever we were renting until Sept 2017 even if we found an amazing house? It sounds like I'd better speak to the council about it and find out their exact view - although as you say, they're likely to be busy this week :(

If you look on their website you should find their admissions policy or booklet - outs was called "starting primary school in 2016" or something like that. Yes, I'd assumed we could move after getting the place allocated but only read that later. Tbh e don't want to leave any further away from the school as ideally want walking distance if possible. Good luck!

Thanks. The admissions policy does talk about moving house but seems to concentrate on pie pole who move after Jan and then want to use the new address as opposed to people who move but don't want to! Will go back and research the small print again. We don't want to be further away either, but don't know what houses will come up yet so might be a few minutes closer or further away...

Don't rely just on published information. They may have ways of dealing with this situation that aren't documented in their admission arrangements. And they are less likely to regard your move as suspicious if you are open and up front about what you are doing and why.

You need to check carefully what the policy is. For our LA, we moved to Trafford (into a rented house) about a month before the January deadline for applications (this is a few years ago). We had to have at least a 12 month tenancy agreement and had to have disposed of our previous property (in another area). We had to submit this evidence with the application form to demonstrate the rented house was our "permanent address".

Your LA should set out what the process is of you move - if its not clear on the website, then ring them and check. Our LA says that the child's priority may change. They are concerned that people rent in catchment for places and then move out of catchment.