Is poor communication from London private prep schools now standard?

[CommunicationNation]

FWIW, we are located in London. I have reached out to four private prep schools, this includes emails and telephone calls. The communication has been dire, with 3 out of 4 not bothering to contact me back (I contacted them before Easter), and the 1 that did contact me back promised a phone call the following day which never materialised.

These schools aren’t cheap, they are all in the region of £30k+. Is this just standard practice that private schools do not respond or are poor communicators? I have heard great things about these schools and they are well regarded locally, but I feel as though I am harassing them to take my money, when it should be the other way around! There is the other possibility that I could have been blacklisted, though I have no idea why, none of these schools have met me or my DC before.

If you don't get a response today I would look elsewhere. This disregard could lead to resentment of the school, so not the beginnings of a positive relationship.

No response today - I’m going to be contacting other schools next week.

Have you phoned them as well? At a school where a friend works the system won’t let any gmail email addresses through unless they have given specific permission for that particular email address. Others sometimes get bounced into spam etc.

Have you phoned them yet? I wouldn’t write these schools off yet if you haven’t. It may be old fashioned but it’s one of those times I would always start with a phone call and then email to follow up. Nor would I contact other schools next week via email. Call first, probably around 10/11 so you get the receptionist after morning drop off chaos but before lunch. If they’re positive about potential spaces then confirm on the phone what the next steps and ask for an email address to follow up with- it may differ from the one on the website (schools aren’t always the best at updating these things) and it’ll mean they’ll be looking out for your email and it won’t be redirected to a spam folder.