Late application

[Whyisitsohardtochoseausername]

I am feeling awful here, I am that mum who didn't do the secondary application on time I was just hours late!
The guilt is eating away at me, I feel awful. We had to isolate, not been able to view schools, business going to pot, I'm on new meds for my stress and the school application just totally slipped my mind. I know this is no excuse, I feel truly awful.
I have tried to persuade the council to accept it as an "on time" application and given reasons as to why it was late but they aren't having any of it. So, my child won't find out which school she is going to until May.
The top preference is a very popular school, we do have a sibling link. The school doesn't work with catchment areas and sibling link is number 2 on the admissions policy.
To help me put my mind at ease can anyone tell me of their experiences with a late application? Am I likely to still get the first choice? Surely I am not the only one :(:(:(

You probably won't get it on results day as your application will only be processes once all the on time applications have been handled and allocations made. You will likely get a place off the waiting list though as you have a sibling link so will likely be at the top of the list but it may take extra time until the second round of applications is processed.

If you have a sibling link and are obviously happy with the school why did you wait to submit the application if it was always going to be first choice - you could have done it the day the applications opened in september?

Unless this is an undersubscribed school, it’s likely that all the places will be filled from on-time applications. You are then likely to be high on the waiting list, as waiting lists are held in oversubscription criteria order. This isn’t what you want to hear, but where schools are oversubscribed making a late application has significant consequences.

Yes agree with others, if the school itself is oversubscribed with first-choices, then all places will be filled from those.

I would imagine you will be placed on the waiting list, and with a sibling link you will be high on it. Depends how much movement there typically is - do a lot of people get a state place but then opt for private? Is there a lot of movement as in people moving house/fluid population (more common in larger towns)? Or is it the kind of school where people are so happy to get a place they are unlikely to move?

How big is the intake? I would imagine for you, the bigger, the better, as it increases the chance of someone moving away from the area or otherwise changing their mind.

It's nothing to do with first preferences. People who have listed the school as their 2nd, 3rd or whatever preference will still get places if they applied in time and if it's the highest preference of all the schools for which they meet the oversubscription criteria. It's only once all the in-time applications have been processed - not just the first prerefences - that late applications will be considered. That's why OP is unlikely to get a place immediately, unless the school is under-subscribed.

Yes of course you are quite right, I was thinking about people fir whom this school is the first available preference.

What I mean is, a school may be oversubscribed but all those who put it somewhere on their form may not actually end up going there. But if it is oversubscribed as you say, with ppl who end up with it as their best available choice, then that's the issue.