Absence Penalty Notice - parent contesting form

Prior to a Penalty Notice being issued due to unauthorised absence from school, the Local Authority  will have  received documents from the school with supporting evidence necessary to issue a Penalty Notice. The documents would often include letters being sent out by the school, attendance printouts and any evidence/correspondence received by the parent. We will have reviewed all the paperwork to ensure it met with our Code of Conduct and issued a Penalty Notice.

If you decide to contest your Penalty Notice, you should consider the following:

• there is no statutory right to appeal once a Penalty Notice has been issued by the Local Authority. If you consider that a Penalty Notice has been wrongly issued to you, you can make representation for it to be withdrawn. If it is not withdrawn, you must pay the penalty or you may be prosecuted for failing to ensure your child’s attendance at school
• once a Penalty Notice has been issued it may only be withdrawn in exceptional circumstances

What is a defence in law?

• the pupil was ill or prevented from attending by an unavoidable cause
• the pupil’s absence was authorised by the school or, in the case of alternative provision, by a person authorised to grant leave
• the absence was on a day exclusively set aside for religious observance by the religious body to which the parent belongs
• the Local Authority  is under a duty to provide transport to the school and failed to do so, as the distance from home to school is outside the Local Travel Agreement

95% of applications for education penalty notice to be withdrawn don’t succeed. Your application is unlikely to succeed if you are contesting for the following reasons;

• You took the child on leave in term time without applying to the school/or contacting the school for authorisation prior to leaving
• You disagree with the Head teacher’s decision to refuse authorisation of the leave
• You informed the school that child has been too ill to attend school regularly but have failed to provide the medical evidence requested by the school
• The child went abroad for medical treatment that can be provided with in the UK and was not authorised by the child’s qualified medical consultant
• A family member went abroad for medical treatment that can be provided in the UK and the child accompanied them
• The family went to a wedding during term time and the absence was not authorised
• The child went on unauthorised leave in term time, but their attendance is otherwise excellent
• You cannot afford to pay the penalty notice(s)

Before you begin

• It is important if you are relying on supporting evidence, this is attached to this form. We will not contact you to request any supporting information/ evidence and will review your file with the information provided. It is more likely without supporting evidence, the contest will not be upheld.
• If you contest the Penalty Notice during the payment period, the Penalty Notice will be put on hold and payment will not increase during the period
• If you have paid the Penalty Notice, we will not be able to look into your contest. This is due to when payment was made, you have discharged yourself from the offence and the matter is closed.
• Once a decision has been made, it is binding and we will not accept further correspondence. You will receive a standard response, generally within 5 days via email or post.

Read more about what happens if a child is absent from school without permission.