School trip cancelled deposit not returned

loopylooby

Hey all. I need some advice please if anyone knows anyone who might be able to give me some insight about how to proceed forward before I go back to the school. 

My eldest daughter is in year 6 and the school have always organised a residential trip for the year 6’s. Back in November the school said they were going to do one again for this July. We all paid a non refundable deposit of £66 in November and started paying the remaining balance in instalments (some have paid in full). 

Today we all receive an email from the school saying that unfortunately they need to cancel the trip due to not having enough staff to make the trip safe and viable. They also told us that unless the venue can get another school to attend on the same dates, we will all lose our deposits!!! To add to this, all the kids were told yesterday that the reason that there is not enough staff is because of the amount of SEN children planning on going meaning they need more staff as it’s a 1 teacher to 1 SEN child requirement

My thoughts on this - surely they would have known how many children were going and who these children were (whether or not they were SEN) BEFORE they send the non refundable deposit to the venue. Why at this point had they not checked the staffing requirements and availability before sending all of our money over? Should the school not be held accountable as this is there oversight?

Secondly, how awful to tell the children that it is because of the amount of SEN children going meaning that there isn’t enough staff. This may cause resentment as the kids have been really looking forward to this.  

Any advice welcome please 

Time2count

In terms of the timing, it could be a teacher/ TA who had signed up to go now possibly finds themselves pregnant/ ill(thinking long term like a new diagnosis of MH condition or kidney disease)/ has a friend's engagement party/ their own childcare has fallen through/ just been informed and operation they need will hopefully be in june-july etc. It could also be 1 of the children who's signed up has just received a diagnosis which they didn't officially have in November.
The problem is, the deposit is non-refundable, which you stated yourself. If the venue can't get the booking taken over they will be losing out. The further payments should be refundable.
The school should have trip insurance and may be able to claim on that, but would depend on numbers, the excess might make the claim impractical.
Depending on where your school is located, maybe you could suggest to the head that there could be a number of free trips that week in July to make up for it.
You could also ask the head if the trip could go ahead if a parent is able to attend - there's plenty of time for the vetting process. Or if part of a trust is there another local school that could offer a staff member to step in (not ideal as they won't know the children). Just check with the head if all options have been explored, I've known 1 of the office staff to go on the residential at 1 school and even a meal time supervisor from another (I'm sure that would come with an overtime cost though!).

In terms of the discussion with the children, that's terrible! All they had to tell them was the adult:child ratio wasn't adequate. The kids aren't daft, they know who the SEN children are and they could end up blaming them. That is def a point to bring up with the head.

silvercar

Define "non refundable". Does it mean that if you and your child pull out, you don't get your deposit back or does it mean if the school cancels the trip you don't get your deposit back? If it wasn't clear that the latter applies I would take it to mean the former. If the school messes up, but you were prepared for your child to go, I think it wrong that the school doesn't refund your deposit. The school shouldn't have paid out any money until it knew it had sufficient staff for the trip.

How far you want to push this may depend on whether it is your youngest/ only child in Year 6. 

RobfromCornwall

You need to look again at (or ask to see) the school's terms and conditions regarding trips.

My instinct is that if the school cancel the trip (for whatever reason) then they should refund.  If it were for events outside of their control, then they would be able to claim on insurance - although that doesn't seem to be the case here.  What refund they do or don't get from the venue is irrelevant and entirely up to them to pursue.  

When challenging the school over this you want to deal with the two things quite separately:

1. The cancellation of the trip and the refund you are expecting (after checking the terms and conditions).  These things happen and are rarely anyone's fault, although unfortunate.  

2. How the students were told of the reasons for the cancellation.  From what you say, the communication should just have been 'we unfortunately can no longer staff this trip' rather than seeming to 'blame' too many SEN students for signing up.  This is probably just one member of staff messing up and speaking out of turn, so the school needs to ensure that does not happen again. 

Newly_retired

In my experience the school will probably have had to pay a deposit to the centre to secure the dates, probably long before the list of pupils was complete, but they should have insurance to cover this. 
Check the T & Cs re your deposit. You did say it was non-refundable. Normally that would be if you cancelled, or if your child behaved in a way that the staff felt unable to take him/her, not if the school cancelled the whole trip.
I agree that the way the decision was communicated was crass, but that is a separate issue.

pollypenny

I'm wondering whether the TAs hadn't realised that they'd be working until the pupils' bedtimes.  During a normal school day, a TA woukd finish at the end of that day.  

No one is paid extra on school holidays or day trips, even though they'd be on duty from 7 to11.  TAs are poorly paid anyway. 

pinkshoes

pollypenny said:

I'm wondering whether the TAs hadn't realised that they'd be working until the pupils' bedtimes.  During a normal school day, a TA woukd finish at the end of that day.  

No one is paid extra on school holidays or day trips, even though they'd be on duty from 7 to11.  TAs are poorly paid anyway. 

They would have known! That's why teachers go free on trips as it's 7am til midnight most days!!

The school need to refund if they cancelled. I have organised a trip and wanted cancel someone going due to SEN needs and their demands at a late stage that were impossible to meet. The school would have had to refund and take the money from elsewhere.

The school should refund ALL money paid including the deposit. This will have to be taken from another pool of school money. It will probably be cheaper to CRB check a parent to go on the trip!!

maman

I agree it was crass for the school to 'blame' too many SEN pupils wishing to attend if that's the way it was explained to pupils. 

I think the best advice I've read is to ask if taking volunteer parent helpers would help to solve the problem.

I've attended many such residential visits and once had to recruit my DH as a helper when a TA had a family bereavement at the last minute. 

flipper_72

At the school I work at it is becoming more and more difficult to find enough staff to go on trips and residentials whilst also having enough staff for the school to continue functioning. As budgets get cut year on year we don’t replace staff leaving which stretches everyone. A risk assessment will have been written before the trip and I presume on this occasion the assessment assumed that the SEN children would choose not to attend, many children with SEN needs would find staying away from home too difficult to cope with, so it wouldn’t be an unreasonable assumption. The outcome is they don’t have enough staff to go. Hopefully they have explored every avenue. On our last residential we took two governors and a member of the office staff, the one before that we had two adult children of staff members (fully checked) alongside a governor and two office staff. We try not to take parents as we feel the children of those parents have a very different experience, however I think we will end up having to go that route soon.

prowla

Did you pay the school or the travel company?