School attendance

Children must get a full-time education that meets their needs — either by attending school or through home education. This is legally required under Section 7 of the Education Act 1996.

Children must start full-time education from the school term after their fifth birthday. They must stay in full-time education until the last Friday in June in the school year they turn 16.

Parents are legally required to make sure their children attend school regularly. This means your child must attend school on every day their school requires them to. Your child's school will tell you what days you child needs to attend and how to tell them if your child is going to be absent or late.

You could get a fine or be prosecuted if your child is missing school without authorisation.

You can only allow your child to miss school if:

• They're too ill to go in
• You've got advance permission for their absence from the school's headteacher
• They're entitled to free school transport, and the Council has failed to provide this transport
• There is an unavoidable reason for their absence, which you should discuss with the school

If your child is going to miss all or part of the school day, you must tell the school. If you don't tell them, they may mark it as an unauthorised absence — even if there's a good reason for your child missing school.

The school's headteacher is the only person who can authorise absence. When deciding whether to authorise your child's absence, they will consider the individual circumstances for the request.

Children who are ill

If your child is too ill to attend school, you should contact the school on the first day of absence. If they're off school for more than one day, you should keep in regular contact with the school throughout this time.

If your child attends school but is too ill to complete the school day, the school will contact you.

Extra support is available if your child can't go to school for long periods because of a health issue. You should contact your child's school for further information and advice.

Find further guidance regarding when to keep your child off school via the NHS website.

Medical appointments

Your child can miss school to get urgent medical or dental treatment.

You should avoid taking your child out of school for non-urgent medical or dental appointments as far as possible. Try to schedule doctor's and dentist's appointments after school or during the school holidays.

If a medical appointment during school hours is unavoidable, you should speak to your child's headteacher. You should also try to minimise disruption to your child's school day.

Leave in term-time

You must get permission from the headteacher if you want to take your child out of school during term-time. Schools will only agree to this in exceptional circumstances.

You can be fined for taking your child out of school during term-time without the headteacher's permission. For example, if you want to take them on holiday. This is because it is an unauthorised absence.

You should contact your child's school for information about requesting term-time leave.

Your child might not want to go to school for several reasons. For example, it could be because they:

• Feel anxious
• Are falling behind in their schoolwork
• Have fallen out with a friend, or miss a friend who has moved away
• Don't feel motivated at school
• Are being bullied

If you're having trouble getting your child to go to school, tell the school as soon as possible so that they can work with you to help your child.

Try and understand why your child doesn't want to attend school. You can find information about school anxiety on the JustOneNorfolk website. This includes advice on:

• Talking to your child about why they don't want to go to school
• Helping them overcome the difficulties they're experiencing

It can be difficult to convince a child to go somewhere that makes them feel anxious or negative. It's still important to encourage your child to go to school — these feelings might get stronger the longer they're absent from school, making it harder for them to return.

What to do if your child is being bullied

If your child is being bullied, keeping your child off school will not resolve the issue.

Talk to your child's class teacher. They will work with you to support your child and resolve the situation.

Some cases of bullying can take a while to resolve. It's essential your child continues to attend school to avoid any further issues — like falling behind in their schoolwork.

Read more about what to do if your child is being bullied.

Unauthorised absence is when:

• Your child is absent or late for school without a good reason. Find out when your child can miss school.
• There is a good reason for your child missing school, but you don't tell the school that your child is going to be absent or late

If your child is regularly missing school without authorisation, the school will work with you to improve their attendance.

Every school has access to an Attendance and Entitlement Officer. They can give you help and advice about your child's school attendance. You can contact them by:

• Email: csattendance@norfolk.gov.uk
• Phone: 01603 223681

Legal action to enforce school attendance

The school's headteacher may decide to take legal action if:

• Your child is regularly missing school without authorisation
• You take your child out of school without getting the headteacher's authorisation in advance

This means you could get a fine or be prosecuted under Section 444 of the Education Act 1996 and Section 23 of the Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003.

When making their decision, the headteacher will consider whether there are exceptional reasons for your child's absence from school.

They may decide to take legal action even if this is your child's first unauthorised absence.

If the headteacher decides to take legal action, they will refer your case to the Council's attendance team. They can:

• Give you a fixed penalty notice for unauthorised absence
• Give you an Education Supervision Order
• Prosecute you in the magistrate's court

Read more about legal action to enforce school attendance on GOV.UK.

A fixed penalty notice is an alternative to prosecution in the magistrate's court. It gives you the opportunity to pay a fine for committing an offence, instead of being taken to court and prosecuted.

Norfolk County Council issues fixed penalty notices for unauthorised absence from school on behalf of headteachers. If you have questions about a fixed penalty notice you have received, you should contact your child's school.

We issue fixed penalty notices in line with the National Framework for penalty notices, as outlined in the DfE statutory guidance Working together to improve school attendance and our local code of conduct.

When we will issue a fixed penalty notice

We issue fixed penalty notices for unauthorised absence when a child has:

• Missed school to go on holiday during term-time, and the absence was not authorised by the headteacher
• Arrived at school after registration for that session has closed, and their absence has been recorded with a 'U'
• Regularly missed school without authorisation, and our attendance team have agreed that issuing a fixed penalty notice is an appropriate early intervention tool to improve the child's attendance

National threshold

The National Framework for Penalty Notices sets out the maximum number of penalty notices which may be issued by a local authority to each parent, for any child, in any three-year period.

To ensure consistent delivery of the code of conduct, schools must consider whether a penalty notice should be issued when the national framework criteria applies. This threshold has been met where a pupil has been recorded as absent for at least ten sessions (usually equivalent to five school days) due to unauthorised absence within ten school weeks.

A maximum of two penalty notices per child, per parent can be issued within a rolling three-year period. The national framework also sets out the escalation process which applies to such penalty notices. If the national threshold is met for a third time (or subsequent times) within three years, another tool should be used. In Norfolk, where a child's attendance has met the national threshold for a third time within three years and the parent/s have already been issued with two penalty notices within that period, consideration will be given to prosecution under section 444 Education Act 1996.

The three-year period and applicable escalation of fines begins from the date on which the first penalty notice is issued. For example, if the first penalty notice is issued on 18 September 2024, charged at £160 if paid within 28 days and reduced to £80 if paid within 21 days, any second penalty notice issued to that parent in respect of that child, on or before the 17 September 2027, would be charged at £160, payable within 28 days. A third penalty notice could not be issued to that parent in respect of that child within the three-year timeframe and, in cases where the national threshold is met for a third or subsequent time, alternative action should be considered.

In line with national guidance, the Local Authority retains the discretion to issue a penalty notice before the threshold is met. This might apply for example, where parents have taken several term time holidays below the national threshold. We also retain the discretion to consider going straight to prosecution where appropriate.

Who will get a fixed penalty notice?

The Council will issue a fixed penalty notice to each of the child's parents.

Under the Education Act 1996, a parent is:

• A biological parent of the child — even if they do not have parental responsibility for the child or live with the child
• Any adult who is not a biological parent but has parental responsibility for the child. This includes adoptive parents, step-parents, and carers.
• Someone the child lives with who looks after the child

Receiving a fixed penalty notice

We send fixed penalty notices by first class post. We judge them as being received two days after they are sent.

If you claim that you have not received a penalty notice issued to you and your claim is credible, we will:

• Resend the original notice, and
• Allow time for you to pay the original fine of £80/£60

Paying the fine

The first penalty notice issued to a parent for a child will be charged at £160 to be paid within 28 days. This will be reduced to £80 if paid within 21 days. Where it is deemed appropriate to issue a second penalty notice, the second penalty notice to the same parent for the same child within three years of the first offence, is charged at a flat rate of £160 and is payable within 28 days. There is no reduced sum available in this instance.

If you do not pay within 28 days, we will prosecute you for your child's absence from school. 

You can pay by debit or credit card. The penalty notice will include details on how to make payment. 

You must pay the fine in full - we cannot arrange for you to pay in instalments. This is because we must follow the legal timeline for issuing fixed penalty notices. 

Challenging a fixed penalty notice

Only a headteacher can authorise absence from school.

If there are exceptional reasons for your child's absence which you have not made the school aware of, you should contact the headteacher.

The headteacher may reconsider authorising your child's absence based on this new information. They are not required to do this if you did not request authorisation for the absence in advance.

If the headteacher maintains that the absence was unauthorised, the fixed penalty notice will still apply.

If your appeal to the headteacher is unsuccessful, you can ask for your case to be heard in the magistrate's court. If the court finds your guilty, you will get a criminal conviction, and the fine you have to pay may increase.

Withdrawing a fixed penalty notice

We will only withdraw a fixed penalty notice if:

• There is proof that the notice was issued to the wrong person
• The notice was issued outside of the terms of the Council's code of conduct for issuing fixed penalties regarding school attendance (Word doc) [145KB]
• The notice contains material errors — information that is false or misleading
• The notice remains unpaid, and we decide not to proceed with prosecution under Section 444 of the Education Act 1996.

You will be prosecuted at the magistrate's court if:

• You ask for a hearing because you want to challenge the fixed penalty notice
• You do not pay the fine in full within 28 days of receiving the fixed penalty notice
• We have decided to prosecute you instead of issuing a fixed penalty notice

You will be prosecuted for the alleged offence of allowing your child to be absent from school without authorisation.

If the court finds you guilty, you could get a fine of up to £2,500 or a prison sentence of up to 3 months. You may also have to pay court costs.