7 May 2020
Important update for parents / carers - school trips
Thank you for your patience in relation to information on school trips and refunds.
We are working remotely and liaising with a wide range of school trip providers. Few have provided us with definitive information until recent days.
We state unreservedly that we do not expect parents / carers to lose money as a result of trip cancellations.
You will no doubt be aware that most leading high street travel agents are not yet confirming refunds or returning cash to customers. Like them, we too find ourselves juggling priorities in an entirely new landscape. Maintained schools do not have established mechanisms for returning vast numbers of individual payments to parents / carers; we are working tirelessly to create and set up brand new systems to enable this and we are making very good progress to this end.
We are now able to confirm arrangements for refunds relating to the 2021 Ski Trip and the October 2020 French Trip.
Ski Trip, 2021
The school have paid initial deposits to the agent. Most parents / carers have paid initial deposits and some have paid up to the full trip amount. The agent now requires us to ask parents / carers for more money to pay 2nd deposits. Whilst the school cannot predict the likelihood of the trip taking place in 2021, we have taken a final decision to cancel the trip to protect parents from, effectively, speculating more money for a trip which may not take place and for which refunds may be very difficult to achieve. The school will underwrite the cost of all money paid by parents for this trip and will return these sums to parents in the next 2 weeks. Parents should expect to hear from us individually in coming days. We will contact all parents / carers to arrange for collection of refunds from the school. We trust that this is a satisfactory outcome for all.
France, October 2020
The school will underwrite the cost of all money paid by parents for this trip and will return these sums to parents in the next 2-4 weeks. Parents should expect to hear from us individually in coming weeks. We will contact all parents / carers to arrange for collection of refunds from the school. We trust that this is a satisfactory outcome for all.
We sincerely appreciate your patience whilst we work through vast numbers of individual refunds and a very large number of trips. Please be reassured that we will seek to avoid any losses for our parents / carers and we will work diligently to ensure refunds are made to you as quickly as possible. In all honesty, we are limited by school closure, teams working remotely from home and the ability of the school to make individual refunds, something we have never done, on this scale, in the history of the school.
We will continue to work through all school trips and contact parents about refunds in due course.
For any family experiencing genuine, demonstrable, financial hardship, please contact the school via the school email address and we will provide support to you directly.
Andrew O'Sullivan
Headteacher