FPN’s are intended to prevent the need for court action and should only be used where it is deemed likely to change parental behaviour and support to secure regular attendance has been provided and has not worked or been engaged with, or would not have been appropriate in the circumstances of the offence (e.g. an unauthorised holiday in term time).
FPN’s can be used by all schools (with the exception of independent schools) where the pupil’s absence has been recorded with one or more of the unauthorised codes and that absence(s) constitutes an offence.
An FPN can be issued to each parent liable for the offence or offences. They should usually only be issued to the parent or parents who have allowed the absence (regardless of which parent has applied for a leave of absence).
All state funded schools must consider whether a FPN for absence is appropriate in each individual case where one of their pupils reaches the national threshold for considering a FPN. Schools should not have a blanket position of issuing or not issuing FPN’s and should make judgements on each individual case to ensure fairness and consistency across the country.
National Threshold
The threshold for the issue of an FPN is 10 sessions of unauthorised absence in a rolling period of 10 school weeks. A school week means any week in which there is at least 1 school session. This can be met with any combination of unauthorised absence (e.g. 4 sessions of holiday taken in term time plus 6 sessions of arriving late after the register closes, all within 10 school weeks). These sessions can be consecutive (e.g. 10 sessions of holiday in one week) or not (e.g. 6 sessions of unauthorised absence taken in 1 week and 1 per week for the next 4 weeks). The period of 10 school weeks can also span different terms or school years (e.g. 2 sessions of unauthorised absence in the Summer Term and a further 8 within the Autumn Term).
How to request an FPN
An FPN can be requested by any state funded school in Suffolk. Any request must be in accordance with Suffolk County Council Penalty Notice Code of Conduct; requests need to be made through the Penalty Notice Portal.
Please note: In order to access the Penalty Notice Portal, you must have an account. To request a Portal account, please email [email protected] providing the below details:
- Full name of the required account holder.
- Account folders ‘named’ school email address.
- The school the account is for.
- If the new account is due to a change in staff member, please provide full name of the person who has left the post so that their account can be closed, this will protect against potential data protection breaches.