Tuesday 3 August 2010

Catchment



Its that old chestnut that raises its head to crap all over your day .....
Somerset County Council have informed me that:

They regret to inform me that it will not be possible to provide school transport for Jamie from Wednesday 1st September 2010 as there is an overload on that vehicle. Oh nuts!

I am sorry that it has been necessary to withdraw transport. I will contact the finance team and cancel charges for Jamie from 01/09/2010. oh that's nice ... As you know when the transport was offered it was on the condition that transport may have to be withdrawn if the seats are needed for a child(ren) entitled to free transport. fair enough....

Once we are in the new academic year we will regularly have bus monitors travelling on the vehicle and should a seat become available we will contact you at the first opportunity. I seriously doubt it... last year after 2 weeks of ferrying her to school I rang you to see if there was a space and you had binned her paperwork...! Secondly, we will ensure that an application for her to travel is given priority should a seat become available. if you loose her details like you did last year I doubt you'll do this either!

Allegedly bad news travels in threes so this is my second bit of bad news.... can't wait for the third to arrive! :s

I had lots planned today, clearing, cleaning but to be honest after speaking to the transport department... whereupon I was asking simple questions trying to work out my options and the lady on the other end of the phone was being really quite nasty...

and speaking to the admissions team as they now deal with the catchment area for school transport too... and this "lad" informed me that he couldn't tell me the actual area of the catchment for transport for that school but if we had a house in mind that we might be moving to I could ring them and they would put the postcode in the computer and it would tell them if it was acceptable.... but as the system for working out the transport catchment area was "very complicated" he couldn't help me any further...



I realise its only 7 and a half miles between Daniels school in Queen Camel and Jamie's school in Ansford but they both have a 9am start. I considered leaving home at 8am to get Jamie to school for 8:30 and then hammer back with Daniel to get him to school for 9am....

or the other option is to drop Daniel off at school at 9am and Jamie is 20 minutes to half and hour late for school each morning....

As the lady at SCC Transport department says "you chose to send you daughter to the non catchment school" mind you as the catchment school is less than 3 miles and they consider it a safe road for her to walk along, even though there is no footpath, has steep sided banks and is a 40mph speed limit (which few people stick to) resulting in there being no provision for transport to that school at all.... I realise that many people drive loads of miles a day to get their children to school so I will just have to suck it up and put up with it...

Anyway I have decided while writing this that its not worth worrying about and it will all work out in the end.... I have a cracking headache so I am off to have a cup of tea and a couple of Nurofen and do a little crochet as that seems to calm my mind during times of stress

The weather down here looks how I feel today, definitely on of those days when you wonder why you bothered getting out of bed! :o|

Never mind.... It will all come out in the wash or some such thing!

I will post something more cheerful tomorrow
Promise!

big hugs Alex
x

Had some headache tablets and shut my eyes for a bit... headache has gone and feeling a little more positive... thank you for your lovely comments... its only school and beaurocracy gone mad so its really not worth stressing about...
going to have that clear up and get the house sorted then perhaps I can get the jumble in my head sorted too! lol

6 comments:

Marigold Jam said...

I do sympathise having had arguments with Surrey County Council many years ago. As you say in the greater scheme of things it will all work out in the end but that is not much use just at the moment. Hope the cuppa and the Nurofen helped and that things will indeed work out sooner rather than later for you and yours.

Jane

Unknown said...

Oh no....that's not good news! I hope that the situation sorts itself out in the end. I take it that she has no friends nearby who could take her to school each day? Sending you lots of hugs xxx

karen said...

oh dear :(
I do hope Things get better for you real soon.

mother of purl said...

Oh no, poor you. I hope you have some good news to re-address the karma! I do think Queen Camel is an enchanting name for a place xx

menopausalmusing said...

How rubbish is all that????? Poor you, but well done for cheering up and just getting on with it. I hope you don't get any more rubbish thrown at you this week....

carole johnston said...

Hi Alex..what a bummer! I am not sure if we have these problems as much here,as our grandchildren all live close to their school I am not sure.What does come to mind is that if the bus companies know they have extra children why not get a bigger bus, here in the bush where we are they even have a tag along bus it is actually one bus with a concertina in the middle attaching another section so it looks like a semi trailer but it is a bus.
Who knows what these people sitting in offices think.
Also I know some schools do not allow children to come early but where one set of my granshildren go to school they have a special early class that the children get dropped off early but just play board games etc till start time. Anyway glad the Neurphen worked,now you have a nice evening and forget it till tomorrow. Bless you Alex and relax.