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  4. Pay a penalty notice for non-attendance at school

Pay a penalty notice for non-attendance at school

Use this page to pay a penalty notice for non-attendance at school. Failure to do this could lead to penalties that are higher than the original fine.

If your child misses school because of an unauthorised absence, schools may issue penalty notices.

Penalty notices will be issued separately to each parent, and for each child. The fine for each penalty notice is £120, with 28 days to pay. If you pay within 21 days, the fine is reduced to £60 for each penalty notice.

For example, a family with two parents (1&2) and two children (A&B) taking unauthorised absence would receive the following penalties:

Parent 1 = 1 penalty for child A plus 1 penalty for child B = 2 penalties
Parent 2 = 1 penalty for child A plus 1 penalty for child B = 2 penalties
Total payable by the family = 4 penalties (or £480).

If the family in this example had paid their fine within 21 days of being issued the penalty notice, they would have had to pay £240.

View our full Penalty Notice code of conduct, which explains how and why we issue Penalty Notices for non-attendance.

Before you pay online

Please ensure you have the penalty notice letter when you pay. We will ask you for your penalty notice reference number (starts with ED) and the date of issue (found just above the signature) for each penalty notice you need to pay.

All you need to make a payment to us online are the following details:

  • Your reference number (this starts with ED)
  • Your name
  • Email address
  • Telephone number
  • Your home address

Payment can be made using most credit and debit cards. Unfortunately we are not able to accept American Express.

Warning If you don't pay your fines, we may prosecute you, which could lead to penalties that are higher than the original fines, and other sanctions imposed by the court.

Pay now