Topping up SEN Funding

[orie1925]

Hey all,

First-time poster, and have loved the advice on here i've found already!

I just wondered if you all had any advice on SEN Funding. I'm expecting that when my child (MLD, ASD) goes under the new SEN funding system with all the top-up elements, that the amount allocated by the LEA, will fall short of the total fees for the private school where I think he would be best placed.

Is it possible for parents to "supplement" this funding, i.e. if the LEA said he needs £20K, but the fees were £25K, could I pay the difference? I don't really want to end up in a long legal battle to show that he couldn't be catered for properly in the other possible schools.

Thanks for your help! :)

[KOKOagainandagain]

Hi and welcome

Try posting on the SN children board - there is more traffic and a number of us have children with ASD and more knowledge than we would care to have wrt statementing and funding.

Can you also provide some background info - how old? Statemented? Appealing to name independent specialist provision etc?

The difficulty is that your child would need to be statemented and the private (I am assuming specialist) school named in Part 4. The lea would be legally obliged to provide total funding - this is why we end up at tribunal. You cannot avoid tribunal by supplementing additional costs of parental choice of school because legally you could renege on this agreement once the school were named.