What to Do If Your Child’s EHC Plan Is Not Ready for September

If this September your child’s EHC Plan is still not sorted — perhaps it hasn’t named the right school (or any school), doesn’t accurately reflect what they actually need, or hasn’t been issued at all — stop and take a breath. You are not alone and you have legal rights the local authority cannot simply ignore because they are busy.

What the Law Actually Says About EHC Plan Deadlines

There are two deadlines that matter most right now:

• The 20-week rule. When a parent, school, or young person requests an EHC Needs Assessment (“EHCNA”), the local authority must decide within 6 weeks whether to go ahead with one. If it does, professional advice is gathered, including from an educational psychologist, and the final EHC Plan must be issued within 20 weeks of the original request.

• The phase transfer deadlines. If your child is moving between key stages this September — whether that is into reception, from infant to junior school, from primary to secondary, or into post-16 education — the local authority must have issued the final amended EHC Plan naming the school or type of placement by 15 February for all phase transfers except post-16, and by 31 March for post-16 transfers.

These are both legal duties, not aspirational targets to be aimed for when resources allow. A shortage of educational psychologists and SEND Team caseworkers — both of which continue to be real issues around the country — are not lawful reasons to miss your child’s deadline.

What Does It Actually Mean If Your Local Authority Has Missed the Deadline?

It means the local authority has broken the law. All too often deadlines around EHC Plans appear to be treated as targets to aim for, when in fact they are non-optional legal requirements. If 15 February, 31 March, or the 20-week point in an EHCNA has passed and your child still does not have a final EHC Plan, the local authority is acting unlawfully and you are entitled to challenge that.

What Is Your Child Entitled to in the Meantime?

A delay in the process should not mean your child goes without. The local authority remains responsible for making sure appropriate support is in place while the final EHC Plan catches up. Fundamentally, a missed deadline never removes your child’s underlying entitlement to support.

Your Options: From Formal Complaint to Legal Escalation

Ideally, start with a formal complaint. Every local authority has a complaints process, available on their website or on request. Put your complaint in writing, be precise about the dates involved (when you made the request, when the deadline fell, how long it has now been missed by), and ask for a specific date by which the Plan will be finalised. Do not accept vague reassurances like “soon” — ask for a date and hold them to it.

Escalate to the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman (“LGSCO”) if the complaint does not resolve things. The LGSCO investigates maladministration, including missed statutory deadlines, and can order an apology, compensation for the distress and lost provision your child has experienced, as well as changes to the local authority’s processes. It is a genuinely useful route, but it is not fast, so it tends to suit situations where some of the immediate urgency has passed, or where you want accountability and redress alongside other action.

Consider judicial review for urgent or persistent breaches. If your child is out of education, missing essential support, or the local authority is showing no signs of moving despite your complaint, a pre-action protocol letter threatening judicial review is often the fastest way to get real movement. In most cases, simply receiving that letter is enough to prompt compliance without court proceedings ever starting. Judicial review claims must be brought promptly, and in any event within three months of the delay arising — as complaints processes can take many weeks or even months, it can sometimes be better to go straight to Judicial Review and bypass the complaints system entirely. If you are planning to go down this route, make sure you get legal advice from a solicitor first.

Can a SEND Advocate Help?

Yes, and this is exactly the kind of moment an advocate earns their keep. Navigating which of these routes to take — and knowing when to push harder rather than wait politely — is much easier with someone who does this every day. An advocate can help you understand the process, support you with a complaint to the local authority and/or LGSCO, and refer you to solicitors who can pursue Judicial Review.

What SEND Advocacy Can Do to Help

If your local authority has missed your child’s EHC Plan deadline, SEND Advocacy can help you work out exactly where you stand, what has and hasn’t been done, and which option gives your family the fastest, most effective route to getting things sorted before more of the school year is lost. Don’t delay: get in touch today.