Authorised vs unauthorised absence

The short version

An absence is authorised when the school has accepted the reason for it, and unauthorised when it has not. That is the whole distinction. It is not about how serious the reason was, or whether a parent gave one — it is about whether the school agreed.

🔴 Authorising an absence does not improve attendance

This is the part people get wrong, and it is worth being blunt about: an authorised absence is still an absence. A child off sick for a fortnight with a doctor’s note has exactly the same attendance percentage as one who was off for a fortnight with no explanation at all.

If authorising improved the figure, the figure would mean nothing — every school could lift its attendance by being generous with the register. So the percentage counts both, and what the authorised mark changes is what gets noticed. A run of absences nobody authorised is worth a conversation today. The same run with reasons attached usually is not.

Both also count toward persistent absence, the 10% threshold.

Who decides

The school does — not the parent. A parent explains; the school authorises. A note saying a child was unwell is a reason offered, and the school may accept it or not. This surprises people, but it is what stops the register from being self-certified.

What is usually authorised

• Illness, where the school accepts the explanation
• Medical or dental appointments that could not be made outside school hours
• Religious observance on a day set apart by the family’s religious body
• A death in the family, or other exceptional family circumstances
• Absence agreed in advance for a reason the school considers exceptional

What is usually not

• Term-time holidays — ⚠️ the usual reason a family meets a penalty notice
• Oversleeping, or arriving after the register has closed
• Birthdays, shopping, day trips and similar
• Any absence where no reason was ever given — including one the school is simply still waiting to hear about
• Minding a sibling, or staying home for reasons the school has not agreed

The third state nobody talks about: not yet decided

At nine in the morning a child is missing and nobody has rung. That absence is not authorised, and calling it unauthorised is a judgement nobody has made yet — the parent may be about to phone.

A register that forces a yes or no at that moment gets filled in with guesses, and the guesses are what the attendance report is later built from. Marking it undecided and coming back is the honest thing to do, and a register worth using should let you.

Late, or absent?

A pupil who arrives after the register opens but before it closes is late and counts as present. Arrive after it closes and the session is an absence — usually an unauthorised one. Which is why “the register closes at…” is a sentence worth knowing the answer to: it is the line between a lateness mark and a missed session.

The same logic is why authorising a late or excused mark makes no sense. Both already mean the pupil was there.

Why any of this matters

Because the two numbers answer different questions. Overall attendance tells you how much teaching a child has had. The unauthorised figure tells you how much of that absence nobody has accounted for — and it is the second one that changes what you do on a Monday morning.

⚠️ General guidance for England, not legal advice. Your school’s own attendance policy and your local authority set what is actually authorised, and the rules differ in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.