Fees in Advance Scheme

We will be applying the same logic and be attaching to your FIA agreement a table reflecting 85% of the fees throughout the 15 terms.

Changes of plan happen, and this is quite normal. If you had been paying for the fees on a termly basis and decided at some point for your child to transfer to another school due to family relocation, personal change in the family life etc.., you would need to give one term’s notice of your child’s withdrawal to the school, as per the terms in the parent contract. The same rule applies for parents who have prepaid for fees under the Fees in Advance scheme. Once the notice has expired, any prepaid and unused terms will be refunded back to you.

The Fees in Advance Scheme only covers the school fees. Ancillary charges, whether these are optional or mandatory, will be invoiced to you separately and due for payment according to the school’s payment terms. Most of the billing of these charges are managed by the fees department.

We have considered the historical fees increases of our schools in the last 10 years, alongside the common understanding that the inflationary context of the next few years, as well as the costs to cover for our schools to be financially viable; and we believe a 5% yearly increase is sensible.

This is not something that we can accommodate, I am afraid. If you can both agree to opt for a FIA scheme, we will be re-arranging your daughter’s billing under one account, and you could then consider benefiting from the FIA scheme. Both parents will need to send their prepayment by the required due date.

Yes, you can. The scheme allows any parent to prepay – for a minimum of 4 terms and a maximum of 22 terms – the fees for one specific pupil, whether the pupil is currently at the school or due to join the school from September 2024. If you have two children for whom you would like to prepay at least 4 terms’ worth of fees, you will be entering into a Fees in Advance agreement for each of your children, as each scheme is nominative.

Unfortunately, we only accept lumpsum payments by bank transfer via the scheme and the actual payment date will need to be processed well in advance of a new full term or a new full academic year, so that our billing department knows how to invoice you (ancillary charges will be invoiced separately for instance).

This is also in compliance with anti-money laundering laws. An international wire transfer will also need to be completed in a timely manner as we will not be able to keep the agreement open if we fail to receive the lumpsum payment by the agreed due date.

Only Whitgift School has a boarding house so this is a scenario which may happen whilst your son is taught at Whitgift. The Fees in advance agreement that you would sign would specify the pupil status of your son: i.e. whether he is a day pupil, a weekly boarder or a full boarder. If your son changes of pupil status during the time of the Fees in Advance agreement, the portion relating to the weekly or full boarding will be invoiced separately and treated like any other ancillary charges. Basically, the extra charge, due to the change of status, will sit outside of the terms of the Fees in Advance agreement.

If in the future years to come, the fees increase by 6.5% for instance in any given year, you will be invoiced for the 1.5% difference. That 1.5% portion will be subject to the same billing rules as for fees accounts on termly paying terms. If, however, the fees were to increase by 3.5% on any given year after 2024-25, which you happen to have pre-paid, the 1.5% difference would create an extra saving – or credit balance- on your child’s fees account, and, at the end of the whole FIA agreement period, this credit would be owed back to you.

The Fees in Advance scheme is a discretionary scheme which has been prepared by our Foundation’s governors. They have reviewed and agreed to the current scheme and have deemed the offered discount appropriate.

As you can see from the agreement, we are offering this scheme under the current tax regulations. If you are seeking any tax or financial advice, please contact a financial advisor.

The Foundation is the legal entity, and the schools are two of its operating units. Therefore, by signing an FIA agreement, you would effectively sign an agreement with the John Whitgift Foundation, a registered charity. You can consult our published accounts on that link:

Accounts and annual returns, THE WHITGIFT FOUNDATION – 312612, Register of Charities – The Charity Commission

The staff discount scheme offers a staff member a discount of up to 66.67% discount on fees; the discount is calculated according to your salary level via the 50% cap rule (subject to review every year), your employment status (which may change if you choose to leave the school), and the fact that you may have additional children joining the scheme. Considering this, I am afraid we are not able to offer both schemes conjointly to the same parent. This is the same for parents of pupils who are recipients of the John Whitgift Bursary scheme. You may want to review which scheme is more beneficial to you as a result.

If you have already processed the payment to us, please ensure that you fill in, sign and return the FIA agreement to the fees department by email, not by post.

As per the FIA agreement, you will have been asked to make your prepayment by the 31^st of July for the autumn term. If it then turns out that your daughter cannot join Trinity due to a decision by the school, you will be sent a full refund as the one term’s withdrawal rule does not apply in that case.

The payment due date will always be circa 6 weeks before the start of a new term, i.e. 4 weeks before the billing of a new term; the billing takes place 2 weeks before the actual start of the term.

Yes, if you miss the payment due date deadline, the agreement made between you and the Foundation will no longer hold and you will need to request a new quote with period 1 as the next term. It is therefore advisable that you ensure that your lumpsum payment is prepared well in advance to avoid any disappointment.

No, the scheme only allows you to enter the scheme from period 1 as set out in our illustrative tables posted on our website. The only exception to this rule is if you are already on one of our 2020 or 2021 FIA schemes and if your prepayment is still on-going and covering some terms in future and that you are after a rolling-over FIA agreement for the consecutive period. As you cannot be on two FIA schemes at the same time, the second FIA scheme will need to cover the next term after the final term pre-paid in the previous FIA scheme.

No, the John Whitgift Foundation’s schools do not offer any sibling discounts. The FIA scheme is a nominative scheme and the discount given is the one set out on the website.

Theoretically you can but It would be odd to prepay only one term of a given year; whilst we would be accommodating this for you, this would mean that you have to start paying on a termly basis at some point, mid-year.

Theoretically you can but It would be odd to prepay only one term of a given year; whilst we would be accommodating this for you, this would mean that you have to start paying on a termly basis at some point, mid-year.