Week 20 came and went. Or the six-week decision date passed with no letter. You have phoned and emailed, and the answers all sound the same: it is with the panel, someone will be in touch. Meanwhile your child is still waiting.
If that is where you are, take a breath. An EHCP deadline missed is not something you have to accept quietly, and chasing it does not make you difficult. The timescales are not targets. They are law.
The Special Educational Needs and Disability Regulations 2014 set two clocks. Under regulation 5(1), the Local Authority must tell you whether it will carry out an EHC needs assessment within six weeks of receiving the request. Under regulation 13(2), it must issue the final EHC plan within 20 weeks of receiving that same request. Both clocks start on the day the request is received, not when a panel meets or a caseworker picks up the file. The regulations do allow the timescales to be extended, but only in a short list of narrow situations set out in regulation 13(3), and a heavy workload or a shortage of staff is not on that list.
Source: The Special Educational Needs and Disability Regulations 2014, regulations 5(1), 13(2) and 13(3), legislation.gov.uk. Checked July 2026.
When a deadline passes, there is a clear escalation route: a short letter, then a formal complaint, then the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman. Here is each step, with honest timings.
Step 1: The first letter, with both dates in writing
Before anything formal, send one short letter. Email counts.
Write to your SEN caseworker, or to the SEN team inbox if you have no named contact. Keep it to a few lines and put two dates in it: the date the Local Authority received the request, and the date the legal deadline passed.
Here is a plain template you can adapt:
Dear SEN Team,
Re: [your child's name], date of birth [date]
You received the request for an EHC needs assessment for my child on [date].
Under the Special Educational Needs and Disability Regulations 2014, the deadline for [the decision on whether to assess / issuing the final EHC plan] was [date]. That deadline has now passed.
Please tell me in writing when the decision will be made.
Yours faithfully,
[Your name and contact details]
Use the first option if you are past six weeks with no decision, the second if you are past 20 weeks with no final plan.
Why start here? It gives the Local Authority a fair, dated chance to put things right quickly, and it opens the written record every later stage will be judged on. Keep a copy, note the date you sent it, and allow a sensible window for a reply. Ten working days is reasonable.
Step 2: The formal complaint
If no reply comes, or it names no date, or the promised date passes too, move to the Local Authority’s formal complaints procedure. Every Local Authority has one; search its name plus “complaints” (adding the word “council” usually surfaces the right page).
Your complaint does not need to be long. It needs four things:
- The two dates again. When the request was received, and when the legal deadline passed.
- What has happened since. Your first letter, any replies, and any promised dates that slipped.
- The impact. What the delay has meant for your child and your family, in short factual terms.
- What you want. The overdue decision or plan by a named date, and an explanation of how the delay will be put right.
Head it “Formal complaint” so it cannot be logged as a general enquiry. If the first response does not resolve it, ask for it to move to the next stage, follow the procedure to the end, and keep every response.
Two things to know. First, complaining pauses nothing: the Local Authority’s duty to make the decision and issue the plan carries on, so keep chasing the casework too. Second, you cannot normally skip this stage. The Ombudsman’s own guidance is that the first step is to complain directly to the organisation, and that it cannot look into your complaint before that has happened (lgo.org.uk, checked July 2026).
Step 3: The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman
If you finish the procedure and the problem still has not been put right, you can take your complaint to the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman at lgo.org.uk. It is free to use and independent of the Local Authority.
What it can do: investigate, decide whether the Local Authority was at fault and whether that fault caused your child injustice, and recommend action to put things right. Recommendations can include a payment as well as practical steps such as completing the overdue work. The Ombudsman has no legal power to compel a Local Authority to act on its recommendations, but on its own published account, organisations comply with them in nearly all cases.
Now the honest part: timing. The Ombudsman publishes its own waiting times. As at its June 2026 update, it says first contact can take up to three weeks after your complaint arrives, it is currently taking up to six months before it makes contact at the assessment stage, and a decision can take up to five months where a complaint is investigated. Treat each figure separately rather than adding them into one total. Plainly, this route is measured in months. It brings accountability and remedy, but it is rarely what gets support in place for next term.
Source: Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman, lgo.org.uk, waiting times last updated June 2026. Checked July 2026.
If your child’s situation is urgent and genuinely cannot wait, a legal route called judicial review exists to challenge ongoing delay, but it is specialist territory: speak to IPSEA or a SEND solicitor rather than attempting it alone.
Step 4: The written record decides everything
Every stage of this route is decided on paper. The complaints officer, and later the Ombudsman’s investigator, was not in the room. They can only weigh what is written down. Treat the record as the case, because it is.
- Keep proof of the start date. The letter or email showing when the Local Authority received the assessment request is your most important document. Both legal clocks hang off it.
- Put every call in writing. If someone phones, follow up the same day with a short email: thank you for the call, here is what you told me.
- Ask for answers in writing, every time. The template above already does this. Repeat it politely at every stage.
- Keep everything in one place. One folder, email or paper, in date order.
- Note the impact as it happens. Missed provision, lost school days, the effect on your child. Short, dated notes beat reconstruction from memory later.
A calm, dated paper trail does two jobs. It makes the delay hard to argue with, and it shows the injustice the delay caused. Those are the two things a complaint stands on.
Frequently asked questions
Does the deadline still apply if the Local Authority is short-staffed?
Yes. The timescales can be extended only in the narrow situations listed in regulation 13(3) of the SEND Regulations 2014, and heavy workload or staff shortages, including a shortage of educational psychologists, are not among them. A Local Authority can be honest that it is stretched, but that changes neither the deadline nor your right to complain.
Do I have to finish the Local Authority’s complaints procedure before going to the Ombudsman?
Normally, yes. The Ombudsman’s own guidance says the first step is to complain directly to the organisation, and that it cannot look into your complaint before that has happened. Completing the procedure also builds the written record your Ombudsman complaint will stand on.
Does complaining pause or slow down the EHCP process itself?
No. The complaint runs alongside the casework, not instead of it. The Local Authority’s duty to decide and to issue the plan continues while your complaint is considered, so keep pressing on both tracks.
What to read next
- How to get an EHCP: the 20-week process explained walks the full timeline stage by stage, so you can pinpoint where your case stalled.
- The SCOPE, our free course on your SEND rights, includes ready-to-use complaint and Ombudsman letter templates you can copy and adapt.
This guide covers England only; Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland run different systems. It is information, not legal advice. For free, expert advice on your child’s situation, contact IPSEA or your local SENDIASS, the free SEND Information, Advice and Support Service for your area.
A missed deadline is the Local Authority’s failure, not yours. Put both dates in writing, follow the route through, and keep the record. One step at a time.