Terminating SIMS/FMS contract with ESS (ParentPay Group)

[TCC]

We’re supporting a primary school client who has encountered an issue with terminating their SIMS/FMS contract with ESS (ParentPay Group). We're keen to understand if other schools have had similar experiences and how they approached or resolved the situation.

Summary of the situation:

• The school intended not to renew its SIMS and FMS contract, which was due to auto-renew in March 2025 for another three years.
• On 20 December 2024, the school contacted their ESS account manager via email to give notice. The manager responded by instructing them to liaise directly with the ESS Contracts Team and copied in the relevant email contact.
• The school followed this instruction and sent an email to the Contracts Team the same day (20 December) stating they did not wish to renew.
• No response was received from ESS until six weeks later, when a pre-invoice arrived. By that point, the school had entered into an agreement with an alternative MIS provider and had begun migrating data.
• ESS has now responded, asserting that notice was not validly given. They are claiming that:
  • The school failed to terminate the contract in accordance with their Terms and Conditions.
  • Notice had to be provided via hard-copy letter sent through the post (rather than email).
  • As no hard copy was sent by 31 December 2024, the contract has now rolled over for another three-year term.
• The school argues that:
  • They acted in good faith by following the advice of their account manager.
  • If ESS had responded promptly, they would have had time to send a letter before the cut-off.
  • They sent their cancellation email on 31 December, which was still within the 90-day window required by the contract.

We’re keen to hear from any schools who:

• Have had a similar experience with contract termination or rollover issues with ESS/ParentPay.
• Successfully challenged ESS’ interpretation of the notice process.
• Have any tips or strategies that worked in resolving the issue—whether through formal legal channels or negotiated outcomes.

Any insight would be greatly appreciated—feel free to share publicly or message privately if preferred.

[msi_school]

I feel your need to help but this is a contract issue you need legal advice, the trust or LEA should have contact with a solicitor who will be alb eto have a look a the contract and the communication with ESS and tell them if they have a chance in a couple of hours. 

[PotNoodleTech]

You need to dig out the last contract that you signed and read through that with a fine tooth comb.  That would state the process for termination asnd that is the one you need to follow as they is the legally binding one you signed.

 

Your gonna need a good legal team.  Can your LA legal team help?

 

"Notice had to be provided via hard-copy letter sent through the post (rather than email)."

 

They are doing this so that they can pretend they did not get the letter in the post too - as it's easy to legally prove someone recieved an email but no so easy to prove they recieved a letter.

Edited May 28, 2025 by PotNoodleTech

[Rob_D]

32 minutes ago, PotNoodleTech said:

but no so easy to prove they recieved a letter.

 

You'd have to use signed for delivery, then you'd have proof the letter was delivered to someone at the recipient address. I wonder what the ruling would be if they (apparently) lost your letter internally.

[DrCheese]

34 minutes ago, Rob_D said:

I wonder what the ruling would be if they (apparently) lost your letter internally.

I would think at that point any arbitration service would rule in favour of you by default. If you have verifiable proof that the letter reached them then they won't have a leg to stand on.

[FragglePete]

"Notice had to be provided via hard-copy letter sent through the post (rather than email)."

 

Damn sure we did not give a hard-copy letter - just an e-mail to a specific e-mail address.

 

Pete

 

[HereIGoAgain2601]

We gave notice to our account manager a year in advance via email and to the contracts address. They replied to say they accepted this. 
 

One school that left the notice until a similar time you mentioned was told they had to send a hard copy letter and did this as well as the email.  
 

They will do anything to try and cling onto some contracts because they know the product won’t sell itself. 

[pete]

We sent in notice (via email, to the correct address) in good time and were instructed that they wouldn't accept email:

 

Quote

We are writing to inform you that to cancel your contract or any products within it, you need to serve notice in line with the terms of your contract. Your current communication, does not meet the requirements as outlined in your contract and, as such, is presently not accepted and your contract(s) will continue unless you rectify the situation and serve notice correctly.

 

As per the terms and conditions of your contract, in accordance with Clause 25, any notice of termination to ESS must be provided in writing to the below address, and this notice must be received no less than 90 days from the end date of the Initial Term or the end date of the Renewal Term, in accordance with Clause 16.2.

 

Head of Legal and Contracts

Education Software Solutions Limited

11 Kingsley Lodge

13 New Cavendish Street

London W1G 9UG.

 

We recommend that when sending notices to us you use special/recorded delivery and retain proof of posting.

 

To ensure your request is processed in a timely manner, please resubmit your notice in accordance with the contract terms, ensuring this is on letter headed paper, that includes your DfE number and products you wish to serve notice on.

 

We sent ours in via special delivery.  Parentpay acknowledged receipt within a day or two of posting.

 

If your client is relying on the argument:

 

"Our account manager said they didn't handle contract negotiations and we had to talk to another dept.  We then did nothing for six weeks and were surprised when the contract was renewed."

 

...then the professional thing to do is politely point out they need a spreadsheet (at a minimum) tracking contract renewals and here's a template they can use.

[mthomas08]

Legal advice is a must.

 

You're in the exact situation I feared at the time, so I chased.. chased.. AND chased to make sure we had our contract cancelled. They even sent a renewal.............. 

They didn't respond. They didn't send us the cancellation acknowledgement. Even after having the discussion with someone about our cancellation, at least we had our email trails to prove it.

 

Luckily we didn't go through the whole "you're forced in to a contract"...  otherwise our SBM would have fought it to the end, he really is clued up on the legal side of things.

[Ditto]

Also it is working to talk to your new MIS people. Depending on who they are, they may well have good advice. None of them like this shoddy practice and it taints the whole industry sector. Overall though, I agree with the view it is best to advise the school to take legal advice.

Edited May 29, 2025 by Ditto

[DrCheese]

I have an email from their contracts team saying we have to give 90 days notice by email & that's enough. They do also state a postal address.

 

I don't know how companies don't see that this does them long-term damage. You may have won that customer back years down the line but instead, you've probably sworn them off for life. Not just a grumpy IT guy either, but you've made finance bods & decision makers at all levels angry. They won't forget that.

Look at how schools have left SIMS en mass after they pulled that 3 year stunt thing - ok, so they thought they'd get a further 3 years of locked in schools but the competition just adjusted & now schools that were lukewarm before made it their mission to leave.

 

To me, contract end is as important as contract start. Sometimes it's just a case of a company asking for too much money during that bidding cycle, or not having the right product right now.

Those things can change during a contract & I have returned to vendors before that later offered a much improved offering.

 

 

 

[FragglePete]

1 hour ago, DrCheese said:

I don't know how companies don't see that this does them long-term damage. You may have won that customer back years down the line but instead, you've probably sworn them off for life. Not just a grumpy IT guy either, but you've made finance bods & decision makers at all levels angry. They won't forget that.

 

 

Yup.  It has been my mission to remove anything to do with Parent Pay Group / ESS from this school and will never go back here or any other school I may end up working with.  I've just got Reading Cloud to do next, and that's on the books for next year as unfortunately just signed up for another year as it slipped under my radar.  However, they did try putting us on a 3 year contract and you had to 'ask' for the one year price which was some 30% higher per year than previous years.  Pulling the same old trick.

 

Pete

[mthomas08]

19 hours ago, DrCheese said:

I don't know how companies don't see that this does them long-term damage. You may have won that customer back years down the line but instead, you've probably sworn them off for life. Not just a grumpy IT guy either, but you've made finance bods & decision makers at all levels angry. They won't forget that.

Look at how schools have left SIMS en mass after they pulled that 3 year stunt thing - ok, so they thought they'd get a further 3 years of locked in schools but the competition just adjusted & now schools that were lukewarm before made it their mission to leave.

 

This is why people went a bit mad at SIMs for trying to force 3 year contracts out of the blue. Since then, their general attitude towards customers has been poor.

Good faith is gone.

 

They even tried the culture of fear, don't leave SIMs.. it will be too much hard work.. create unknowns..  stick with what you know. Instead of trying to advertise their own product, it was..  please don't leave us... it will give you a headache and annoy you.

 

Then this fiasco just makes it worse.

 

Schools are lucky to have people like us, keeping ourselves in the loop with the market and customer treatment..  I passed a lot of this information to SLT when we left SIMs. 

 

Oh and EduGeek is a gift from god (admins) because without this place.. how many of us wouldn't know.

[pete]

Follow-up:

 

Even after ParentPay confirm in writing that they've actioned your contact termination, they may not bother to properly inform their credit control team who will:

• Automatically send renewal invoices to the email that's not the licensing/renewals point-of-contact (but may once have been)
• Have an auto-responder* on the SMB-ESScreditcontrol@ mailbox that acknowledges a recent mistake re invoices, but possibly not this mistake.  But they do include a phone number to ring.
  • Chances are you'll be "accidentally" hung up on though.

*

Quote

Dear Customer,

If you’ve received or are inquiring about a recent payment reminder, please note it was sent in error for an invoice that has already been settled. We kindly ask you to disregard the message.

We sincerely apologize for the confusion and inconvenience. Our team is actively working to resolve the issue and prevent future occurrences.

Thank you for your patience and understanding.