Parents have been left in limbo after a uniform provider failed to deliver orders on time.

School Trends, which provides custom logo uniform for Hedingham School and Sixth Form, in Sible Hedingham, has blamed an in-house IT issue for the chaos.

Around 60 parents who placed orders at the end of July have been left with no uniform for the start of term.

The school formerly used local company Baldwins, but switched to School Trends because of its apparently excellent track record and references.

Headteacher John Panayi said: “Hedingham School has been in almost daily contact with School Trends since the problem regarding school uniform first started.

“We are painfully aware of the unnecessary stress and strain this situation has caused parents and students.

“We have lodged complaints at the highest level and will share School Trend’s response with parents.

“However, this whole situation is highly unsatisfactory and is particularly disappointing as the process undertaken to evaluate uniform providers was robust.

“It is aware of the seriousness of the issues, which has jeopardised our ongoing relationship with them and we will keep our uniform provision under review.”

Staff at the school have been made aware of the situation and say they are doing all they can to minimise the impact for affected students.

But parent Kathleen Perry, whose daughter started in Year 7 last week, spent £87 with the company and described the situation as chaos.

She said: "Children starting are nervous enough as it is.

"It is their first day, you will never get that back.

"They are going to a big new school and without a uniform.

"We went to Baldwins in the end and they gave us everything except the PE kit, which is exclusively online.

"It is not good enough.

Paul Essex, managing director at School Trends, explained the problem was caused by one of its suppliers.

He said: “These delays have been caused by one of our major suppliers experiencing a technical problem that resulted in orders on its system being cancelled and having to be re-entered manually.

“This, coupled with the exceptionally high volume of orders we’ve received this year, means we’ve not met our customers’ expectations and we can only apologise for the stress and anxiety this has caused.

“We are working around the clock to get any outstanding orders through the system and to our customers as quickly as possible.”