Yes, completely: no licence cost and no trial limit. It is released under the GNU Affero General Public License. That is a real option for a school with no software budget, and we would rather a school used FET than went back to a spreadsheet.

What does FET not do for an Australian primary school?

It has no concept of Australian planning time, no state vocabulary, no yard duty or wet day supervision, no daily cover, and no support team. Every local rule has to be expressed by you as a general constraint, and any mistake in that translation produces a timetable that looks right and is not.

How long does FET take to set up compared with Bell Path?

Realistically several days for someone learning FET, against about an hour of setup in Bell Path for a small school, longer for a large one. With FET you describe the school in a general constraint language rather than answering questions about a primary school. Whether that trade is worth it depends on whose hours are scarcer at your school.

Can we start with FET and move later?

You can, and some schools do. What transfers is the thinking: knowing your real rules, your entitlements and your specialist rotation. The setup itself will not transfer, because the two products describe a school in different terms.

Comparison

Bell Path vs FET

Choose Bell Path when leadership time is what you are short of, and you want Australian planning time, daily cover and yard duty handled. Choose FET when there is no budget and someone technical will own it.

FET is free, open source, capable and actively maintained, with a new version out on 2 October 2026. If there is no budget, it deserves a serious look. This page is about what the zero price does and does not cover for an Australian primary school.

Send us your timetable See a sample school's week

Already run one? Send the file and it is in Bell Path within 48 hours, with Daily Cover free for two weeks.

FET is written by two named developers, Liviu Lalescu and Volker Dirr, and released under the GNU Affero General Public License, an open-source licence. Its features are assessed from its public documentation and forum.

Sources checked · 3 October 2026

Which product fits which school.

Choose Bell Path if

You are short of leadership hours, not software budget
You need Australian planning time enforced rather than modelled by hand
You want daily cover, yard duty, wet day plans and events as well as the timetable
You need someone to answer when it will not build and you cannot work out why

Choose FET if

Your school cannot fund software this year. FET is free forever and that matters more than any feature list
You have a staff member who enjoys this kind of problem and will own it properly
You want full control over every rule, including rules no commercial product lets you set
You are comfortable with a desktop program, manual data entry and help from a forum rather than a support team

What the decision usually comes down to.

Price

Published annual pricing, $679 a year for up to 100 students and $1,349 for 101 to 300, rising with school size, with no GST added

Free, permanently, under an open-source licence

Real cost

Setup a school leader can finish in about an hour at a small school, longer at a large one

Setup measured in days, plus one person being the only one who understands it

Australian context

State planning-time rules, state vocabulary, yard duty, wet day and relief arrangements

None. You model every Australian rule yourself as a general constraint

When it will not build

Names the teacher, the rule and the fix, and will not build while a Must fix finding stands

Reports that no solution exists. Working out why is your job, with help from community forums

After the timetable

Daily cover, yard duty with a fairness record, wet day plans, event timetables, an operations calendar and a staff portal

FET itself builds timetables and stops there. Its co-author sells TiTiTo, a separate paid tool for substitution and supervision planning

Support

Email support and a walkthrough on request

A forum where the developers answer most days, documentation, and paid custom versions. Nobody is obliged to answer

FAQ

Questions schools ask when comparing Bell Path and FET.

Is FET really free?
Yes, completely: no licence cost and no trial limit. It is released under the GNU Affero General Public License. That is a real option for a school with no software budget, and we would rather a school used FET than went back to a spreadsheet.
What does FET not do for an Australian primary school?
It has no concept of Australian planning time, no state vocabulary, no yard duty or wet day supervision, no daily cover, and no support team. Every local rule has to be expressed by you as a general constraint, and any mistake in that translation produces a timetable that looks right and is not.
How long does FET take to set up compared with Bell Path?
Realistically several days for someone learning FET, against about an hour of setup in Bell Path for a small school, longer for a large one. With FET you describe the school in a general constraint language rather than answering questions about a primary school. Whether that trade is worth it depends on whose hours are scarcer at your school.
Can we start with FET and move later?
You can, and some schools do. What transfers is the thinking: knowing your real rules, your entitlements and your specialist rotation. The setup itself will not transfer, because the two products describe a school in different terms.

Other comparisons.

See all 12 comparisons

See the timetable before you decide.

Send us the timetable you already run and it is in Bell Path within 48 hours, or see a week Bell Path built for a sample school first.