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CASHLESS CATERING

15^th June 2010

Dear Parent/Guardian 

I am pleased to announce two new initiatives which will help to increase our efficiency and simplify the serving of snacks and meals at break-time and lunchtime.

The first is the installation of a biometric cashless catering system to the school meal service.

This is a system that incorporates the latest technology and eliminates the need to carry cash throughout the day, reducing the risk of lost money, as well as providing a more efficient, faster and ultimately better quality of service. The system will recognise your child’s thumbprint at the revaluation point and the tills so there is no need to carry a card or remember a PIN. (The actual thumbprint image is not retained but is converted to an alpha-numeric number which the system recognises.)

The new system will start operating on Monday 5^th July and from this day no cash will be accepted at the till points.

All students and staff will have to be registered and given brief training in how to use the system and this is planned for Thursday 1^st July.

Any amount of money can be paid into your child’s account, with the money spent on food and drink deducted on a daily basis.

There will be a daily ‘spend limit’ of £4 programmed into the system. This can be increased or decreased for an individual student by making a written request to the school. Please address your letter to the Premises Manager – Mr D.Hanson.

The second new development relates to the way money is paid into your child’s school meal account.

We are adopting the ‘Parentpay’ system which enables you to make payments into your school account online using a secure website. At first, this will only relate to payments for school meals but will later be extended so that the system can be used for payments for school trips and other items. ‘Parentpay’ is easy to use and you will have the freedom to make payments whenever you want, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Many parents will welcome the certainty that money paid using ‘Parentpay’ will reach school quickly and safely and that the money can only be spent on school meal items.

You will be able to start using ‘Parentpay’ from Mon 28^th June and you will shortly receive another letter from me giving details of how to register online and set up your account with a secure username and password.

You do not have to use ‘Parentpay’, (since cash can be put into the system via the revaluation machine in school), but it will help us to be much more efficient if you do.

There will be three alternative methods of payment into your account:-

1   By paying online using ‘Parentpay’ with a debit card. (Not credit card.)

2   By sending in a cheque – made payable to ‘North Yorkshire County Caterers’  (posted into the secure box adjacent to the revaluation machine).

3   By putting cash into the revaluation machine (situated in the main corridor near classroom T1).

Further explanation about the biometric system and about ‘Parentpay’ can be found on the attached information pages.

If you have any objections to your son/daughter’s thumbprint being used in a biometric system such as this, please contact me at the school.

I think the system will be much more efficient and will allow the school to monitor the meal service more efficiently than at present. I hope that being able to pay for school meals in more ways than are currently possible will meet with your approval.

Yours sincerely

M.L.Pearman

Headmaster