St. Godric’s Catholic Primary School

Phase: Primary

Local Authority: Durham

Aim

Prevent cash from going missing in school. Provide an efficient payments service for staff and parents.

Solution

An inclusive payment service that allows schools to go entirely cashless even when parents wish to continue paying in cash.

Impact

Improved efficiencies in the school office. Reduced paper usage. Parents have positive experience of school payments.

Realising benefits of cashless efficiency

Administrative Assistant at St Godric’s Roman Catholic School, became concerned about the amount of cash going missing between home and school: “The key goal was to take away the large amounts of cash and cheques which were brought into school, as some were being lost between the classroom and the office.”

Choosing the right cashless payment system is an important step in going entirely cashless: “We went to view a demonstration with other schools to see how ParentPay worked. The demonstration was efficient and to my pace, nothing was too much trouble and there is always help at the end of the telephone if needed.”

The payments system was introduced specifically to manage payments for trips, after-school clubs, and dinner money: “These have worked brilliantly. If anything is cancelled it is so easy to refund straight back to the parent’s ParentPay account.”

ParentPay and staff reaction

Office staff have felt huge relief at the implementation of the cashless system: “ParentPay has proved efficient and the email communication works very well too. It is so much easier than sending out individual letters to pupils, which sometimes never get home, and it also reduces the amount of paper we use. My favourite feature is the weekly finance report which makes it so easy to rectify payments.”

When asked if St Godric’s RC School faced any hurdles when it came to rolling ParentPay out to parents, they said: “We haven’t found this to be a problem. Parents are advised as soon as their child starts school and we outline the benefits of ParentPay immediately. Only one parent wished to pay by PayPoint. This simply meant printing out a barcode letter for the trip.”

ParentPay prides itself on its inclusivity. The option to use PayPoint allows a school to go entirely cashless without isolating those parents that still use cash. Aftercare is extremely important as staff won’t use a system if they find it too complicated. ParentPay has a reputation for the excellent service it offers schools and parents. That is why St Godric’s RC school said:

Download the PDF version of St. Godric’s Catholic Primary School’s journey with ParentPay.