Cashless Catering

[Pipz]

Morning all,

 

Apologies if this in the wrong please but I thought I'd ask about others experiences.

 

We currently have our trip payments online via Schoolcomms and are now looking to expand the cashless initiative to include meals.

 

NRS, Cunninghams and Live Register are 3 providers currently under review.

 

I just wondered if anyone had any experience with the above (our caterer prefers Live Register and Schoolcomms prefer NRS) as far as implementation, on going use and costs and anything else you might be able to think of so that I can create a cunning plan to best handle this transition.

 

Thanks in advance!

 

Pipz

[Mark182]

We have used Live Register for the last 8 years and they have been brilliant with us.

[rad]

NRS school here (with Parentpay)

I cant fault them. If I have an issue, it is dealt with quickly. Engineer visits occur on the same day of calling the issue in.

[DavidYoung]

We've had LiveRegister for about a year & half now and it works really well. We used to have Vericool and the difference is night & day we always used to have issues linking with ParentPay (almost every other week) but have had less than a handful since being with LR.

 

We basically built our own tills using VeryPC AIO touchscreen PCs and an Ergonomic stand which worked out cheaper too.

[round2it]

Nrs here.

 

Kit works well but be careful of sales rep get every thing in writing read paperwork very closely.

 

Support is good.

[Cache]

We use NRS and Schoolcomms, our caterer favoured NRS and we specified that as we were already using Schoolcomms for trips and other online payments that is what we wanted to use.

 

Only a couple of minor issues here that we've resolved by just adjusting scheduled report upload times slightly.

 

NRS's requirements for virtualising the server backend were extremly OTT IMHO so we ended up with a physical box in the catering office (because I didn't have the physical resources to meet their requirements), but I will probably just try P2V'ing it in the future.

Edited October 24, 2017 by Cache

[Sylv3r]

We use schoolcomms and CRB (Cunninghams) - they have had some flack on this forum, but we couldn't speak highly of them through their support from their Scotland office. We've been using both together since around June. Previously we used sQuid which again, worked well. There's a couple of features that I think schoolcomms lacks that sQuid offered us and several parents have mentioned it - automatic top-ups being the biggy, with the sQuid system parents could set when they automatically went below a certain value to top back up - at present parents are having to remember to check the balance regularly and top-up manually.

[fiza]

@Sylv3r May I ask why you moved from sQuid to Schoolcomms?

[Edu-IT]

We went with NRS after having demonstrations of a fair few.

[round2it]

we use squid also, NRs support pretty much all online payment companys

[Sylv3r]

@Sylv3r May I ask why you moved from sQuid to Schoolcomms?

 

We didn't have any issues with sQuid in the three years we used them, the biggest driving factor was giving parents one app that allowed them to check student timetables, behaviour, school reports and online payments under the one logon was my biggest reason to switch. Since we've moved to the one system, the uptake has certainly increased. sQuid didn't have an app when we used it and I didn't want parents having multiple logons for various systems.

[tech-man]

NRS x7 tills x1 pre order terminal x2 revals x2 biometric integrated vending machines. ParentPay

 

Works very well. Support is good.

[RobFrain]

Hi

We were in a very similar situation. We were either going to go for Cunninghams or NRS and at the very last minute we got a call from Biostore/ Fastrak. We felt sorry for them and gave them a chance and they came in on the morning we were deciding between the two systems. When we saw the system it was brilliant and did exactly what we wanted it to do with a nice UI for the canteen staff. We delayed the decision for another week and then chose Fastrak. Three years down the line with have had no major issues and haven't looked back. We have three wireless tills and are now looking at cashless vending machines as well. Definitely worth a look. We are currently with Parentpay, however we have seen another school who use Biostore/ Fastrak with School Gateway and it works great! If you are in the North West please do get in contact!

[Pipz]

Thanks very much to all for the posts - it's much appreciated!

 

Forgive me for returning to the thread late - current analysis has Live Register ahead on costs, NRS 2nd (just) and Cunningham's 3rd (due to on-going maintenance pushing it back).

 

Reassuring to see that both those two front runners have positive reports regarding use - it might well be easier to go with Live register as the caterers prefer it and it doesn't make much difference to me which system I learn to administrate. I'm just mainly concerned about reliability (software/hardware) and cost - hope that's not too short sighted!

 

I expect the replies will be mixed but have many issues presented in your respective school when rolling out biometrics? My favoured method is Biometrics with a PIN for those who do not wish to register in this way.

[RobFrain]

Thanks very much to all for the posts - it's much appreciated!

 

Forgive me for returning to the thread late - current analysis has Live Register ahead on costs, NRS 2nd (just) and Cunningham's 3rd (due to on-going maintenance pushing it back).

 

 

Have you had a look at the Biostore system called Fastrak? Definitely worth taking a look. I think you could be in quite a shock with price and functionality!

[Cache]

We do Biometrics for those who consent and offer a PIN number to those who don't or the biometrics just won't work for them for whatever reason, no real issues.

 

Suprisingly for us a number of staff refused to have their thumbprint taken, yet quite happily use it to unlock their phone.

[gillp]

We are in our second year with CRB Cunninghams and WisePay. The system works but it took half a term to iron out the problems. If we were to start again I would not choose them. I saw BioStore and Bett and was very impressed. If we had the energy and resource to start again I would look at them.

 

Gill