Don't let lunch balances stack up!
As the school year rolled to a close many administrators were left holding the bag – the lunch bag that is, faced with eating the cost of hundreds, thousands or even tens of thousands in negative lunch balance fees. Did these students go hungry? No, many were allowed to continue to purchase lunch items or were given alternative meals, such as a peanut butter and jelly sandwich at the school expense.
Some districts have turned to collection agencies to collect negative balances, while others, pardon the pun…just eat them.
The solution to minimizing negative balances is sending a timely notification to the parents/guardians informing them that their student’s lunch account is low or negative. Many districts and schools send letters and emails, but these often go unheeded or get lost in transit. The best solution is to place a phone call to parents in the evening while they are home on a school night. Upon receipt of such notice the parent is in a position to hop on line, write a check or pull out some cash to make a payment.
But with potentially hundreds of offenders, how does one make those calls? The answer is a broadcast parent notification system like SchoolReach. These systems can be interfaced with your lunch balance tracking system to trigger an automated call to a parent as soon as a student’s balance reaches a threshold level.
The process offered by SchoolReach is called EZ Lunch Balance and it can work wonders on reducing lunch balance debt. Many of our clients have all but eliminated their negative lunch balance issues all but for a few hard core repeat offenders. No one wants a child to go hungry, so the balances are often quickly brought current upon receipt of a timely notification.
So if your district is looking to save money or reduce losses, look into improving your negative lunch balance notification process. The results can be mouthwatering!
