School's New Lunch Payment Program

I got the letter that Hackettstown School now has MyPaymentsPlus - an online service to add money into a student's meal account. I was thrilled. It states that there is a small program fee, but no amount. There is no where on the site that mentions program fees, how much they are, if they are a one time deal, etc. I assume each district sets there own fee, but it should be listed for the school when I sign up.

I went to add $50 to the account. The program fee pops up as $2.38. I then tried $150 and the fee jumps to $7.12. It appears the "small fee" will be $20+ for a whole school year of buying lunch everyday.

Does anyone else have a comment about this? Is this typical?

grapes grapes
Sep '13

Why can't you just give your child money? Let them start learning how to handle and use money and learn what a dollar gets them.

Inntheknow
Sep '13

I believe you can still send a check in and won't have the service
charge.
And most parents sign up because it is convenient
and don't always have cash on hand

nutty nutty
Sep '13

The fee is right about what credit card companies charge them. It's becoming more and more common to pass that charge along to consumers.


@inntheknow - my child has been budgeting lunch money for several years and will still have to budget on this system.

I'm not sure if taking in daily money is an option with this new system. It is unclear if you have to use the system or not. I have heard that other school's allow for a check to be sent in for no additional fees, but on the paper that I received, it has checks, debit and credit cards listed under the 'small program fee' section.

grapes grapes
Sep '13

wow, my son's at NWR and we use the online payment, no fee...

Lori...since '73 Lori...since '73
Sep '13

You can still send in checks or cash. I was also kinda pissed about the new system and probably won't use it as a result.

Njchia Njchia
Sep '13

The fee on checks is if you use the electronic checks through the web page.

Njchia Njchia
Sep '13

cash is for chumps, everyone knows that

kids need to learn early how to swipe those debit cards, it's only monopoly money anyways, isn't it? the money comes from somewhere else, don't know how much i have or how much i spend, i just keep swiping that little plastic card with the neat picture on it.

easy peasy . . . . .wait a min . . . . . .overdraft charge? whaaaat? why? don't the debit cards just always work?

i say give them cash and make them count out the change,

a penny saved is a penny earned, still true to this very day

BrotherDog BrotherDog
Sep '13

One reason people would use this program is because it's hard to always have enough cash if you have multiple children. For 12 years, I've always had to make sure I have enough cash to give three kids each roughly $2.50 a day (when they didn't bring lunch from home). There are plenty of other occasions to teach them about using cash other than school lunch time, so this program is something I'd consider.


But if you're going to be paying ahead of time in a lump sum, why not just take the cash out ahead of time and set it aside for lunches. Great way to show your kids, how to save money, how to budget it, how to handle it. And then no silly extra fees for feeding my kids with my own money. Just my opinion.

Inntheknow
Sep '13

I'm not going to pay a fee to use this program. My daughter will not even eat the lach at the middle school . I will give my other child cash if she wants to buy. Do what I do ask the night before if you are going to buy or bring.

pitbulllover4life pitbulllover4life
Sep '13

Does anyone have the website information to sign up for this? I did not get anything in the mail and the school's website has nothing that I can find about it...Thanks so much

Hockeymom115 Hockeymom115
Sep '13

Who uses cash anymore? The only time I use cash is for a lotery ticket. I usually get cash back from a store near by before.


My son goes to Warren Hills and we started using this program last year and I love it. It tells you what they ate how much they spent and if I forget to refill it he text me and in a minute he has lunch money. I have never paid a fee so maybe it depends on the school. The web site is mypaymentsplus.com if your school has the system you should have no problem signing up.

Painkiller
Sep '13

Wonder how this happened?? Gee, new meal provider, new super, ...oh, I get it. More money from the taxpayers not used for education. Who is the business administrator who makes these deals?? Didn't she resign, and is now the interim? But, still got her bonus....Need a new sheriff. Where is Deputy Dawg when you need him??

acl76 acl76
Sep '13

@hockeymom115 - it is www.mypaymentsplus.com You should of gotten a letter in the mail a few weeks ago with your child's ID that you need to sign up. Contact the school if you don't have it.

I emailed the school to find out if I could send a check in to be put on account without a fee and have not heard back yet with an answer. I did finally put a small amount of money on account through the site and paid the service fee. I like it because I can monitor what choices my child makes and he still has to budget.

@acl76 - Maschio is the meal provider. Not sure if they are new to Hackettstown, but they have decent food.

grapes grapes
Sep '13

Once again, they changed the payment program for the school lunch but I can not find any information on it. I had two messages left on my voice mail but I didn't even know they had a parent portal.

Tried to set up an account but it requires a student ID which we have not received yet.
Anyone else having this problem?


I only got my kid's ID on his schedule. Signed up for payforit but the fees aren't listed so I sent them an email. One school has the fee at 5.75% so I'm waiting to hear what Hackettstown charges. They also make you input credit card before you can sign up.

Hopeful Hopeful
Sep '15

CJ - I received a letter in the mail about a week ago with the information to login to the parent portal, my guess is you'll have to call the school to get the Student ID or ask your student, they should know it or be on a schedule or something.

I was able to get into the lunch payment program from the parent portal with no problem and they carried over the balance I had from last year so I had no problem logging into that and checking the account.The terms of use say there is a service fee of 3-6% and will be indicated prior to finalizing payment. My guess is the variance depends on what type of payment you use - Amex and Discover card are generally a higher rate, but just a guess on my part.

trekster3- trekster3-
Sep '15

My kids are in elementary school. I don't have a parent portal and they don't have a scheduled with a student ID number on it. We didn't get a letter in the mail. Actually our letter stating what teacher my one child has this year came last Thursday.

Thank You for you help. I will be calling today to get the information.


I wish the elementary schools would have done the Parent Portal too, they have to enter grades and information anyway, might as well make it easier on all to have it in one place.

trekster3- trekster3-
Sep '15

Letters about the parent portal for Elementary went home today!!!

concernedparent concernedparent
Sep '15

The elementary school does have the parent portal. The letter for my kindergartener came home in his backpack today.

Njchia Njchia
Sep '15

Found out they charge 4% on credit cards.

Hopeful Hopeful
Sep '15

Last year at the Middle School you were able to send in a check made out to the Hackettstown Board of Education and write on the memo your child's name and lunch money and it would be manually applied to their account and you would avoid the percentage charge online when using a credit card..

michelemorp michelemorp
Sep '15

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