Board Agenda - June 06, 2006

23. Parent Account Management System (PAYPAMS)

Presenter: Richard Matkin

Purpose: A - Request decision - closure required

Time: No time limit

Description:

The District seeks to replace the existing system for the online payment of school lunches (Epay) with a more robust system that will provide features that have been requested by parents, and will better accommodate the needs of District staff. Food and Nutritional Services (FANS) Staff selected a vendor from the Catalog Information Systems Vendor list provided by the Texas Building and Procurement Commission Cooperative. The selected vendor, PAYPAMS, is partnered with PCS Revenue Control Systems, the provider of the point of sale system that is currently in use.

There is no up front cost to the District. The software, setup, installation, and training are provided at no charge. The actual cost is based on a fee of 5.6% of the amount of each transaction, which will be evenly split at 2.8% per transaction for the FANS Department and 2.8% for the parent.

While this will be the first time that parents have been charged a fee for making an online payment, the new system will provide features that have been requested over the years and will be very convenient to use. Some of the features that parents have requested that are available through PAYPAMS include:
- The ability to make automatic payments based on account balance
- The ability to monitor what their child is eating
- The ability to receive email notifications of meal account balance and low balances (set by parent) "
- The ability to maintain one account for multiple students "
- The ability to see more timely postings of payments to accounts

In addition to parent benefits, the District will benefit from 24 hour technical support to monitor the systems, total integration with FANS point of sale system, and detailed online reports for deposits by school, District, bank account, etc. The PAYPAMS system also has the capabilities of linking payment options for other departments in the future.

Following Board approval, staff will develop an implementation plan that best meets the needs of the District.

Recommendation:

The Administration recommends the replacement of the existing system for the online payment of school lunches (Epay) with PAYPAMS.

Business Impact:

Estimated Cost: $70,000
Budget/Financial Implication: FANS Operating Budget
Evaluation Criteria: Quality of Goods or Services; Vendor's Reputation; Best Meets the Needs of the District.

Summary:

Appendix:

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