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School canteen

School canteen: menu, meal bookings and payment by card

The kitchen publishes its menu, families book through the portal, and scanning the card in the canteen debits the pupil's wallet. The school knows before noon how many meals to prepare.

Kitchen quantities per service day: booked, served and no-show
Kitchen quantities: booked, served and no-show, per canteen and per dish.
Booking the day's meal on the families portal
Booking on the family side.
Before service

The kitchen keeps its menu and sets the booking deadline

01

The head cook publishes each day's dishes

Each canteen has its own menu: meal deals, dishes of the day, prices. The head cook keeps it up to date personally, without going through the bursar's office.

Day menu of a canteen with its meal deals
02

Families book until the deadline set by the school

From the portal, the parent chooses each day's meal deal for each child. The amount is reserved on their sub-wallet. The booking can still be changed or cancelled until the deadline the school has set, for example the evening before at 10 a.m.

Next week's meals, with the days booked and the days still to book
03

The school office can book for a pupil

For a pupil without portal access, the school office enters the booking. The origin of each booking stays visible: school office or families app.

List of meal bookings with their origin
Annual enrolment

Enrol a class for the year and deregister a day before the deadline

01

The kitchen sets the deregistration deadline

The school sets the booking deadline and the cancellation deadline, for example 8 a.m. on the same day. A booking horizon, for example 14 days, sets how far ahead enrolments place their meals.

02

The school office enrols a class in one go

The school office chooses the canteen, the class, the meal, the days of the week and the school year. Each pupil is booked on the menus published for those days. A pupil with no paying parent, with two paying parents, or already enrolled is left aside and listed.

Class enrolment assistant: canteen, class, meal and days of the week
03

The enrolment list shows the meals booked and the days not booked

For each pupil, the list gives the days, the paying parent, the number of meals booked and the number of days not booked. The bookings generated are ordinary bookings: they appear in the day's list and in the kitchen's forecast.

  • A one-off booking already made is never overwritten
  • A deregistered day never comes back
  • Closing days, with no menu published, generate no booking
List of meal enrolments for a class, with meals booked and days not booked
04

The family deregisters a day or a period from their phone

In the app, the child enrolled for the year sees their days with the Deregister button and the deadline. An absence of several days is declared in one go. A meal deregistered before the deadline is released; after that time it remains due.

  • Separated parents: only the paying parent sees the enrolment, the other sees a booked day
  • Shared custody: two enrolments on different days
Families app: days enrolled for the year, with the Deregister and Absent for a few days buttons

The names, amounts and statements visible in these screenshots are fictitious demonstration data.

End-of-month invoicing

The monthly invoice groups the children of the same parent

01

The canteen moves to monthly invoicing, with no wallet to top up

A booking then commits no wallet: families book without topping up, and the bursar invoices in one go the meals due for the past month. Each child has a paying parent, set on their record. A meal cancelled within the deadline is not invoiced; a meal booked and not cancelled in time is due under the school's rule.

02

The assistant shows the month by parent before creating anything

On the first of the month, the Invoice the month's meals assistant lists, per paying parent, the children, the number of meals and the amount. The invoices are created as drafts, reviewed, then validated. Running it again never invoices a meal twice, and a meal checked later completes the draft.

Monthly meal invoicing assistant, with the children, number of meals and amount per paying parent
03

One invoice for the siblings, with one block per child

The invoice carries one section for the month, one block per child and the meal days listed. An invoice cancelled or refunded by credit note makes its meals invoiceable again. The family finds its invoice and statement in the app.

Sibling invoice: one section for the month, one block per child with the meal days
04

The families' standing orders pay the invoices

The treasurer imports the bank statement and each recognised transfer settles the family's invoices. The detail of the reconciliation is on the page administrative and accounting management.

The names, amounts and statements visible in these screenshots are fictitious demonstration data.

At the canteen

At the till, the card is enough

01

Scanning the card confirms and debits the booked meal

The till shows what the pupil has booked, the wallet is debited, the pupil moves on. A school can also choose to take payment at the till rather than at booking.

  • Works on the touch screens or tablets of the canteen
  • A pupil can eat in a canteen other than their own
  • Staff and outside guests use the same till
Canteen till with the meal deals and payment by the pupil's card
After service

Meals served are tracked by canteen and by diner

01

Management sees the no-shows on the same day

Management tracks meals by canteen, by day and by type of diner. No-shows are visible on the same day.

Meal analysis by canteen and by month
02

The parent sees what their child has bought

Each till scan appears in the portal activity with the location, the time and the details of the items.

Detail of a canteen purchase as seen by the parent
At the till

The till runs in the browser of the computers already in place

01

A badge reader in keyboard emulation mode is enough

The till is a web page that opens in the browser of the canteen's existing touch stations, with no dedicated terminal to buy. The RFID reader plugs into USB and behaves like a keyboard: it identifies the pupil as soon as the badge is presented.

  • No proprietary till hardware to buy
  • Works on the touch stations or tablets already in use
Canteen till with the pupil identified and the full meal added
02

The pupil's wallet is already offered at the right amount

Once the badge is recognised, the Mensavo Wallet payment method is offered, already filled in with the amount due. The cashier confirms and the pupil moves on: one action serves and debits the booked meal.

Till payment screen with the Mensavo wallet already offered
Second meal and meal not taken

The second meal and the meal not taken follow rules set by the school

01

A second meal on the same day is handled according to the rule chosen

A pupil who takes a second meal on the same day, for example after a sports activity, follows the rule the school has set: invoicing at the normal rate, a specific rate, or refusal beyond the first meal.

02

A booked meal not taken is not invoiced twice

When a pupil does not turn up at the canteen although they had booked, the meal stays marked as a no-show: the kitchen and management see the real attendance rate, with no double invoicing and no re-keying.

Meal analysis with meals served, booked, no-shows and the attendance rate
Reporting

Till sales feed the same reporting as bookings

01

One analysis, whatever the origin of the meal

A meal booked from the portal, entered by the school office or sold directly at the till: each meal feeds the same analysis, by canteen, by day and by type of diner, with no separate export to reconcile.

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About thirty minutes to see the wallet, the canteen, the invoicing and the families portal on the cases you choose.

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