Lunch Funding Guidelines 2007-08

In the 2007-08 school year GTACS is pleased to be introducing two options to choose from to fund your child’s lunches each week.  Both options offer the advantage of eliminating the handling of cash in the dining room and expedite lunch lines so we can focus on the students and their daily interaction with healthy foods as a pathway to life-long wellness practice.

GTACS will be using a Point of Sale (POS) software debit system called Meal Magic for our student meal payment management. The use of this system will allow us to automatically deduct your child’s meal price from an account that you fund

You may pay for your child’s lunch in one of two ways:

Option 1 – Check Payment:

You may write a check, made out to GTACS, for your child’s meals. Families may fund their children’s accounts in increments of 20 meals or more, per child, at a time. We are happy to accept payment for the entire school year at once and if for any reason there is a balance left at the end of the year, GTACS will refund the balance or the amount can be rolled into the following calendar year.  If a 20-meal increment is prohibitive for you, we will accept lower meal total funding as needed.

For families that routinely switch between hot lunch service and brown bagging, your child’s milk can be purchased for 35 cents by using this POS debit system. This is the preferred method of payment to eliminate the quarters and dimes needed each week to pay for milk. GTACS requests that you maintain a balance of at least $10, if possible, in your child’s account for that purpose.

To help us expedite input of your funds into the software system we ask that you either mail or drop off your checks to the St. Francis school office; Attention: Dining Services, 123 E. 11^th St., Traverse City, MI 49684 or leave your payments for Dining Services with the front desk at your child’s school site.

If you have more than one child, please indicate how to break down the check total for each child. You no longer need to write a separate check for each child at a different school.  One check can fund all of your children as long as we know how to break down the full amount for each child.  If no information is provided, we will divide the check amount evenly between all children attending GTACS.

Option 2 – Online Deposit:

You may also choose to fund your child’s account electronically by visiting www.lunchdeposit.com.  This service does charge the user 6% for each transaction, but GTACS receives no benefit from that.  It is a convenience offered as part of the software and some families may find that service worth the fee for the convenience and the ability to view the fund level of your children’s account/s.  To learn more about the service, please visit www.lunchdeposit.com and click on the FAQ link.  (Note: In Option 1 above, there is no way to view your account online.  Your check is simply deposited into an account and we keep a running total of the deductions each time your child receives a lunch.  When you have questions about your account balance you may simply contact Karen Spencer, Dining Services Assistant, at 946-6353, for an update of your account.)

We encourage you to begin funding your child’s account at any time.  Hot lunch program to begin soon - stay tuned for further information.