ParentPay app missing balance after leaving school

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My child moved schools, so I thought I'd be able to withdraw the balance of funds I put on parent pay. But there is none, just one negative payment for the full amount I added, but labelled "school dinners"

Anyone had a similar experience? It looks dodgy to me, like the school have just taken the balance.

Whilst at the school I could see the individual items bought. I don't think my child could have spent the balance of £25 in 3 days. I especially doubt it'd be to the penny.

Yes! I had one school leaver and she left about a fiver on the account and she was removed along with the balance? I have another at the school, so if assumed the amount would be refunded so I could just use it for the other kid but no? It’s gone.

Email them and ask how they plan on repaying you the balance. It could be that they withdraw it then post you a check for it.

I've filed an SAR to start with to obtain the transaction history to get a final balance figure.

Whilst a low amount of money, it's the principle! I suspect the school is at fault rather than ParentPay. They said the first day's lunch would be free, but it was a negative on the account when I signed in.

I hate these things where you put money on account. Just use contactless payment cards like the rest of the world and save us all from yet another bloody app.

Have they refunded it into the bank account you used to top up Parentpay?

I hope you get to the bottom of this. I was just thinking of this this morning as I we are possibly having to move town's to a school that doesn't use parentpay. I'll be sure to empty the account first!

Jeez. Just email the school.

A SAR! What a pain in the arse for the school taking up some poor admins persons time when all you needed to do is email the school and ask! What an over reaction!

I can’t believe you have done a SAR - what a dickish thing to do. I deal with SARS in our school and they are a time-consuming pain in the arse that take me away from my real job of supporting students’ education.
If you’d phoned, you’d most likely have your answer by now.

You just need to email school - I hadn't topped up the account in ages (due to packed lunches) so they couldn't refund to my credit card but they refunded to my bank account

This has happened to me too!

I am school admin staff. I'm term time only. That means I get paid for only the term time. ie. when your kids aren't there I shouldn't be either as I dont get paid. I absolutely refuse to go in during the holidays now as I used to but didn't get paid, and well, I'm already on low pay so......Basically when the job was simpler in the old days and it was just cash payments for school milk, dinners and trips, and paper records, the job was straightforward. TAs of each class took in the envelopes with money in, recorded who'd paid against what and passed them to the office staff to count and bank.

Then technology came in. Sold to schools as saving staff admin time, popular with parents as easier for them. What they didn't tell schools was the amount of often complicated admin of these systems behind the scenes - at the times of year that office staff just aren't in/paid. Ending the school year. Starting up the new one. Adding all the new parents. Hoping that your IT systems can handle all the uploads.

I know how you feel as a parent, OP. I'd want any credit back too. But I also know how school admin staff feel. It's all a complicated nightmare for them. They don't get paid enough to sort it. Especially not in their unpaid time over the school holidays.

So be patient with them. They WILL want to help you, and sort things out. Because they wouldn't be doing the job otherwise. Sometimes it's purely down to the time they have available to sort these things out. Nothing wrong with chasing it up now and again of course.

The SAR was to ParentPay, not the school. It was parent pay that I paid and could see the transactions previously - hence going that route. Yes I could contact the school (or their outsourced catering provider probably). They've not been great (partly the reaosn for moving schools), but yes will email them this week.

All far too complicated just to pay for some food! I feel for all the admin staff with system setup and support calls.

Full credit to ParentPay support who have responded with some facts. Yes there was a credit balance (of over £10). It is not clear to me why the school has taken the balance from the child account when closing that child account associated with that school. As suggested I need to contact the school to refund to the parent account so I can withdraw.

It seems odd that the school is able to deduct the balance without authorisation, I was under the impression that I had paid money to ParentPay which would be drawn down by authorisation only from my son or me. I'd need to read the full Ts and Cs to see quite what the relationships and responsibilities are WRT ParentPay and School. Logically I'd have expected the balance on any child account that is closed to be automatically available to the parent account for withdrawal. That is not how it is set up.

I hope this thread helps other parents who's money disappears.

I'd suggest keeping the minimum amount of credit on account as possible.

I had the same problem, and the same as you I couldn't understand the relationship between Parent Pay, the school and myself. I tried contacting the school but they just put the blame onto parentpay, and parentpay said 'contact the school'.

After a bit of digging and back and forth I learned that as soon as you put the money against an item on Parent Pay (so mine was auto top up for lunches / snacks) it means you have authorised the funds to be transferred out of the parent pay account and into the school's bank account. Once the funds are held by the school / caterer, parentpay can't transfer the money back.

So the bottom line is, the school has to authorise the money to be available to you in order for you to withdraw from parentpay. If the account is closed then the school needs to send the money back to you directly.

Ultimately the school is holding the money so always contact them and request a refund. You can then either withdraw from parent pay (if you still have an account) or request a refund to your bank directly from the school.
The school cannot hold onto your money, no matter how busy the staff are.
Once I understood this and emailed the school explaining all of this, they sent my money back by bank transfer the same day.

If they are part of a trust I would say email the central finance team there as they will have all of the info and knowledge to help you.

Hope this helps anybody in the same situation.