It can be difficult to keep track of balances and payments. ParentPay gives Payers the opportunity to set up email or text alerts.
Text message alerts can only be received if you have credit in your text message balance. Charges for text alerts are deducted from the text message balance each time a text is sent. Texts are charged at 6p each. There is no charge for email alerts.
NOTE: Text alerts will only be sent to verified mobile numbers. Email alerts will only be sent to the email address used as your username.
Setting up alerts
- From within your ParentPay account, navigate to Communication > Alert settings
- From the list of alerts that can be set up, select which alerts would like to be received, and whether you want to receive them by email or text message. (Text message alerts will be charged at 6p each.)
Balance alerts – Most schools will allow payers to set a balance threshold to be set for balance associated items such as school meals, or after school clubs. You can then choose to receive email or text alerts once the balance falls below the selected threshold. The thresholds can be set for each balance associated item linked with each child attached to your ParentPay account. Maximum of one alert per item and child every 2 days once the balance alert reaches the threshold.
New item alerts – Select to receive alerts when your child is added to a new trip or item for payment. Alerts can be set individually for each child attached to your ParentPay account.
Maximum of one alert per child received per day.
Payment alerts – Cheques and cash – Select to receive an alert each time the school records manual cheque or cash payments against your child
Payment alerts – PayPoint – Select to receive an alert each time a PayPoint payment is recorded against your child’s account.
Message alerts – Select to receive a text message alert each time the school sends an email to you through the ParentPay system.
- Select Save
NOTE: Balance alerts are not available in all schools. If your school’s ParentPay configuration does not support balance alerts, you will not be given the option to set them up. You will be notified whether you can set up balance alerts at the top of the Alert settings screen.
If you have selected to receive text alerts, you will now need to top up your text message balance.
- Select the Add Credit to your test message balance here link
- Select Add Credit now
- Enter the amount to add to your balance (Min £2.40 / Max £9.00) and you can either select Add to basket or you can pay via Bank Transfer if you have enabled this feature
- If you have selected Add to basket, select the basket icon in the top right corner of the screen to review the payment. You will then have the option to pay via Parent Account credit, Bank Transfer, Visa Checkout or Other payment method.
NOTE: If there is any credit in the Parent Account, this will be used to pay for the items. If the total of the items to pay for is greater than the Parent Account balance, the difference can be paid by other methods
- Complete the payment process. Once the payment has been completed, a confirmation message will be displayed