Principals Today magazine featured the integration of student management system eTap with Kindo. You’ll find it in their 2016 Term 2 issue under the banner ‘Dollars and sense’. This sure makes sense to us!
The Kindo e-commerce system provides parents with a seamless view of their account on eTap, with a quick click to pay… resulting in instant eTap updates.
View their article here. (page 19) or scroll down to read more.
Cashless school payment system integrates with eTAP
Many schools can now remove office handling of parent payments thanks to the integration of student management system, eTAP with school e-commerce platform, Kindo. The ‘marriage’ of the two online systems promises to free up a significant amount of office admin time and allows parents and caregivers to action all their financial transactions with the school through a single login.
Kindo’s intuitive platform enables parents to pay school expenses and complete permission slips from their mobile, tablet or laptop. Now, all school invoices on eTAP can also be paid via Kindo with payments flowing directly into the SMS without manual reconciliation or data entry.
This will dramatically cut down interruptions and data entry in the school office. It will also make it quick and easy for working parents to action payments and respond to school opportunities like fundraisers, sports team sign up and trips.
“Schools using Kindo have already seen payments coming in more quickly,” said Kindo founder and CEO, Sandra Finlay. “Now that Kindo can act as a seamless extension of eTAP, schools will be able to focus office resources on more valuable activities rather than payment reconciliation and updating records.”
Allowing part payments is another feature that is set to make parents and schools very happy, according to Finlay. “Parents can easily see what they owe and what payments are outstanding, then choose to pay all or some of each amount. Many schools already manage this manually but it’s a time-consuming job that requires an intuitive knowledge of a family’s wishes.
“The integration between eTAP and Kindo empowers families to decide how to step out their payments without complicating things for school administrators. Payments made through Kindo will be posted directly into eTAP without passing through anyone’s hands.”
Administration and accounts team at Stonefields School, Ellie Bramwell and Lauren Wessels are excited about the time savings that the integration offers. “Now that the two systems can talk to each other it’s a dream come true,” said Ellie. “It totally takes away manual reconciliation, cutting out such a mundane part of the process.”
This creation of a single centre of truth for all pupil-related payments also makes it easier for schools to run off ‘real-time’ reports for staff members so they can see how many families have paid for each activity at any given time.
Stonefields School is one of the schools that have seen money coming in more quickly since they started using Kindo at the end of 2012. “And it’s even more efficient now,” said Office Wizard, Ellie Bramwell. “Payments download automatically into eTAP without us touching the system. It’s such a bonus for administrators. I wish we could make paying through Kindo compulsory for all parents!”
Ellie Bramwell used to see manual reconciliation of payments as a mind-numbing but important part of her role but she’s enjoying being able to give it away, safe in the knowledge that automation means the job will get done accurately.
“We’re now less likely to work through our morning tea and lunchbreaks and we have more time for the kids. It makes perfect sense,” she concludes. “Cutting out a boring task and allowing parents to pay at their convenience – it’s a win-win for parents and the school.”
Dawn Findlay, Finance Manager at Ellerslie School is finding that Kindo/eTAP combination is popular with parents, simplifies payment processing and cuts down on admin time. “We sent out reminder letters about children’s expenses at the beginning of term one with a link to Kindo. Over the following weekend we got a flood of money in through Kindo.
“By the end of February we had around 350 transactions through for our fees, which represents about half of our school families. More families sign up for Kindo with every reminder we send out.”
Dawn estimates that Kindo is cutting out an hour to an hour and a half of admin time every day, plus saving the school money on paper and consumables.
“Because Kindo integrates with our SMS, we don’t have to write receipts or enter and reconcile payments into our system manually. It also eliminates any human errors caused by constant interruptions in the office – our systems are all streamlined now.”
Schools wanting to find out more can contact Kindo on 09 8695200 or go to Kindo.co.nz
