Bath Public Schools
39 Andrews Road
Bath, Maine 04530

Fall 2007

With current national attention being focused on children’s health and wellness issues, the Bath Public Schools Food Service Department is excited to be among one of the first school districts in the State to provide parents a convenient, easy and secure online prepayment service to deposit money into your child’s school meal account at any time. This service also provides you the ability to view your child’s account balance through a web site called MyNutrikids.com. By having money in each child’s account prior to entering the cafeteria, we find the lunch lines move along much faster so your child has more time to eat and be with friends.

Also, parents will have the ability to print out a copy of their child’s eating history report. This history report will show you all dates and times that your child has purchased a breakfast, lunch or other food items within the past thirty days.

A new feature this year is an automatic low balance email notification. Parents will be able to establish school meal balance amounts so that if your child’s account balance falls below the established amount, you will receive an email alerting you to the low balance. We believe that this feature will provide more convenience to you by proactively notifying you of your child’s balance status. The low balance amount will be set by you for each child which will provide you with the flexibility to set a different balance notification amount per child.

To access these services:

• Simply go to the district web site at www.bathpublicschools.com
• Click on the Food Services link.
• Click on the MyNutrikids.com link. From this site you will create your account and add money to your child’s school meal account. All you need is your child’s name, student ID number and school ZIP code.
• Or you can go directly to the site at www.MyNutrikids.com

Things to know:

• If you have more than one child in the District you can handle all online prepayments from the same online account.
• Payments may be made through an existing PayPal account or with a major credit or debit card only. The minimum prepayment amount is $10.00 per prepay transaction (total sum of prepayments for all of your listed children in a single transaction).
• On line deposit convenience fee  Mynutrikids.com is now required by per revised credit card processing regulations to modify the method by which convenience fees are assessed for on line deposits. The convenience fee charged for online deposits will change from a variable fee structure of 3.5% + $.30 to a flat fee of $1.75. This convenience fee will apply to deposits of all amounts. Parents placing money into multiple meal accounts will only be assessed the $1.75 fee once per deposit transaction. This fee will be applied to all payment types (credit, debit, e-check, PayPal account). The following examples illustrate the impact of the change:

  Total deposit amount	Former Convenience Fee	New Convenience Fee
  $20	$1.00	$1.75
  $50	$2.05	$1.75
  $75	$2.93	$1.75

In order to minimize any increase in the online meal account payment convenience fee we would suggest that you consider making larger and less frequent prepayments. The Bath Public Schools will not profit from these fees. Alternatively, you may continue to make meal account prepayments directly to the district at no charge.

In the near future, we will also have the ability to offer interactive menu planning that allows parents and children to view upcoming school meal menu choices, make menu selections and view nutritional facts about their choices.  Parents and children will also have the opportunity to access a number of nutrition education sites so that you can learn together about smart meal selections and choices, exercise and overall health and wellness.

We are very excited to offer these new services. However, if you choose not to take advantage of the online prepayment service you may continue to make advance payments via check, which should be made payable to the Bath School FoodService Program. Please write your child’s full name on the memo portion of the check.

If you have any questions about these new services, please feel free to contact Debra Blum at 207-443-6601 or by email at dblum@bathpublicschools.com

Best Regards,
David MacDowell
Director of FoodServices