ParentPay Reviews 4,442

I am shocked that schools are still using Parentpay. Nothing but constant issues with it. 2 kids in 2 different schools and issues with both. My eldest constantly gets overcharged for food she hasn’t had! My youngest balance goes into minus into plus into minus! Plenty of times the system is down so can’t even log on to book and pay for meals. Even booking meals is not straightforward you have to keep going back to Home Screen and then start again to book meal for each day.

Terrible user experience! Unintuitive and poor usability. I waste so much time trying to figure out where info is. Given this is an important service for parents and schools, invest in a digital team who understand UX to overhaul your service! Truly awful.

My daughter ends up the wrong lunches sometimes or orders mysteriously canceled has to be a better system

It just doesn't work properly. I've 2 kids in different schools, both use ParentPay as the only way to pay and myself and other parents are having regular problems. sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.
Both schools seem to believe the system is brilliant, but as a parent who continues to have regular difficulties with the system. I know that it isn't fit for purpose. If you're part of a schools business team, please get a different system. ParentPay will only cause headaches for both you and the parents of the kids who attend your school.

Terrible they want you to jump through so many hoops to make a payment I’ve had 3 children over about 15 years the app is really bad time for a change

I have £175 of transactions that are still in ‘pending’ status although the money has come out of my bank account. My sons place on D of E expedition and a school trip which I have been paying for for more than 14 months is in jeopardy because the payment deadline has passed and the payments are still pending. I’m also trying to get a ticket to a school production, the tickets are limited in numbers, the payment is pending and I can’t purchase another ticket as item is stuck in pending status. Please can you help to get this resolved. I spent many hours on Thursday and Friday, ringing the school, ringing my bank and emailing your customer support.

Child going hungry because impossible to log in and no customer support number. Everytime I get ‘sorry there’s an issue, we’re working hard to fix it’. When is it going to be fixed because this has been going on for months.

When there's a problem, for example with logging on, I've found them to be bureaucratic, verbose, condescending, slow to respond, all in the guise of safeguarding data, and - in a few cases - ParentPay has failed to either produce the school items paid for or explain how they should be obtained once bought. I'm not sure I trust them, frankly, which is why I've never topped up with more than small sums at any one time.

Dreadful dreadful dreadful company. Took my money and would not return it. Terrible on line support. Email address on formal complaints policy bounced back. Might be forced to report the mater to the police as a crime as i am getting not response from the on line support.

Awful service and company I paid for my sons dinners however it didn't deduct from his account, when I got I touch they weren't very helpful at all. Constantly asking for screen shots of my bank, but due to security reasons my app won't allow it but they didn't seem to comprehend what I was saying. I ended up having to put more money on so my son could have a dinner if I didn't have to use there service I never would again

Terrible company. Added £25 cash last week which is not reflected in the balance. Daughter unable to purchase school meal. Unable to log in, website down all day. Have submitted online query at 8.30am and no response. So I’m now £25 down and daughter can’t have school dinner

Parent are generally stressed, time poor and have a lot of admin tasks to juggle. I'm sorry but this is such a poor platform - clunky and confusing. It's added stress into my life instead of helping things. Even just to reset your password to login doesn't seem possible, as I haven't received a reset email yet, and I've now waited 10 mins. Once logged in, the interface is so confusing and it's totally unclear what has ben paid, and how needs to be paid. Simple things like choosing school meals should be simple, but aren't. Basically terrible.

Not fit for purpose. I put some money in both my kids accounts only to find out they are staying in and I cannot pay any of their clubs or trips. It asks you to add more money in. What kind of people are getting signed up with them. One word to describe: Corrupt

School is unable to provide a running total to child leaving them learning to spend unaccountable not a great start in life as a vulnerable teen.

A more useless company one would struggle to find!
Very quick to whip that money. Then become totally uncontactable! The email system is like a dream for the unscrupulous company it’s become! I truly wish I had read these reviews before trying to sign up.
I’m not convinced of the legality of their actions and unless they can start providing some accountability. It could be worth some kind of legal advice.
A scam too far!

Another non transparent company, dodging between the lines to make greedy profits. I don't know where their accounting degrees come from as they don't make any sense at all. We have transactions that don't tally, and payments that there is no receipts for. You cannot contact this company easily, there help section is useless as they fire everything back to the school. But as usual there is no option other than to use this company as there is no other alternative. Talk about license to print money with no accountability.

What a totally useless designed payment system. I don’t think you could design such a poor system that lacks any sensible logic f tried yourself Who ever designed this must have been given the brief of…useless credit system, hit and miss notifications, complicated system that leaves you unsure if you have paid or not for items, missing items to at you know you have paid for and on and in.

Useless, why do you not accept apple pay for easier payments

Consistently loosing our children's meal orders, and then blaming the parent for not ordering them. Shocking system, heavily flawed

Great service from the team, issue I had was resolved with a few messages, really helpful and fast response to my emails