If you’ve ever tried to pay for a school trip at 8.58pm the night before and ended up locked out of your account while your child sobs about being “the only one not going,” congratulations—you’ve met ParentPay.
On paper, it’s a brilliant idea. In real life? Well… let’s just say it’s not quite living up to its potential.
When my kids’ school first rolled it out, the parents Whatsapp group lit up. Everyone was complaining about yet another app to download, and to be honest, I agreed. Then I did a bit of research (I Googled it for 5 minutes) and actually, ParentPay looked pretty handy.
I downloaded the app, and to begin with, I was pleasantly surprised. It genuinely made life more convenient. Then I started to run into some of the famous ParentPay bugs, and my relationship with the app soured.
How it Works (When it Works)
If you don’t already know, ParentPay is an online payment system used by thousands of UK schools. It’s supposed to take the faff out of school admin for parents by letting you pay for things like school dinner, trips, clubs etc., all via the ParentPay platform.
You set up your child’s profile (on the account that you run), and from there you can manage everything to do with payments, consent, and even diary management to an extent. It’s quite useful as a memory aid as much as to pay for stuff.
If you have two kids at the same school (or even at different schools) it’s even more useful, as you can add them both to your account and jump between them to do whatever you need to do. You can even see what your child has bought for lunch! So when they try to convince you they didn’t just buy chips you can catch them out 🕵️
When it works, it’s great. No more frantic hunts for pound coins 5 minutes before leaving for the school run. No more crumpled consent forms at the bottom of book bags. No chance that a payment will be missed by the school, or lost by your dozy child between the school gates and the classroom.
You can log on, pay for a year 4 museum trip, top up both kids’ lunch money, and click ‘consent’ for the Forest School thing all before the kettle boils in the morning. You feel like a parent who has got their you know what together.
You know who doesn’t always have their you know what together? ParentPay. That’s who.
When it Doesn’t Work
To be fair, I have had my issues with ParentPay but they probably seem more numerous than they are because all of the other parents rage at it in the Whatsapp group. So I feel like it’s causing me headaches every other day, even though much of the time the issue is happening to somebody else.
That said, it definitely throws a strop more often than an overtired 3 year old who is two bags of Haribo deep.
For all its good intentions, ParentPay can be spectacularly frustrating.
The log in system suddenly gets amnesia, or you need to reset your password but the email literally never comes through and you end up talking to customer services. The random error messages that leave you with no clue about how to fix the issue, the payments that don’t show up even though the money is no longer in your bank account, the app crashes, the payment reminders when you have already paid.
It’s buggy as hell.
The most frustrating thing about it is that you kind of have to use it. It’s not really a choice. I suppose you could refuse but it would make your life even harder as you would constantly need to make special arrangements with the school. So it’s got you in a place where putting up with it is probably the lesser of two evils.
Just look at some of the reviews online. Maybe they should change the name from ParentPay to ParentPain.
Another Thing to Juggle
In truth, ParentPay is probably more helpful than not most of the time. It’s biggest downfall is that it is a product invented for convenience. So when it makes life less convenient, it feels like a double failure.
For example, if your oven breaks, it’s inconvenient and annoying but it’s an appliance and these thing fail eventually. When an app you were forced to download for your own (*the school’s) convenience breaks, it feels like an absolute liberty.
It might only cause me problems one or two days a month, but it’s always at the worst time. The rest of the time it is saving me sofa diving for pound coins and stressing about holiday club payments. On balance, this is a win, but it doesn’t always feel like it.
It’s just one more thing to juggle in the game of parenting. One more plate to keep spinning. One more fried nerve moving you ever closer to a phone smashing mental breakdown 🤣
If you are about to start using it then I wish you the best of luck. It genuinely is a better alternative to loose change in grubby envelopes or laborious bank transfers. Just be prepared to want to chew your own hand off once or twice a month.