Croydon’s e-Pay Cashless Schools Project has won a prestigious e-Government National Award for its ground-breaking project to create cashless schools across Croydon, in the category Local e-Government excellence: Take-up & usage growth.

Working with Nationwide Retail Systems, the market leader in cashless catering and management systems for schools, Croydon has delivered a unique, socially inclusive service with ambitious targets including the removal of all dinner money from Croydon schools.

During academic year 2008/9 online dinner money collection is expected to climb to in excess of £3.4 million. The project has increased the safety of Croydon’s school children, vastly reduced time spent on dinner money administration, increased the uptake of both paid and free school meals and removed cash collection vehicles from the busy streets of Croydon. 

Speaking at the event Prime Minister Gordon Brown said "The 2008 awards saw a record number of nominations from across the country - individuals, teams and organisations who are using new technologies in innovative and creative ways to deliver better public services. When times are tough, as they are now, it is more important than ever for government to work as smoothly and efficiently as possible, so it's good to see technology providing real efficiency gains at the same time as increasing the effectiveness of services."

The 2008 e-Government National Awards are the UK's highest level commendation for the best e-Government and technology-driven services - services which, through innovative online delivery or IT implementation, have positively transformed the lives of citizens, local communities, businesses and stakeholder groups.

The winners were presented with their awards at a glittering black tie dinner at the City of London's Guildhall, on Tuesday 20 January, by Cabinet Minister Tom Watson MP, and Government CIO John Suffolk. 

Tom Watson MP, Cabinet Office Minister for Transformational Government said: "Today's citizens are quite rightly demanding better government services and technology is proven by the winners to be delivering this, breaking new ground and helping to achieve new goals. The winners, and all the nominees, should be very proud of what they have achieved."

Croydon Council’s Executive Director of Resources & Customer Service, Nathan Elvery, said: “Croydon’s borough-wide project set ambitious targets; including removing all dinner money from our schools, and it has achieved many goals, from healthier diets to greater safety.”

With a total focus on Every Child Matters and Healthy Food, Croydon and ParentPay worked with partner Nationwide Retail Systems ( cashless catering ) to expand the project and now collect data to record what meals children have selected.

Mr Elvery, added: “Providing meal data online gives every parent a good reason to use online technology – to view their children’s meal choices and nutritional information.”

The capture and reporting of meal choice and nutritional information online via ParentPay to the parents, schools and Local Authority, is supporting Croydon’s engagement with all stakeholders to measurably improve children’s lives through healthy eating. 

Croydon Council Corporate Catering Manager, Allyson Lloyd added “We are delighted to be recognised with this award. The project has improved the sustainability of the school meals service which contributes to the health of children by supplying high quality healthy meals in Croydon schools.”

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