Replies

• Hi Scott, I feel your pain! There's a Nutmeg Group Chat further down the board - it might be worth copying and pasting there as a few users will be tracking the responses, so you might get more responses there. Sorry I can't help, we moved to Saffron a few years ago, but I'm sure others are in the same position.
  15th March 2021

• Hi Carolyn, We're still providing payments to parents of children who remain at home for learning. I suspect this will be our solution for as long as it's needed, including funded holiday periods. Hope this helps!
  15th March 2021

• no worries - that's you all added to the next meeting :)
  15th March 2021

• Hi Rick, Like Gerry, we started phasing out janitorial contractual overtime way back in 2010, and even then we only had a few still on it. We don't directly manage the janitors, but I doubt we have any - if any- still on contractual overtime. They receive a call out payment if there's an alarm call and additional hours (at overtime rate if over 37 hours) for any other work done.
  25th February 2021

• Morning! No worries - I've added you to the meeting invite :)
  25th February 2021

• Thanks Gerry - we were only talking about this yesterday!
  23rd February 2021

• We've been charging for pupils not entitled to FSM since January, and so from Monday we're back to FSM for all P1 - 3, and continuing to charge for others not entitled to FSM on P4-7 and S1-S6.
  23rd February 2021

• :)
  23rd February 2021

• Additional sales points throughout the school and outdoor sales points for a school of that size would be my first thoughts - would be good to hear of any other creative thoughts! 2,700 pupils? Crikey!
  23rd February 2021

• Morning Steven, We don't have a system in place for cleaning at all. We use excel spreadsheets, timesheets and have a database we use for collating customer feedback. We had hoped that the APSE cleaning monitoring tool might be an option for us in future - we're just about to roll out smartphones to cleaning staff in Argyll and Bute (one per premise cleaned) to help improve connectivity, communication, etc. We don't plan to roll out anything else beyond that at this early stage, but having the devices onsite gives us the opportunity to look at what options we might have in the future. I'm looking forward to hearing what solutions others are using! Jayne
  12th February 2021

• Hi folks, We'll go with 9th March then - after the other meeting. I'll build in a short break after HoH to let everyone grab a cuppa and have a comfort break :) It'll then be for Civica to arrange future sessions ;)
  11th February 2021

• Completely agree - they won't have McC&W done by April, let alone everything else. If everyone is ok with 9th March we can go with that - does that work for everyone?
  9th February 2021

• Hi All, Nikki and I met with Civica on Friday, and they are keen to have a User Group Meeting, as well as individual sessions with each Local Authority. As we're all meeting on 9th March for the Food and Drink Guidance Meeting followed by Hands on Hungry, what do you all think about holding the first Saffron User Group immediately after that? I know it's one big, long afternoon of meetings but would be a chance when we all have the afternoon scheduled in our diaries?
  9th February 2021

• Hi Gerry, Nikki and I met with Civica on Friday and we specifically asked about this, I've offered them access to our database so that they can do supplier products as well as McC and W - McC &W is their priority at the moment, but they're up for a discussion. Will post below re. potential User Group Meeting.
  9th February 2021

• Hi Neil, I think we'll need the cleaners in the longer term, but we would need Scottish Government to commit to funding them. COSLA are still pushing them to release the £30M in grant funding for logistics costs, which will help, but I don't think there has been any commitment for funding into the new financial year - yet. I'm hearing there may be £45M coming that will be expected to cover a lot of different school related costs in 2021/22, so it's a good time to make sure you get your share of that when/if it's confirmed.
  4th February 2021