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IRIS BioStore Portal

A cloud-based cashless catering system for schools and trusts

Our cost-effective, cashless catering system helps primary and secondary schools manage mealtimes – all while empowering parents, providing pupils with choice and giving trusts control.

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  • 75%

    of multi-academy trusts are in
    partnership with IRIS Education

  • 12,000+

    schools in the UK rely on
    IRIS Education software every day

  • 4 million

    families use IRIS Education software
    to connect with their school

IRIS BioStore Portal

A smarter, more cost-effective school meal ordering system

IRIS BioStore Portal meets the different needs of primary and secondary schools.

It’s fast to add and easy to use – whether you have parents preordering meals for their child, primary pupils choosing them at registration, or secondary students negotiating a busy canteen.

Meanwhile, trusts can see and control everything remotely.

  • icon primary schools | IRIS BioStore Portal

    Primary schools

    Provide pre-ordering for parents – and child-friendly meal selection at registration time.

  • icon secondary schools | IRIS BioStore Portal

    Secondary schools

    Empower pupil choice while also saving money on till hardware and biometric equipment.

  • icon Mats schools | IRIS BioStore Portal

    MATs and school groups

    Get trust-wide menu management and reporting without the need for site visits.

BioStore Portal for Primary schools

Pre-order meals and sync software with your MIS

As a cashless catering system for primary schools, IRIS BioStore Portal is designed to make life easier for everyone, including teachers, students, staff, parents, and carers.

  • Parents and carers can pre-order and pay for children’s meals from home through a mobile app
  • Alternatively, pupils can choose their meal in class as part of their morning registration – all without leaving the BioStore Portal system
  • BioStore Portal syncs up with your MIS to pull across student records and write back attendance.
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BioStore Portal for Secondary schools

Cloud-based meal management for secondary schools

Our cashless catering system provides secondary schools with a fast, tablet-based, intuitive system that works even if the internet goes down.

  • Students scan a QR code to pay for lunch, whether they are buying meals themselves or funded as part of free school meals (FSM)
  • There’s no need for a school to invest in expensive biometric identification technology.

BioStore Portal for multi-academy trusts

Manage meals trust-wide

To make the best of resources and centralised catering contracts, trusts must manage meals centrally and make data-driven decisions that minimise costs and reduce waste.

With BioStore Portal, menus can be created at trust level and sent to individual schools. Data on their uptake can be reported back without a site visit.

  • Log in, load up, and manage new or existing menus across your trust remotely from a single online location
  • Get centralised reporting on data like class overviews, customer transactions, whole-school reports, and more
  • BioStore Portal caters for any type of MAT, including primary, secondary, or mixed estate.
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Book a demo

Discover how IRIS BioStore Portal can support your schools at lunchtime. Fill in the contact form, and we’ll be in touch to arrange a product demo.

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“IRIS Education offered the products that felt like the best fit for our trust. The integration of the solutions means we are working smarter with our data, our processes are smoother, and we’re making efficiencies. What’s more, we have one team to support us, and one supplier to build a great relationship with; it feels like a partnership and we’re all on the same team.”
David Houghton, COO of Kernow Learning Trust

75% of UK multi-academy trusts are partnered with IRIS

What are the benefits of using IRIS BioStore Portal

Cashless catering systems for schools can vary. So, what are the features, functionality and cost-saving benefits that make IRIS BioStore Portal right for your school or trust?

  • Connect to your MIS

    Our data extractor makes this process straightforward – there’s no need for third-party software to bring your systems together; we do it all for you. This ensures your cashless catering system maintains a live copy of your student cohort. No pupils get left out.

  • Cost-effective cashless catering

    • You don’t need to pay for any new bio-scanning technology – we have made something that is cost-effective and scalable. If you have a tablet that uses Android or IOS, you can get started immediately.
    • Our cloud-based technology also means you can save money that would have been spent on expensive hardware. Servers, for example, can be extremely costly and time-intensive to replace.

  • Integrate with your existing IRIS apps

    IRIS BioStore Portal can be used standalone or as an add-on to our parental engagement apps, IRIS ParentMail and IRIS Reach. This cuts down on the number of apps parents have to juggle.

    BioStore Portal comes with our online payment system, IRIS PlusPay, built in for free.

  • Less effort to maintain

    • If you have on-premise systems, you are responsible for backups and security policies. That issue is gone when you use a cloud-based solution like IRIS BioStore Portal.
    • With BioStore Portal, you waste less time at trust level. Catering managers or staff no longer need to travel to multiple schools. Information is retrieved or updated at the fastest possible speed – which is important when updating the likes of menus.

  • Comprehensive reporting

    • Get strategic with mealtimes. Control expenses, track pupil food choices, and never serve an unpopular meal again.
    • Pick from a range of ready-to-go reports. View mealtime data across the trust, school-wide, or drill down further.

  • Allergen management and product warnings

    • Schools are safety first – and that includes at mealtime. IRIS BioStore Portal lets you track allergy risks from foods, preventing children from buying something dangerous to their health.
    • The system allows students to easily identify meals that meet their dietary requirements, such as halal or vegan options.

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Brochure

IRIS Biostore Cashless Catering

Download our IRIS BioStore Portal brochure to learn how this cashless catering system can make a major difference in the way primary schools and trusts manage mealtimes. 

biostore

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Learn more about IRIS BioStore Portal and how this cloud-based software can improve school meal management.

Students can use a QR code to order and pay for their meals.

When students are ready to pay, all they need to do is present their unique QR code. Catering staff simply scan the QR code using a tablet or smartphone, and the transaction is complete.

While QR codes can be scanned directly from other screens (e.g. a mobile phone belonging to an older student), schools can also provide pupils with printed copies of the QR code, such as on an ID card, to scan at lunchtime.

IRIS BioStore Portal is designed to integrate and work in harmony with a range of solutions, including third-party software.

BioStore Portal integrates with all major MIS providers, and it works in perfect harmony with our MIS solutions for the state and independent sectors, IRIS Ed:gen and iSAMS By IRIS. The software can also facilitate and process online payments by integrating with IRIS PlusPay and ParentPay.

Yes, and it does so in a sensitive way that keeps this information anonymous. All you need is a funding source to be added to the pupil’s account, and it works as seamlessly as any other type of meal transaction.

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