Honiton Community College is preparing to launch a cashless catering system to transform school lunches.

Plans are afoot to implement a cashless catering system at Honiton Community College to benefit students and parents.

The system is expected to be launched next month and it is hoped it will reduce queuing times for students and make it easier for parents and carers to pay for their child’s meals as well as reducing the risk of cash being lost or stolen.

It also allows parents and carers to view their child’s meals online.

The college’s director of finance, Gary Wills, said: “We are very keen to install the cashless catering solution as the benefits are there for all to see, with ease of payment for parents and carers, security of cash and the ability for students entitled to free school meals to take them without embarrassment, being the major advantages.

“The system we will employ uses biometrics, which is a tried and tested new technology that many other schools and organisations are now using.

“A scan is taken of a finger and approximately 10 points are identified and converted into an algorithm which is then assigned to the child; the actual scan is then deleted.

“No copy of a student’s fingerprint is ever recorded.”