St. Patrick’s SCRIP

Help support our parish by using SCRIP! 

What is SCRIP??

SCRIP means SUBSTITUTE MONEY!  You are purchasing gift cards that are used just like cash!  We purchase these gift cards at a discount to grocery stores, restaurants, movie theatres, home stores, etc. and resell them to you for face value! 

If you buy a $25 Hy-Vee gift card, it is worth $25 to purchase gas, groceries, or prescriptions at any Hy-Vee store!  Our program bought that $25 card at a 3% discount – for $24.25 – meaning our program gets to keep the 75 cents!!! 

(If one family purchased a $100 Hy-Vee gift card each month for a year – our program would profit $36! If 100 families did this, the program would profit $3600.)

Over the last 3 years, St. Pat’s SCRIP has donated $13,500 to the Library Media Center, Building Fund, and Technology Fund!

SCRIP is available at the school office, after weekend Masses, and by sending an order to school in your child’s backpack (returned same day – except for pre-order items).

Looking ahead… we will have the following drives to earn lots of “free money” and possibly a dress down day for our kids:

BACK TO SCHOOL September 22-October 3

HOLIDAY December 1-December 12

SPRING March 23-April 3

"Can I pay for my scrip with a credit card?"

 For many families, credit cards are the preferred way to shop, as they accumulate rewards, airline miles and rebates.  It's difficult to convince these families to participate in your scrip program if you can't accommodate their preferred way to pay.
 
The problem is, the freebies that entice families to pay with credit cards, aren't really "free".  Someone has to pay for the free airline tickets and rebates, and that someone is your scrip program.

The Ugly Math Of Credit Cards
Offering credit cards is a fairly simple process that begins with a Merchant bank.  The fine print will vary from bank to bank, but most merchant agreement have some kind of nominal application fee, a fee for leased or purchased equipment, and maybe some sort of monthly minimum charge to keep your account open.  But the real cost is the "discount rate".
 
The discount rate is simply the amount your deposits are discounted by the merchant bank.  Typical discount rates range from 4% to 2%.  Every time your families purchase scrip and pay with the credit card, the merchant bank will deposit those funds - less the discount - into your bank account, usually within 48 hours.
 
So the bank gets 2% or more of your face value scrip program sales.  And that's the rate for a transaction with an actual card swipe.  If you "hand key" a transaction - for instance take a credit card number from a form or verbally - the discount fee is substantially higher.
 
Even uglier, suppose your credit card users purchase low margin products.  Some retailers in very competitive categories can only offer single digit rebates.  If your families buy lots of scrip with 2% discounts and pay with credit cards, your organization benefit has vanished.  And if your merchant fee is higher than normal, you could very well be losing money!

Contact Jane Chapman @ 553-6131 or Deb Gustafson @ 491-3820 with any questions!!!

Link to Order Form for On Hand Items

Link to Order Form for Special Order Items