Meal Plan offers you a flexible, sociable and tasty eating experience. It can help you budget as you will need to decide how best to spend your £55 each week.  

In addition, Meal Plan saves you the hassle of:

• Planning your weekly meals
• Weekly shopping
• Commuting time and the cost of a bus or taxi fare to and from the supermarket
• Preparing and cooking meals.
• Clearing, cleaning and washing up after every meal

Meal Plan costs £50 per week - but your card is loaded with £55 to spend!

The meals will be provided during term time for a total of 32 weeks, as follows:

2016/17:

1. 19th September 2016 to 11th December 2016 (12 weeks)
2. 9th January 2017 to 26th March 2017 (11 weeks)
3. 24th April 2017 to 25th June 2017 (9 weeks)

2017/18

1. 18 September 2017 to 10th December 2017 (12 weeks)
2. 8th January 2018 to 25th March 2018 (11 weeks)
3. 23rd April 2018 to 24th June 2018 (9 weeks)

* All meals must be taken during the applicable termly periods, as indicated above. No transfer to other mealtimes, venues or dates will be permitted.

Please remember that the £55.00 meal plan budget is to spend from Monday to Sunday and students should budget their spending accordingly across each day.

The cost of the Meal Plan is included in the residence fees charged for student accommodation. The total residence fee including Meal Plan will be clearly marked on the accommodation contract documentation.

When completing the Payment Form the options to pay residence fees are either by:

• One single payment by Debit or Credit Card, cheque or bank transfer,(please note that there is a 1.2% administration charge to pay for Credit Card over the telephone) or
• Monthly or termly Direct Debit installments.

We can cater for all diets such as vegetarian, gluten free, halal, and kosher.  If there is a specific diet that you need within InFusion in Shackleton Hub, just let a catering manager know when you arrive and they will help as much as possible.  We cannot cater for high allergen diets such as nut free, as all of our food is prepared in kitchens where these items are present and so we cannot 100% guarantee food is free from nuts.

If all or part of the weekly allowance is not spent by the end of each week this cannot be carried over as credit to the following week.

With so many outlets available for meal plan cards, students find they are able to budget their meal plan money to fit into their week.

Current Meal Plan balances are accessible at any till by presenting theUniversity ID card to the card reader. The remaining balance for that week will be displayed on the customer information screen or related back by the till operator.

As the accommodation and Meal Plan packages are provided together, under the terms and conditions of the accommodation contract they cannot be separated, therefore a student would be unable to stay in the same accommodation.

You cannot loan out a University ID card. These cards contain a digital Image and are for the owners use only. Students are strongly advised to keep their University ID card with them at all times.

The Meal Plan is not transferable between students.

Ownership and control of your student ID card is your responsibility, as it has cash value for meal plan users it is not transferrable to other parties and must be presented for every transaction.

Meal plan is operated on a No Card, No credit basis, across all outlets of the university.

The till operator cannot process meal plan without the student’s personal card to swipe through the till.

The procedure is as follows in office hours:

• The Student is to report the loss/theft in person to the Student Hub Located on the Ground Floor of the Aston Webb Building.
• A replacement University ID card is £10 which will be payable at the time the new card is issued.
• Between normal working hours Meal Plan Credit will not be issued and the student must apply for a replacement card on the same day.

Out of Hours

• If the lost card is on a weekend day then the student must make contact directly with the Catering Duty Manager at the HUB on the Vale who will organise a meal provision to be charged against the remaining balance of meal plan for that student’s card until the Student Hub is back open. (The student will be required to produce 2 forms of ID for this to be authorised).
• No credit facility or refund is applicable.

In the event that funds have expired students will need to pay by another means

Please Remember –  ID Cards are a source of electronic funds please keep them safe at all times.

We welcome comments, feedback and suggestions regarding the Meal Plan and our catering and retail facilities on the main campus and the Hub. With this in mind we have the following mechanisms in place:

• Focus Groups – these are established at the start of each academic year and run for the duration of your contract period. The groups meet once a term and if students are interested in joining a focus group they can contact the Operations Manager (Hub)
• Customer Surveys – We carry out customer surveys on a regular basis throughout the academic year. We will advertise these around the Hub at various times so please keep an eye out for them.
• Feedback Forms – These are available for you to complete throughout the academic year and are located at the tills.

• One to One Sessions – Staff may join you whilst you are eating your meal to ask you for your comments on the menus, quality of food and Service and any other comments or suggestions you may have.

Any complaints regarding any aspect of the food service at The Hub should be made to The Hub Catering Operations Manager, Church Road, Edgbaston, Birmingham B15 3SX.

If students are not satisfied with the outcome of the complaint to The Operations Manager (Hub) they should complete a “Student Accommodation Complaint Form” available at the Hub Reception or at Living.

In the unlikely event of an error on a University ID Card, students should visit the Student HUB on main Campus or talk to the Catering Operations Manager based on The Vale.