Portland St. Patrick Catholic School

Scrip is a term that means “substitute money”.  When you purchase scrip from St. Patrick School, you’re purchasing gift certificates or gift cards that are used just like cash.

Great Lakes Scrip center acts on behalf of St. Patrick School and other churches, schools and non-profit organizations to purchase large amounts of scrip from grocery stores, department stores and other retailers.  Because the scrip is purchased with cash up front, the participating retailers offer a substantial discount.  St. Patrick School buys the scrip from Great Lakes Scrip Center at a discount, and re-sells the certificates for full face value.  The bulk of the discount – from two to fifteen percent or more – is divided between the purchaser and St. Patrick School.  As the purchaser, your half is applied as you designate, toward your child’s tuition, the Athletic Association, Youth Faith Formation, etc.

Example:  As a school parent, Kathy purchases a $100 worth of Kohl’s gift cards through the school scrip program.  Kohl’s discount (or 'pay back' portion) is 4%.  As a result, Kathy receives $2 applied towards her tuition bill and the school receives $2 cash back.

For more information, please visit the Great Lakes Scrip website or contact Mary Willemin  or phone 647-2462.

The Scrip/Gift Card team welcomes everyone in the school family back after a good summer.  We will begin regular in school hours on Tuesday the 1st of September.  As was the case last year, the Scrip room will be open daily from 8:00 am till 9:00 am and then from 2:00 pm till 3:45 pm.  Special orders placed by Monday evening will be available by Thursday of the same week.  And of course you can send the orders via kid mail for in stock items and they will go home that same day.

The following scrip is always available to buy immediately---no wait at all!  As always, orders placed by 4:00 p.m. on Monday will be delivered on Thursday of the same week.  Send any suggestions or questions to Mary Willemin or phone her at 517-647-2462.  Click here for a printable order form for "on-hand" scrip.  Send it to school with your student, along with a check made payable to St. Patrick School---we'll send the scrip home the same day.

	Percentage	Denomination
DEPARTMENT STORES
J.C. Penney	6%	$25 & $100
Kohls	4%	$25 & $100
DINING
Applebees	8%	$25
Arby's	8%	$10
Burger King	4%	$10
KFC	9%	$5
Subway	3%	$10
Wendy's	10%	$4
DISCOUNT STORES
Walmart/Sams	2%	$25 & $100
GAS & AUTO
Marathon	3%	$25 & $100
Shell	2.5%	$25 & $50
Speedway	4%	$25 & $100
HOME IMPROVEMENT
Lowes	4%	$25 & $100
Menards	3%	$25
SPECIALTY STORES
Bath & Body	18%	$10

 

NEW!  BUY SCRIP FROM YOUR HOME!    

It's now possible to order Scrip from the comforts of your own home!  Here's how to do it:

• Go to  www.glscrip.com.
• In the upper right hand corner of the screen, click on Shop With Scrip.
• Fill in your e-mail address and create a password.
• Fill in the rest of the required information.
• St. Pat's school code is 7A4F6C3B186 (It is case sensitive, so be sure to use upper case letters when you type it in.).

You now have an account with Great Lakes Scrip!  In order to place an order, click on the My Account tab at the top of the screen.  Choose the scrip that you'd like to order and add it to your cart.  Then proceed to the Checkout.

You'll need to pay for the scrip, which can be done in one of two ways.  Either, bring a check to school, or sign up for Presto Pay, which is the fastest and easiest way to pay for your scrip.  By using Presto Pay, you don't need to send a check to school, the payment is deducted from your checking account.  Here's how to do it:

• Click on Presto Pay on the left side of the screen.
• You'll be taken to a screen that explains how it works and asks you to accept the terms.
• Now you will need to fill in information about your account.  The bank routing number can be found at the bottom of your checks.  It is the first set of numbers shown.  The second set of numbers is your account information.
• Once you submit this information, Great Lakes Scrip company will begin processing your account.  This could take 48-72 hours.
• Two small deposits will be made into your bank account.  As soon as you see those two transactions, go back into My Account to verify the amounts.  This is done for security reasons to make sure that the bank account is really yours.
• As soon as you verify the information, you're set up to use Presto Pay.  Congratulations, and THANK YOU!

Your scrip will be delivered to the school for you to pick up.  Orders placed by Monday evening will be ready for pickup on Thursday of the same week.

     From Keelie Honsowitz:   "Scott and I realize that sending your children to a Catholic school is a major decision that must be thought through.  However, it was a decision that didn't take much time for us at all.  We both graduated from St. Patrick's in 2000 and we just knew that our kids were going to go there too.   Currently we have two daughters, Emma 3 years old and Mattie 7 months old. 
     Not knowing what the tuition costs will be when our children are enrolled, we decided to open up a scrip account last year to being saving for their Catholic education.  The account was so easy to set up and getting scrip is even easier.  However, sometimes I forget to stop by to order it before I need it or most of the time I rely on others within my family to drop off the check or pick up the orders for me.   Now with the scrip online and the Presto Pay, I can do it right from home.  I have all of my favorites saved to my account, so when our gas cards are getting low I can now order more and have the money directly taken from my check account and just pick them up when they are ready.
     I'm always on the computer, and this is so easy and quick to set up and to use.  I used to order scrip once in awhile, but now I'll be ordering all the time.   The scrip program is wonderful and will really help out when our girls are at St. Patrick's.  I'm trying to talk my whole family into ordering scrip through our account.  It's amazing to think that this can help pay for some of our tuition costs and provide additional funding for St. Patrick's, while just ordering gift cards to places that we go to and spend money at already."

     From Cathy and Craig Schmidt:  "As I sit and write this, I’m mentally making a list of what scrip needs to be ordered and picked up next week. Lowe’s for order/moisture bags for the basement, restock Burger King, Wendy’s, KFC and Arby’s, and let’s not forget the Speedway. With the holidays coming, there’s much more shopping to be done; Bath and Body, Kohl’s, JC Penny’s, Bed, Bath and Beyond, Gander Mountain, Best Buy, and Walmart. And of course, while we’re shopping, we’re going to have to stop and eat; favorite possibilities: Red Robin’s, Cracker Barrel, Applebee’s, Bennigan’s, Outback, and Max & Erma’s. I should probably pick up a few extra that I don’t normally buy for the photo development or special sales at Rite Aid and Walgreen’s.
     And this is how it began in 1999/2000. It was our first year with our children attending St. Pat’s, Casey in 3rd grade and Curtis in Kindergarten. Craig and I really did not understand what the SCRIP program was all about. I started asking a few questions to some of the other parents. What is it? How does it work? And any of us can do this no matter what our income is? It’s not a special program like food stamps? Luckily, two of my friends were volunteers who sold the SCRIP on weekends and their minds were fair picking for the answers. Once we fully understood that SCRIP is just the “normal” gift certificates at the same dollar amount as purchasing it in the restaurant or store. Just one stop at St. Pat’s; we didn’t have to drive to each store/restaurant to get them. And of course the big bonus, besides St. Pat’s getting money, we get money credited to our tuition bill! It didn’t take long for the light bulb to turn on. The only question was, where do we get the extra money to buy this?
     The answer was simple: it wasn’t “extra” money; it was money we were going to spend anyway. Groceries at Meijer’s were purchased with SCRIP. We started planning when and where we were going to go out to dinner; of course, with the boys at that age, Burger King was mostly purchased. Birthday and Christmas gifts were going to be pre-thought as to which store they were to be purchased from or what gift card was going to be mailed. Upcoming wedding and they’re registered at Bed, Bath & Beyond; we went together with our families and purchased the SCRIP to purchase the gift. Baby showers took on the same theory. We purchased quite a few gas cards along the way (both daily purchases and trips) and opened a Kohl’s and JC Penny credit card. We told our families about the program and they purchased SCRIP for the holidays, to pay their Kohl’s and JC Penny’s credit cards, kitchen and home repairs, etc.
     We started out slow and very low volume (okay, so we’re still low volume). Not really getting on the ball very fast, we only accumulated $51.54 credit to our tuition bill that first year. The next year, with the help of our families, we accumulated $217.23 credit. Over the past eight years, we have accumulated a total $1482.34 “free money” towards our tuition bills.
     This year Casey graduates and we still plan to purchase SCRIP in the future to help the school and whichever program we designate our portion to. We would like to take this opportunity to thank all of those individuals who have helped grow and maintain this program for us to utilize so easily over the years."

     “My name is Sue Fox.  I would like to let you know about the dividends that are available through the Scrip/Gift Card program.  My three daughters graduated from St. Patrick High School.  Scrip was introduced while my youngest was in Jr. High.  I immediately began using it, but really decided to see what I could do during her High School years.  I was amazed that my rebate was around $1000.00.  That was $1000.00 off her tuition investment and all I had to do was purchase the gift cards before getting gas, groceries, eating out etc.  It was money I would have spent anyway.
     I continue to use Scrip/Gift Cards today as we save for our grandchildren’s tuition when they enter St. Patrick School in the future.
I’m in the habit of having it on hand.  You can get grandparents, aunts and uncles, friends or neighbors to use Scrip under your account number and you will be credited for it. Trust me.  Scrip is a WIN-WIN program”

     "My name is Gladys Stiffler.  I've used scrip for many years, and since we buy our fuel oil from Crystal Flash---one of the merchants on the scrip list---I even use it to pay my fuel oil bills!"