Over the weekend, students may have taken advantage of white pieces of paper resembling gift cards with “$5.00” printed on them hanging up on the bulletin board in Mack’s Market, supposedly donated by students with excess points. It’s the end of the school year. Some students have more meal points than they can spend, and others are running low. The idea for students to be able to transfer their meal points was set into action prematurely, and the program has been discontinued, according to Bon Appetit general manager Kirk Mustain.
The Pilot House management team put up the cards with good intentions but without checking with Mustain. It was a mix-up, Mustain said. Meal points are never transferrable.
“No, those are down now. Those were a mistake on my manager’s part,” Mustain said. “It came from a good place in his heart.”
Mustain explained that students can buy their friends food, but to have a transfer system like that would “open up a host of issues.” Parents even began to call the school because of this mistake, according to Mustain.
“I even got parent calls, those kind of things,” Mustain said. “The meal plan was intended for you.”
Meal plan points are never transferrable, and the reason this happened was because the managers have a lot of autonomy. Mustain said that ultimately it cannot be done this way.
Like in years past, students can donate their points to events or organizations that gather points to give to charities of their choice. Mustain said they typically cap those donations at about $5,000 because the meal plans are intended for your use on campus.
“Once we start having people donate their meal plans away, that’s when I start getting the phone calls,” Mustain said. “I want everyone to spend their money because I want them to get full value at the end of the year out of their meal plan.”
