Satisfied Parents and Streamlined Processes for St. Joseph’s College, Gregory Terrace

As one of Queensland’s leading boys’ schools with a 150-year tradition of excellence, St Joseph’s College, Gregory Terrace sought a more efficient, technology-driven solution to manage fees that matched their reputation for innovation and excellence. The challenge: how to transform an labour-intensive system into a streamlined process that would satisfy both internal efficiency needs and meet the expectations of over 800 families.

Solutions came through partnerships with Feesable which brought innovation and improvements to how the College approached fee management—delivering significant time savings, reducing errors, and enhancing the overall parent experience.

Managing school fees is a complex and resource-intensive process. Sienna Thiessens, Fee Administrator, when talking about how the College has traditionally managed fees and payments shared, “It’s a very manual process at the moment”.

The finance team of three relied on multiple spreadsheets to create customised fee quotes, track payments, and manage direct debits. This manual approach led to inefficiencies, an increased risk of errors, and lots of parent inquiries, adding to the burden for a busy finance team. Sienna continues, “…it definitely is a very time consuming process.”

Additionally, reconciling accounts was challenging, particularly when extracurricular activities and incidental charges were added to payment plans throughout the year.

As existing systems no longer met the College’s needs, and with manual processes at their limit, the finance team required a solution that could streamline the generation of annual fees while simplifying collection of payment preferences, and also deliver an improved experience for parents.

Partnership with Feesable set a solid foundation for innovation and delivered immediate results. Feesable set up an intuitive fee calculator that enables parents to generate personalised fee quotes, select extracurricular activities and provide payment preferences, giving full clarity to parents and importantly, making for an excellent customer experience that parents would expect from Terrace.

Amanda Moore, Acting Dean of Business Operations, mentioned, “It was good for parents to look at the quote and select instalment options themselves – then they have a clear idea of what they’re up for.”

The Terrace team also utilised the fee calculator as a fast and simple way to generate custom quotes for internal use, and to send directly to parents in a professional styled email. Amanda noted, “Working out the concessions and payments for families was really easy with Feesable. I could personalise the quote with names, download it and send it directly to them – so I really liked it!”

Providing self-serve quotes saved countless hours of fielding enquiries from parents. “I could just direct them to the fee calculator and I wouldn’t have to work it out for them,” said Sienna. “I only had to help one person, so I think the parents found it pretty easy to use.”

Feesable also set up a custom workflow to provide valuable data to Terrace to review submissions and streamline payment processing. Sienna added, “I thought Feesable was very user-friendly and made setting up direct debits straightforward. Even small things such as custom rounding, made a significant difference.”

Feesable has delivered tangible improvements for the College, enhancing the fee management experience for both staff and parents.

Parents now benefit from a modern experience they would expect from a leading school, plus gain clarity from simple fee breakdowns and visibility of payment options, which allows for more effective budgeting – and most importantly, all this breeds trust with families.

Feesable has also proven to be a transformative solution for the finance team through a streamlined process that delivers increased accuracy, greater control, and reduced administrative workload, saving valuable time with far less enquiries from parents.

The College has also recently added the Fee Calculator to the website to help future families gain a clear understanding of the costs as they make choices about education for their family. As further automation and integration solutions progress in partnership with Feesable, the College anticipates even greater impact to come.