At My Food Program, our mission is to make participation in the CACFP and SFSP as easy as possible. We are always trying to make our software better by improving on the functions we have and adding new ones based on customer feedback. Check out our list of software updates and new features below.
Update 20.12.1
New Report: Daily Meal Production Record
We have added a third version of food production records to complement our Daily Meal Production with Leftovers and Dietary Accommodations and our standard food production record. This compact version of the report fits one day per page.
Site Dashboard Buttons are now Clickable
The dashboard buttons that provide information about claim status and missing records can now be clicked and will take the user to the place to get relevant information.
- Claim Status goes to Review Disallowed Meals Page
- Days Missing Meal Counts and Days Missing Menus go to the Menu Calendar
- Participants Missing Income Forms and Participants Missing Enrollment Forms go to the Missing Forms Report
- Staff Need Training goes to the Staff Training Report
Ability to Cross-Check Multiple Expense Entries to a Receipt Total
When users enter receipts with purchases from multiple categories, they now have the ability to enter a receipt total and cross-check the sum of expenses to the total on the receipt. (1) The receipt total will also populate on the Expense Detail report. We have also added a category called “Non-Allowable Expenses Included on Receipt” in order to make the receipt total balance. The “Applied Amount” in this category will always be $0. (2)
List of Active Staff When Entering Labor and Benefits
Users now have a list of active staff to select from when recording expenses under any categories related to labor and benefits. In addition the name of active staff members, you will also see the default selection “Staff Expenses/No Staff Name Specified” and also the option to record “For Multiple Staff”. The staff-person name selected will be auto-filled as the Description for the expense entry.
Sponsors Can Require Users to Enter Menus and/or Food Production Records Before Meal Counts
There are two new flags in Site Details:
- Require menus before meal counts: if this flag is checked, then users are required to enter a menu before they can check children in for a meal. They will receive a proactive message on the web and mobile app telling them that the menu is required. In addition, menu cannot be edited after a meal count is entered.
- Require finalized food production record before meal counts: if this flag is checked, then users are required to enter a menu, create a food production record and finalize that food production record before children can be checked in for a meal. They will receive a proactive message on the web and mobile app telling them that a finalized food production record is required. In addition, the food production record cannot be deleted after a meal count is entered.
Note that these restrictions do NOT apply to infant rosters.
Automated Disallows for Milk Shortages
Sponsors can now automate the process of disallowing meals for milk shortages. In Sponsor Setup, check the box that says, “Milk audit required before claim and adjust claim if milk is underserved”. And then there are three options for how to calculate the claim adjustment:
- Adjust the claim by a percentage
- Adjust a claim by a certain amount of underserved milk
- Adjust certain meals and snacks based on receipt dates
You can also add a leeway percentage if your state agency allows for one. Meals and snacks that are disallowed for a milk shortage appear on the Disallowed Meals Report with error code “Disallowed by Sponsor – Milk Shortage” and are also viewable as disallowed on the meal count screen. The claim adjustments made for milk shortages will be summarized on the Milk Audit page after the claim is created.
In the example below, the center was short by 13% on 1% milk. Therefore, the number of breakfasts, lunches, and snacks with milk were reduced by 13% in each FRP category. The center was short by 9% on whole milk, so each breakfast, lunch and snack with milk was reduced by 9% across each FRP category.
New Report: Participants with Special Dietary Needs
We have added a report at the site level that lists children with special dietary needs. It includes all active participants and summarizes the information entered on the Special Diet screen.
Other Enhancements and Bug Fixes
- Added buttons to the menu page to go to the next month or prior month.
- Corrected the display of Early Snack on Site Details and Participant Schedule.
- We re-named the dashboard button “Submit to Sponsor” to read instead “Check for Errors or Submit to Sponsor”.
- Added the total participant count on the Claim Summary Report.
- Added a drop-down list of staff.
- All active sites are included on sponsor-level Monitoring Report.
- Updated the logic for the “Days Missing Menus” and “Days Missing Meal Counts” to account for closures and holidays.
- Users that have multiple sponsor accounts can toggle between them more easily.
- If a child care center or adult day care center has a claiming percentage below 25%, the software will automatically set all meals to non-payable and create a “zero” claim.
- Option to include uploaded receipts as an addendum to the Expense Detail Report.
- Formatting changes to the CACFP Meal Benefit Income Eligibility Form for centers located in Texas.
- Changed rounding protocol on average daily attendance for Indiana family child care homes claim export file.
- Corrected a text-wrapping error on the site-level Claim Summary Report.
- Bug fix in Disallowed Meals Report that listed “Meal Over Claim Limit” in addition to “Milk Shortage”.
- Improved error message if a user tries to record more hours in breaks + working hours than total hours.
- Sponsor admin users can now edit or delete a training entry.
Update 20.11.1
Sponsor Admin and Site Managers/Directors Can Now Record Staff Hours on Behalf of Others
This feature allows Sponsor Admin users and Site Manager/Directors to tally hours on behalf of site staff in order to track CACFP labor expenses to demonstrate a nonprofit meal service. When Sponsor Admin and Site Manager/Director users click on “Record Hours” from the main site dashboard, they will now notice a dropdown menu with all active staffpersons listed and the ability to view and record hours.
New Sponsor Options for Participant Status
We know that there is confusion for users switching from CACFP software in which participant status has an impact on claims. (In My Food Program, we look at enrollment forms and income forms rather than participant status). To clear up confusion, we are giving sponsors the option to simplify participant status to just Active or Inactive. Sponsors can select the participant status options they want to make available to their sites in Sponsor Setup.
Ability to Ignore Missing Infant Menus for Children Under 6 Months
Some states waive the requirement to maintain infant menus for children under 6 months since the “menu” is simply iron-fortified infant formula or breastmilk If this is the case in your state, you can now set My Food Program to ignore missing menus for children under 6 months while still enforcing the menu requirement for children ages 6-11 months old. You’ll find these setting in Site Details.
Ability to Store Electronic Signatures for Providers or Center Directors and Apply Them to Meal Count Forms
Some state agencies require a signature on meal count and attendance forms. If your state accepts electronic signatures, then we have an easy way to accomplish this! Site-Level users with the permission level “Site Manager/Director” can now add their electronic signature to their account. These signatures will then populate on the Daily, Weekly and Monthly Meal Count with Attendance Reports along with the date that the site submitted their claim to their sponsor.
Added a “Menu Notes” Field
On the menu planning page, we now have the ability to make notes about a menu without replacing the entire list of food items.These menu notes appear on the Child Menu Print-Ready Report.
Sponsors Can Restrict Sites from Claiming Meals Outside of Participant Schedules
We have added more versatility to the options around recording and claiming meals that are not indicated on a child’s enrollment form. Sponsors may now select from the following four options:
- Allow meals outside of the participant’s typical schedules without additional recordkeeping
- Allow meals outside of the participant’s typical schedule, but ask that sites note those meals and provide a reason
- Disallow meals outside of the participant’s typical schedule unless a site provides a reason
- Always disallow meals outside of the participant’s typical schedule
Sponsors will find these options in Sponsor Setup.
Hyperlink to Infant Menu by Name on the Attendance and Meal Count Page
Sites that are recording infant menus by name can now save several clicks by going directly from the meal count screen to the infant menu by name screen for that date and meal type.
Other Enhancements and Bug Fixes
- Our meal validation (aka “Check for Errors”) goes lightning fast now! We’ve improved speed by over 90%.
- New report for users in Indiana: Nonprofit Overage Allowance. This report adds up all expenses ever recorded and divides them by the number of claim months.
- Making a participant inactive in an after school site no longer removes the ARAM participation flag.
- Meal Recap Report now separates meal counts by shifts.
- Child Care Centers in Texas will notice that we replaced our default income/enrollment form with a format that matches TDA.
- On the Sponsor-Level Claims Summary spreadsheet, we only fill the columns for blend rate or actual meal count by type in accordance with the site setting.
- New report for users in Illinois: CACFP Master List. This form matches the formatting of ISBE 67-95. Located at the Site Level under Participant Reports.
- Sites using Infant Menu by Name and create pre-planned menus will now see that those pre-planned food items automatically populate onto the Infant Menu by Name screen for children ages 6-11 months old. Users must still select the formula or breastmilk offered and verify the amounts served, but this should speed infant menu recordkeeping considerably.
- Cash-in-lieu of Commodities is now broken out separately on the Claim Summary Report for site types other than Family Child Care Homes.
- Added a reminder to the enrollment form that prompts parents/guardians to write in the names of additional children in the household.
- Improved the error message when decimal entries are made for milk expenses.
- Created a better visual separation between infant meal notification and infant developmental readiness.
- Moved the “Save” button to the center of the page for sites marking attendance and meal counts on the same page to prevent the need for horizontal scrolling.
- The Disallowed Meals Report can now be run with either the detailed version or the summary version.
- Sponsors can now disallow all meals for a roster, date and meal using the side-by-side attendance and meal count entry screen.
Update 20.10.1
Nonprofit Food Service Account Status Page
We have new functionality for tracking the balance in the nonprofit food service account to ensure that the CACFP reimbursement is being appropriately spent. You’ll find this new screen by clicking on “Expenses” and then “Nonprofit food service account status”.
- Sponsors can set the opening balance. Either type a number in or click the green button on the left to copy the closing balance from the prior month
- Reimbursement for Operating (85% of meal reimbursement plus cash in lieu of commodities) is populated based on the claim data but can be edited if necessary
- Reimbursement for Admin (15% of meal reimbursement) is populated only for self-sponsored sites and is based on the claim
- Operating Expenses are drawn directly from the receipt ledger
- Admin Expenses are drawn directly from the receipt ledger and only available for self-sponsored sites
- If you edit the opening balance or change the reimbursement amounts, you can re-calculate the ending balance for a month by clicking the green button on the right
New Sponsor-Level Report: Nonprofit Status Report
We have a new sponsor-level report to track the reimbursement received in a month with the approved expenses. Similar to the Nonprofit Food Service Account Status, the reimbursement for operating expenses is separated from the reimbursement for Admin and expenses in each category are also reported along with the monthly profit or deficit. Any values that are positive, which indicate a profit, are in RED. We also report the ending balance in the Nonprofit Food Service Account for that month.
Allow Headcount Attendance for At-Risk Sites
After School Programs that keep daily sign-in sheets to verify the names of children can now enter an attendance count instead of needing to add each child into the software. Note that the software will prevent the entry of a meal count that exceeds the attendance count, but there is minimal reporting available with this setting since there are no participants entered into the software.
Infant Form is Added to the Prefilled Income/Enrollment Form if the Household has a Participant less than 12 Months Old
When a household has a participant that is under 12 months old, the pre-filled income/enrollment form now has a third page to collect the information about whether the center or the parent/guardian is providing formula and food.
Enhanced Sponsor Control of Food Items
We now offer the option for sponsors to have complete control over food items on a PER SITE basis. This is on top of the feature we have to exclude foods for ALL SITES. If you want to manage the foods available to sites, check the box in Site Details called “Enhanced Sponsor Control of Food Items”. When this box is checked,
- Sites are restricted to adding only Favorite Foods to their menus (the food search feature is hidden)
- Sponsors have control over the Favorite Foods List
Other Enhancements and Bug Fixes
- Users can see the password that they’ve typed in. Just click on the “eye” icon on the login page
- Sponsor can hide the “Check for Errors” button on a site. This means that the site cannot see their claim errors prior to submitting their claim to their sponsor
- Added a deduction to total hours worked for breaks
- Changed the formatting on the prefilled income/enrollment forms for child care center
- Printed the parent/guardian name on the first page in case page 1 and page 2 get separated from each other
- Added a place to designate categorical eligibility for children who are homeless, runaway, or migrant
- Made it more clear which federal program a case number was associated with
- Added column for parents/guardians to write in net income from self-employment
- Option to generate the Weekly Meal Count with Attendance Report with all participants combined or a separate page for each classroom
- Ability to set the Claiming Method (Blended Per Meal or Actual Meal Count by Type) in Site Details. This means that users no longer need to designate the claiming method when generating the Claim Summary Report.
- Removed the requirement for household information if a site type is after school or emergency shelter, even if the sponsor is set to require household information for other site types within the sponsorship
- Added additional reasons for placing a household in the A-Free category
- Direct Certification
- Extended Direct Certification
- Homeless
- Migrant
- Runaway
- The sponsor-level Site Export Report now includes the most recent facility license, even if that facility license is expired
- Condensed the Disallowed Meals Report for readability. If a participant has multiple errors for the same reason, for example a missing enrollment form, the participant will be listed once. Details about which meals are disallowed can also be found on the Monthly Meal Count with Attendance Report
Update 20.09.1
Claim Summary Report – Fresh New Look
Our Claim Summary Report has gotten a full makeover! Our goal was to include all the information that sponsors need to enter their claim and make it easier to locate relevant claim information. Each site type has a slightly different report format and there are differences between claims calculated using the Blend Rate method and the Actual Meal Count by Type method.
The claim summary report includes:
- Claimable meal counts for Blend Rate Method; Actual Meal Count by Type has meal counts by income eligibility category as well
- Participant count each income eligibility category
- Total participant count
- Total attendance, days open & average daily attendance
- Claim estimate for operating funds (85% of meal reimbursement + cash-in-lieu) and admin funds (15% of meal reimbursement) and the total claim amount
You can click on the report for your specific site type below to see an updated full report sample!
New Sponsor-Level Report: State Claim Summary Report
This report is for sponsors of family day care homes and aggregates claim information for all providers for the month. Data includes:
- Number of providers in each tier (Tier I, Tier II High, Tier II Mixed, Tier II Low)
- Attendance & Participant Information
- Total Attendance
- Days Open
- Average Daily Attendance
- Enrolled Children
- Participating Children
- Meal Information
- Number of Tier I and Tier II meals and snacks
- Number of meals and snacks served by Tier I and Tier II providers
See a sample of this report here >
New Filtered View: Claim Payment Amounts Only
This report is for sponsors that just want to know the amount of the reimbursement check to be sent to the center or family day care home. This is just a truncated version of our comprehensive Sponsor-Level Claim Summary Report. To get the payment amounts, just click on “Claims” then “Claims Report” and check the box that says Payment Amounts Only.
For Family Day Care Homes, the fields displayed will be:
- Site Identification Number
- Site Name
- Payment Method
- Claim Batch
- CACFP Claim Estimate
- Claim Adjustments Date(s) and Amount(s)
For All Other Site Types, the fields displayed will be:
- Site Identification Number
- Site Name
- Payment Method
- Claim Batch
- Claiming Percentage
- CACFP Blend Rate Estimate
- CACFP Actual Meal Count Claim Estimate
- ARAM Claim Estimate
New Sponsor-Level Report: Site Closures
This report lets sponsors know which sites have recorded a site closure, holiday or field trip for a given date range. The fields include:
- Site Name and ID Number
- Monitor
- Date
- Closure Type (Closure, Field Trip, Holiday)
- Meals/Snacks affected by closure
NOTE: if a Sponsor Reporter runs the report it will include only the sites assigned to them.
See a sample of this report here >
Expense Groups Added and Used in Reports
Expense categories are now sorted into five different groups.
- For Family Day Care Homes: Schedule C, Form 8829 and Form 4562
- For all other site types (Child Care Center, Adult Day Care, After School, Emergency Shelter, and Summer Food): Operating and Administrative
Expenses recorded in these categories will also be grouped together in the Expense Detail Report.
New Participant Flag: Served Milk Substitute
We have a new indicator for participants with special dietary needs related to milk. The new flag is called, “Served Milk Substitute”. If that flag is checked, then that participant will not be included in the milk requirements calculations used in the Milk Audit or the Milk Served Report.
Progress Bar Added to Check for Errors and Submit to Sponsor
After users click “Check for Errors” or “Submit to Sponsor” a progress bar is now displayed on the screen. Once the check of meals and attendance is complete, the page will automatically refresh and the results will display on the screen.
Other Enhancements and Bug Fixes
- Inactive rosters are no longer displayed as an option on the participant page
- Sponsor Admin users can now make manual adjustments to milk audits even if site-level users are restricted to certain entry methods
- Changed formatting on Weekly Meal Count with Attendance Report to include more participants per page and eliminate unnecessary page breaks.
- Additional fields are filled from the system for enrollment forms
- We added a progress bar to the Check for Errors/Submit to Sponsor function. Now instead of getting the “Meal Validation in Progress. Please check back later.” users will see a horizontal green bar that keeps them informed about the progress of the error check.
- Users can upload a form when recording a Field Trip, Closure or Holiday. This is helpful for sponsors in states that require specific forms to be completed related to closures.
- Invoicing rate of “monthly” has been added to our invoicing system
- Date Withdrawn is now set automatically when a participant is set to Inactive
Update 20.08.2
Improvements to the Milk Audits – Sponsor Policy Settings
Our new milk audit feature has been received very well. We’ve recently improved it by allowing sponsors to customize the milk audit units, calculation methods, audit types, delete permissions and fields for manual increases and decreases. You will find these setting in Sponsor Setup at the bottom of the page:
Additional Information Added to Participant Report
The Participant Report is the go-to report for getting your monthly claiming percentage. For child care centers, we’ve added important information to this report, including Age, Start Date, Withdraw Date, Enrollment Form Dates, Income Form Dates and whether an attendance was recorded in that month.
Improved Print-Ready Menu
We’ve added a field for “Display Name” and used that for all food items in our database. If a sponsoring organization or state agency has additional questions about a specific food item, that can be found on the Meal Detail page or on Food Production Reports. But this method means that the print-ready menus are much easier on the eyes. (Note that if you type text in the Description for Print View then the software uses that text instead of the Display Name). Here’s an example of the improvement.
New Report: Portioned Menu Report
We’re adding a THIRD way to print out your menus in addition to our versions in Excel and PDF. This portioned menu report lists each food item and the portion guide for each age range. Below is the example for child care centers. Other site types display only the age ranges that are relevant for their site type. You’ll find this new menu report at the bottom of the menu calendar page.
Other Enhancements and Bug Fixes
- Children are listed alphabetically by last name on the Daily Menu, Attendance & Meal Count Sheet
- The site logo has been added to the Paper Back-Up report
- A review visit type “Desk Audit” has been entered
- Milk audits can now be finalized and manual increases or decreases can be deleted
- User Hours Detail Report had column added for Non-CACFP Hours and we re-named Direct to Operating
Update 20.08.1
New Report: Annual Re-Enrollment
This report includes a list of all enrolled participants along with their date of birth, race/ethnicity, schedule and typical meals. It includes a place for the parent/guardian to sign and date that the enrollment information is still current. This report can be used in lieu of printing new enrollment forms for each enrolled child.
Record Date of Infant Developmental Readiness
We have added the ability to record a date on which an infant is developmentally ready for fruits and/or vegetable and when they are developmentally ready for grains/meat or alternate. If the site is entering infant menus by name, then the meal planning screen will remind users that they must offer a solid food if the infant is developmentally-ready. We have a double-check during our claims processing and meals will be disallowed if they are missing a component for which the infant is developmentally ready.
Improvements in Manual Claim Adjustments for Family Child Care Homes
Manual claim adjustments are now linked to meal errors. Sponsor admin users can now see a list of claim errors and opt to “over-ride” those errors and make a manual adjustment to the claim. Below is an example of the manual claim adjustment screen when a participant had an expired enrollment form. The manual claim adjustments, along with the dollar value of the adjustment is also listed on the sponsor claim summary report.
Other Enhancements and Bug Fixes
- Invoicing Summary Report is now run by Guardian and not Household
- Time-saver! There is now a link to the Disallowed Meals Report right below the summary of claim errors
- Corrected permissions for site-level users to change participant flags and add/edit income and enrollment forms
- Hid the ability to record CACFP Administrative Hours for sponsored centers
Update 20.07.1
Ability to Add Additional Tier Status Determination Dates
Sponsors of family child care homes can now enter multiple tier determinations for a provider to ensure continuity in tier determinations. Tier determination dates cannot overlap and you cannot enter a new tier determination for a month that already has a claim.
Enrollment Form Policies
We have added the ability to track the parent signature date and sponsor signature date on enrollment forms. Neither of these are required fields. In addition, sponsors can now set their policies for enrollment form effective and expiration dates based on signature dates. Choices for effective date:
- Sponsor signature date
- Parent signature date
- First day of the month in which the parent signed
- First day of the month in which the sponsor signed
Choices for expiration date:
- Exactly 1 year from the effective date
- One day prior to 1 year from the effective date
- End of the month 1 year from effective date
- End of the prior month 1 year from effective date
- Specific date: for example, if you always renew paperwork in October, you may want all forms to expire on 9/30 of each year.
Sponsor policies on enrollment form effective and expiration dates are in Sponsor Setup. This is the new screen displayed when enrollment forms are created:
Income Form Policies
We have added the ability to track parent signature date and sponsor signature date on Income Forms. Neither of these are required fields. In addition, sponsors can now set their policies for income form effective and expiration dates based on signature dates. Choices for Effective Date:
- First day of calendar month in which the form was signed by the parent
- First day of calendar month in which the form was signed by the sponsor
Choices for Expiration Date:
- 12 months
- 13 months
- Specific date: for example, if you always renew paperwork in October, you may want all forms to expire on 9/30 of each year.
Sponsor policies on income form effective and expiration dates are in Sponsor Setup. This is the new screen displayed when income forms are created:
Additional Fields on Invoices to Parents
For those of you using our feature that allows you to generate invoices to email or print and give to parents, we now have the ability for you to set the invoice date (rather than it defaulting to the creation date).
Licensed Capacity Checks Using License Types
Sponsors now have a choice of methods for checking license capacity. The method currently in place uses defined age ranges and sets capacities within those along with limits based on combinations of age ranges. Our new method will instead allow sponsor to define license types and apply those license types to site. Here’s how it works:
- The first step is to define license types. Sponsors can define as many license types as they wish (1).
- The second step is to define the capacities and distribution for each license type. As an example, below is the definition for Group Family Day Care (C1 License) in the state of Minnesota (2). The configuration below means that no more than 10 children (School Age and non-School Agers) can be in care. Only 8 can be non-School Agers, only 3 can be infants or toddlers and only 2 can be infants.
- The last step is to assign a license or licenses to a provider. Note that you CAN assign more than one license to a provider (3).
During our meal validation process, the software will look at the combination of children checked in for each shift for each meal. If the combination of children is in compliance with a license, then no meals are disallowed. If a combination of children passes for one license but fails for another no meals will be disallowed. If the combination of children is out of compliance with the license(s) associated with that provider, then meals are disallowed to bring them in compliance with one license while disallowing the fewest meals possible. When meals are disallowed we record which meals were disallowed and which license type the combination was ultimately in compliance with.
See below for video instructions to walk you through the process of setting up either method for Licensing Capacity Checks. You can also download the training pages here.
New Report: Reimbursements by Calendar Year
This report is for sponsors of family child care homes. It generates a statement of the reimbursements sent to providers for a given calendar year. It includes claims that were created within the calendar year. For example a December 2020 claim that is created in January 2021 will not be included in the 2020 version of this report since the claim was created and paid in 2021.
New Sponsor-Level Report: Bulk Enrollment Forms
This report pulls the participant registration form for each household. If the site is a family child care home with Tier 1, then just an enrollment form is generated. If the site is a family child care homes with Tier 2 or an adult or child care center, then a combination income/enrollment form is generated. Users can select to include:
- Any participant who has a missing/expiring income form
- Any participant who has a missing/expiring enrollment form
- Any participant who has either a missing/expiring income or enrollment form
- All active participants in active sites
Be warned that if you run a large sponsorship, it may take several minutes for the report to generate.
New Sponsor-Level Report: Participants with Duplicate Meals in Multiple Sites
This report is a companion to the existing sponsor-level report: Participants Enrolled in Multiple Sites. The new report will look for any participants with the same first name, last name and date of birth that was checked in for the same meal on the same day in multiple sites. Disallowances are not automatic since the sponsor would need to confirm which meal count was authentic.
Other Enhancements and Bug Fixes
- The sponsor-level Site Summary Report and Menu Report are filtered for Sponsor Reporters to only show the sites that they are assigned to monitor.
- For sites with different hours on different days of the week, the menu calendar, Paper Backup Report and attendance and meal count entry screens now reflect the meals served on each day of the week.
- The calculator for using household size and income to estimate the income eligibility category has been updated with the most recent rates from USDA which are effective July 1, 2020 to June 20, 2021.
- Prevent deletion of enrollment forms if they were in effect during a claim month. Also prevent adding an enrollment form if a claim is already created for that month.
- Moved Tier Status to the bottom of the Site Details page and linked Census Tract or School District Name with the tier status determination.
- Changed the Participant Registration Form to use the Idaho template for sites located in Idaho.
- Sponsors can now run the Monthly Meal Count with Attendance Report for all sites for a given month in one PDF.
Update 20.06.1
New Report: Daily Menu, Attendance and Meal Count Sheet
This new site-level report is intended to be printed daily and completed by hand as a record of the infant and child menu as well as attendance and meal counts for each participant. Participant names are pre-filled.
Record Log for each Site Viewable by Sponsor Only
We added a section on Site Details for sponsors to record information or correspondence with the site using a free-form text box. Unlike the “Notes” box, the Record Log is not viewable by the provider or center
5 Different Methods for Determining Your Monthly Claiming Percentage
State agencies have five different methods for determining whether a participant should be included in the monthly count of participants and the claiming percentage (# of participants in categories A-Free/B-Reduced/C-Paid or Tier I/Tier II). Sponsors can now set their policy regarding the calculation of their monthly claiming percentage. The selection is found in Sponsor Setup and includes the following options:
- Include any participant that attended at least once during the month
- Include any participant that ate a meal or snack at least once during the month
- Include any participant that attended at least once during the month AND had an enrollment form that was valid for at least one day in the month
- Include any participant that ate a meal or snack at least once during the month AND had an enrollment form that was valid for at least one day in the month
- Include any participant that had an enrollment form that was valid for at least one day in the month (it doesn’t matter if the participant attended or ate a meal or snack during the month)
After setting the sponsor policy, the process will be automatic and your Participant Report and Claim Summary Report will provide an participant count based on your sponsor policy.
NEW Feature: Automated Milk Audit
Sponsors can now conduct a milk audit without needing to print and compare reports. The Milk Audit is available from the site dashboard. Users need to select the month/year for the audit as well as:
- Calculation Type
- Calculated from Attendance: this will take the minimum portion size for milk times the number of participants in each age range and calculate how much milk you should have used.
- ood Production Amounts: this will take the usage amounts right from your food production records. Ensure that you have entered a food production record for each of the meals with milk so you have accurate amounts.
- Audit Type
- By Day: this version gives you a running balance by day and meal of how much milk is on hand.
- By Month: this version gives you a bottom line for the entire month.
Any milk purchases entered using our Expense feature will be automatically pulled into the report. Users also have the option to manually increase milk amounts to reflect an opening balance or purchase not entered in our Expense tracker. Users can manually decrease amounts if there is spoilage/waste or additional servings of milk. See below for a sample report as well as video instructions to walk you through the process. You can also download PDF instructions here.
New Sponsor-Level Report: Payable Meals by Tier
Some states require that meals be reported by the week instead of by the month. To accommodate this reporting method we created the Payable Meals by Tier Report. Users can select a custom date range for this report.
Other Enhancements and Bug Fixes
- Added middle name to the Paper Back-Up Report.
- Display contents of the Notes field from Site Details on the Site Summary Report.
- If no claim errors are found, the Review Disallowed Meals screen displays a message that confirms no claim errors were found.
- Directors/Managers at child care centers are prevented from deleting expenses.
- Site Hours and Meal Times are now required at Site Setup.
- Added a new field for the sponsor to record preferred language for a provider or center.
- Added a summary of expenses by category to the Expense Detail Report.
- Family day care providers can enter and modify their own space-time percentage without involving their sponsor.
- Refreshed the icons on our dashboard.
- Added facility phone number to the Site Orders report.
- New Report: Alabama Claim Summary Report.
Update 20.05.1
New Sponsor-Level Report: Expense Summaries
This new sponsor-level report is most helpful for sponsors of unaffiliated centers which must demonstrate a non-profit meal service. Sponsors can now run the Expense Summary Report for all active sites within a sponsorship. Each site is on a separate page.
Progress Bar for Sponsor-Level Claims Processing
When a sponsor admin user clicks “Create Claims” a progress bar will now appear to track which claim is currently processing and how many claims are left. Even better, if any user (even the one that didn’t start the claims creation process) visits the page, they get the same update!
Create Claim Batches
Sponsors can now group their claims into batches in order to track multiple claims submissions to the state agency. To turn on batch claiming, check the box for Batch Claims in Sponsor Setup (1). On a monthly basis, running claims in batches has two steps:
- Step 1: Name your claim batches.
On the sponsor dashboard, click “Claims” and then “Manage Claim Batches (2)
That will bring you to a screen where you can name the Claim Batch (you can use a simple 1, 2, 3 system or you can use a date or any other batch naming convention you would like!) and also designate the date that the batch is being submitted to the state and the date your centers or providers can expect payment (3). - Step 2: Assign each claim to a batch.
When you run claims, you will be prompted to assign each claim to a batch (4).
Family Child Care Providers Can Record Hours for Space-Time Percentage Calculations
To record hours, providers just need to click on the dashboard button called “Record Hours”. There are two categories for the hours (shown below). The information entered in this screen populates a Staff Report called the User Hours Detail Report that will sum up the hours in each category and allow the provider to easily calculate their space-time percentage
Monthly Bulk Entry by Name
We have added a FOURTH way to configure the screen to enter attendance and meal counts! In addition to our traditional layout with attendance and meal counts on separate screens, side-by-side interface with attendance and meal counts on the same screen and our weekly entry by roster we now have monthly entry by name. See below for what that interface looks like. Users just need to select the month and the participant and enter the attendance and meal counts. We hope this new interface provides an efficient method to enter data.
Added Site ID on the Main Site List and Made it Searchable
For those sponsors with many providers or centers, we have made it easier to navigate our main site list by displaying the site identification number and allowing that field to be searchable.
Print-and-Post Menus
We now have the ability to create print-ready menus in PDF. To find this feature, go to Menu then scroll to the bottom and click on Monthly Child Menu Print-Ready and click on the download link. Below is what the menus will look like. NOTE: these menus look much, much better if providers or centers make use of our “Description for Print View” box on the menu planning page. If no Description for Print View is entered, then the system will pull the technical food item name and the menu can get very cluttered.
Sites Alerts for Claim Creation, Submission and Payment Dates
On the Submit to Sponsor page, we’ve added a series of icons that lets the provider or center know the date when they submitted their attendance, meal counts and menus to their sponsor and when the claim is processed by the sponsor. You can ALSO alert providers or centers of the date their claim was submitted to the state system and when they should expect payment if you make use of our Batch Claiming feature.
Ability to Hide Expense Categories
Sponsors now have the ability to restrict users to specific expense categories. You will find the list in Sponsor Setup. Check the expenses that are allowed and those will be the only ones that will appear for selection at the site level:
Other Enhancements and Bug Fixes
- Fixed the alphabetical listing of infant foods.
- Added facility license number and effective dates to the Site Summary Report along with any upcoming facility closures or field trips.
- Added additional visit types to assist with tracking monitoring visits. They can now be categorized by trimester.
- Sites using shifts can now designate a start and end time for each shift.
- Removed Food Production Record reminder for family child care homes on meal submission screen.
- Ability to record a mailing address that is different from a physical address.
- Added state upload file for family child care homes and direct certification file for Idaho.
- Site Manager/Directors of adult day care centers and child care centers now have permission to run the Household Report.
- Added the number of times a claim has been adjusted and the most recent adjustment date to the sponsor-level Claims Summary Report.
- Moved sponsor-level claims reports (State Claim Export Files and Sponsor-Level Claims Summary) to the Claims tab on the Sponsor Dashboard.
- Changed when the meal type name turns green. It will now turn green if there is only an infant menu and any meal count.
- Added Meal Type, Day of the Week, Follow-Up Required, Not Home and a Claim Summary to the Site Summary Report.
- Added date of claims creation, submission to state and expected payment date to the bottom of the claim summary report at the site-level.
Update 20.04.2
Ability to Customize Food Lists
We now have the ability for sponsors to exclude foods from being included on menus! For example, if your state agency does not allow the breading on chicken nuggets to be counted toward the grain/bread component, you can prevent providers from adding them to their menus. Foods to exclude are designated in Sponsor Setup. Note that sponsors are not able to add foods to our database – that is a function available only to My Food Program staff. If you need a food added to our database, please contact us and we will get it added right away.
Save Infant Menus
Users can now save menus for infants just as they can for children. After planning an infant menu, simply click the “Save Menu” button and give the menu a name. You can select from saved menus when planning infant menus as well.
Site Closures Displayed on Menu Calendar
We have added a red “X” on the menu calendar to remind sites of days that were recorded as closed or a holiday. Attendance and meal counts cannot be entered for days recorded as closed. If a site closure is recorded after meal counts have been entered, they will be disallowed as part of the claims processing.
Track Serious Deficiency Events
Sponsors can now record events associated with serious deficiency using My Food Program. Sponsors will find this feature in the “Visits” section. (1) Select the date, event and reason. (2) All Serious Deficiency Events recorded for a site appear at the bottom of the Visits page. Only Sponsor Administrators can enter or delete serious deficiency events. Centers or Providers can view the serious deficiency events, but cannot edit or delete them.
Manually Adjust Claims (for Family Day Care Homes only)
Sponsors can now record a manual claim adjustment in lieu of rolling back and re-processing the claim. This allows the sponsor to retain the original claim information while making an adjustment for additional information collected after the original claim was created. To create a manual claim adjustment, click on the “Process Claim” button and select “Sponsor Manual Adjustments” and enter the requested information (shown below). Sponsor manual adjustment cannot be deleted so use them with care. Also, since the original meal counts and attendance are not modified by a manual adjustment, reports detailing attendance and meal counts will not reflect the manual adjustment.
New Options for Infant Meal Notification
We have made changes related to infant meal notification (i.e. whether it is the center/provider or the parents that are supplying formula and food for infants under 12 months old). Summary of changes:
- Additional field to designate the formula offered by the center or provider.
- If the infant meal notification indicates that the parents are supplying BOTH formula/breastmilk AND solid foods, then meals will be disallowed when the child turns 6 months old until they are 1 year old.
- Added the ability to disallow meals for missing infant meal notification. All meals for infants without an infant meal notification on-file will be disallowed if this is set to “Error”.
Daily Notes Field
Providers or centers now have the ability to write a note to the sponsor on their attendance page ((1) if using the traditional meal entry method) or the attendance/meal count page ((2) if using the side-by-side meal count entry method). These notes feed into a new sponsor-level report that lists the notes submitted by the sites (3).
Option to Require Sites to Ensure Comprehensive Participant Information
All sites are required to enter first name, last name, birthdate and start date. Sponsors can now ALSO require sites to enter:
- Household Address
- Parent/Guardian Name and Phone Number
- Participant Race & Ethnicity
- Participant Schedule
This option is configurable in Sponsor Setup:
Changes to Pre-Filled Income and Enrollment Forms for Family Day Care Homes
For family day care homes, we have made the following additions to the enrollment form:
- Providers Own
- Residential
- Related/Non-Residential
- Infant Feeding Preferences
- Parent or Provider is supplying formula
- Brand of parent formula
- Brand of provider formula
- Parent or Provider supplying solid foods
Also, if a provider is Tier I, then ONLY the enrollment form is generated. If the provider is Tier II, then the combination income and enrollment form is generated. Parents may, of course, decline to provide income information and simply sign the form.
To create an enrollment or combination income/enrollment form for a household, click on Participants & Rosters, select the parent/guardian name and then click the blue “Create Participant Registration Form” button.
Other Enhancements and Bug Fixes
- Site level users are prevented from designating a participant as a foster child
- Fix to Site Summary Report to include children in pending or incomplete status
- Added visit type and day of the week to the sponsor-level Site Audit Report
- Added columns on the sponsor-level Claims Summary Report for tier status, total participants and all snacks combined (AM snack + PM snack + Evening Snack)
- Added Age and Date of Birth to the Weekly Meal Count with Attendance Report
- Users are now preventing from creating enrollment forms with the exact same start and end dates
- Upload file for the state of Indiana – both homes and centers
- Corrected a bug that was preventing Food Production Record estimates from being created in summer food sites
- Added date of birth and age to the Weekly Meal Count with Attendance Report
- New sponsor-level report: Serious Deficiency
- Changed wording on invoice discounts to more clearly explain to enter them as negative numbers
- Removed days of the week that that the site is not open from the Paper Back-Ups report
Update 20.04.1
New Sponsor-Level Report: Site Menu Report
Some state agencies require that sponsors keep a printed copy of menus for each site. This report solves that problem! It is a list of each active site and the child and infant menus for the month. It also notes if the site was closed that day or recorded no menu. This report uses the food item descriptions from our database and not the “Description for Print View”. This is a sample of the report:
New Sponsor-Level Report: Participant Export Report
This report generates a spreadsheet with each of the attributes from the participant page, including:
- Participant Name
- Date of Birth
- Participant ID Number
- Start Date and Withdrawal Date
- Gender
- Status
- Roster
- Parent/Guardian Name, Address, Phone, Email
- Race/Ethnicity
- Foster Child, Special Needs, Providers Own Child, Related/Non-Residential and Claimable Status
- Schedule of Typical Days in Attendance and Meals Eaten
- Enrollment Form Effective and Expiration Dates
- Infant Notification Date and Details
- Special Dietary Needs Notification Date and Details
New Report: Current Claims Status
We have added the ability to download the information from the sponsor claims screen into a spreadsheet. You’ll find a new button called “Export as .csv” in the upper-right corner of the claims screen.
New Function: Add Multiple Expenses on the Same Screen
We have added the ability to record multiple expenses for the same date on one screen. This is especially helpful if you have one receipt/invoice that you want to distribute across several categories. Upload the receipt image once and it will be associated with each of your expense entries.
Other Enhancements and Bug Fixes
- Generate the family day care homes monitoring form pre-filled with sponsor and provider information. Find that new report at the site level under Reports/Recordkeeping Reports
Update 20.03.2
Create Food Production Records in Bulk
We can now create food production records for all meals and snacks within a date range with one click! You can find this new feature on the Menu page:
Once you click the Food Production Estimates button, you will be provided with the option to enter the date range and the method you want to use to generate the estimates.
- Use Schedules: if you use this option, the system will use participant schedules to generate estimates in the future. This can help with food procurement! (Note: if meal counts are already taken, then the system will use those instead of schedules).
- Enter Estimates: use this option if you don’t have participant schedules entered. This allows you to input an estimated attendance by age range for each meal type.
Remember that you MUST enter menus before generating food production records!
Ability to Designate ARAM Special Days
Typically ARAM breakfast, AM snack and lunch can only be claimed on the weekends. But with the COVID-19 pandemic and the waivers in place, we have added a feature for sponsors to designate dates on which ARAM breakfast, AM snacks and lunches can be claimed. You’ll find this new feature in Sponsor Setup.
Track the County for each Site and Designate a Group Family Child Care License
We have added two new fields to Site Details. The first field allows you to enter the name of the county. For family child care providers, we have also entered a flag for Group Family Child Care License:
New State Claim File Section
We have been adding more and more state agency claim upload files. To clean up the list of sponsor-level reports, we grouped them together as “State Agency Export Files”. Just select the state and site type for your sponsorship to generate the file. We have added Kansas and New York to our list most recently.
Other Enhancements and Bug Fixes
- Reasons for Tier I have changed to Census, School District or Provider Income. Census and School District used to be combined together.
- Sponsor users can now use one login credential to login to more than one sponsor. Contact us if you an administrator for more than one sponsor and we can get you set up.
Update 20.03.1
Brand-New Sponsor Claims Screen
The sponsor claims screen has a completely refreshed look and tons of new information for sponsors! Instead of a summary of the claim, we have included information that helps you manage your sites.
Each active site is listed on the screen along with the status of their claim:
- Attendance & Meal Counts
- Red if no attendance or meal counts have been entered for the month
- Green if attendance and meal counts have been entered for the month
- M symbol if it is a manual claim site
- Site Submitted to Sponsor
- Red if the site still needs to submit their attendance and meal counts to sponsor
- Green if the site has submitted their attendance and meal counts (along with date/time stamp)
- M symbol if it is a manual claim
- Claim Errors
- Red if there are claim errors
- Green if no claim claim errors
- Claims (CACFP, ARAM and SFSP) have a date/time stamp if a claim has been created
Disallow Meals Outside of Participant Schedule
Sponsors can now choose to disallow meals that are outside of a participant’s normal schedule as indicated on their enrollment form. To activate this feature, login as a sponsor user and click on Setup and then select the button “Disallow Meals Outside of Schedule”. Meal will be disallowed outside of the normal schedule unless a reason is provided by the site.
Assign Sites and Specific Monitoring Forms to Staff
Sponsor Admin users can now assign the centers or providers in their sponsorship to particular staff (Sponsor Reporters). In addition, Sponsor Admin users can restrict the monitoring forms available to Sponsor Reporters on the My Food Program for Reviewers Mobile App. This means that a Sponsor Reporter can’t accidentally submit a review for the wrong center or provider or accidentally use the incorrect form! To assign sites and forms to Sponsor Reporters, click on “Users” on the sponsor dashboard and select from the dropdown choices.
Other Enhancements and Bug Fixes
- Fixed date picker on Daily Meal Production with Leftovers and Dietary Accommodations
- Added a participant flag for Related/Non-Residential
- Renamed the button to generate income and enrollment forms to “Create Participant Registration Forms”
- Added a header with site information to the visit report
- Added site address to the Claim Summary Report
- Fixed food production display on mobile browser
- Renamed the checkbox on the participant page called “CACFP” to the very specific “Include in claims (if unchecked, attendance and meal counts can be recorded but will not be included in the claim)
Update 20.02.2
Change from “Attendance on a School Day” to “Meal Outside of Schedule”
We are changing the name of the box “Attendance on a School Day” to be more inclusive of daily notes that providers want to share about participants attending outside of their normal schedule. Here is what the screen will look like:
***PLEASE NOTE: For those providers using our invoicing system, checking the box “Meal Outside of Normal Schedule” will still flag the days as “School Days” and applies the “School Day Rate”. They should carefully review their invoices before printing or emailing them to parents.
Check of Participants Enrolled in Multiple Sites
We have a new sponsor-level report that checks all participants across all sites. If it finds a participant with the same last name and address, it displays it on this report.
Other Enhancements and Bug Fixes
- Last day of the calendar month is now showing on the meal submission screen.
- Dashboard icon for enrollment forms has been renamed to provide clarity.
- The Meal Count by Age Range now also includes infants ages 0-5 months and 6-11 months.
- Headers were corrected for the Monthly Meal Count with Attendance.
- Meal Recap Report is categorizing participants by income eligibility category prior the creation of the claim.
Update 20.02.1
Added Helpful Information to Submit to Sponsor Screen
We have divided the Submit to Sponsor screen into three sections:
- New Meal Counts: these are meals that have not been checked for errors yet.
- Meal Counts with Errors
- Checked Meal Counts: these are meals that HAVE been checked for errors and did not trigger any disallow codes.
In addition, we put a large statement at the top of the screen to confirm that meals have been submitted to the sponsor. This is what the new screen looks like:
Updated the Enrollment Form Dashboard Indicator to Include Enrollment Forms that are Expiring in the next 30 days.
Improvements to Reports
- If no meals are disallowed for a claim, a blank Disallowed Meals Report is generated that confirms that there were no claim errors.
- Added the number of claimable meals and snacks by tier to the sponsor-level claims summary spreadsheet.
- Updated the Disallowed Meals Report to accurately report counts when an entire meal is disallowed.
Other Enhancements and Bug Fixes
We made a few small tweaks to improve the user experience:
- The date and time that a site closure or field trip was entered is now displayed on the screen.
- It is now possible to create a printable infant menu if using infant menu by date.
- Inactive children are removed from parent invoices.
- Added more information about how to use the “Description for Print View” box on the menu planning page.
- For sites that operate meal shifts, we fixed a bug related to participants being checked in for multiple shifts.
Update 20.01.1
Individual Infant Menus
We now offer the ability to record the food items and amounts offered to each infant in care. The infant must be checked in for the meal first. Infants are listed, along with their ID number and age in months. Users select from the appropriate food components for that meal or snack.
At My Food Program, we work hard to design software that catches errors before they happen. That’s why we have the following safeguards in place for infant menus:
- You cannot record an amount of iron-fortified infant formula or breastmilk that is less than the minimum portion size.
- When you select a food item, the quantity displayed defaults to the minimum portion size for that age range.
- You cannot save the infant menu until you have recorded at least iron-fortified infant formula or breastmilk for each infant checked in for that meal or snack.
Track Facility License
Within each site, you can now add a facility license, including the effective and expiration dates. Sponsor users can also upload an image or scan of the license.
Other Enhancements and Bug Fixes
We made a few small tweaks to improve the user experience:
- Renamed the dashboard button “Side-by-Side” to “Attendance & Meal Count Entry” and the field “Present” to the more precise term “Daily Attendance”.
- Fixed a bug on the Site Summary Report stating that a facility was open on Sunday when it was not.
- Renamed the checkbox “Provider’s Own Child” to “Provider’s Own or Residential Child”.
- Added a legend to the Monthly Meal Count with Attendance Report.