Education IT Reporter

Transact, a payment solutions for a connected campus, and Grubhub, a leading food-ordering and delivery marketplace nationwide, announced today a partnership to extend Grubhub’s restaurant network to Transact’s CampusCash program. The partnership enables more student spending off campus, allowing universities to better adapt to hybrid learning environments and increase availability for contactless meal delivery and payment options.

Transact serves 12 million customers annually at more than 1,300 universities across the country. The Transact CampusCash program enables students on campuses using Transact’s mobile-centric campus technology to use their student ID cards for cashless payments at university-approved off-campus merchants. Grubhub’s robust network of more than 300,000 restaurants is now included in Transact’s off-campus merchant program. This partnership will allow students to use their university-branded CampusCash account while they are away from campus, even visiting family and friends across the country.

“Universities had to quickly adapt technologies to keep operations running smoothly over the last 18 months as they pivoted to hybrid learning and contactless dining experiences,” said Brian Madigan, vice president of campus and corporate partners at Grubhub. “We’re excited to partner with Transact to help university partners stay nimble with continued flexible meal models and expand the off-campus dining options available to students, while driving orders to local restaurants in their communities.”

“We’re always looking for ways to increase the value of student ID cards, and partnering with Grubhub to provide students with additional off-campus dining options makes the cards even more indispensable,” said Erica Bass, vice president of product management at Transact. “By giving students more cashless options to choose from, we’re doubling down on our efforts to provide a superior dining and overall campus experience.”

Campuses with an existing Transact off-campus merchant program can easily add Grubhub as an off-campus merchant to their existing program to give students more dining options. Matt Camino, director of the PacificCard at the University of the Pacific, said, “Our experience adding Grubhub to our off-campus flex tender program has been seamless. We added Grubhub to fill a gap for students who do not have transportation off campus readily available. Our students are excited about the additional food options and delivery services. With students returning to campus fully, I’m looking forward to the positive impact that the Grubhub and CampusCash off-campus program partnership will provide.”

Fairleigh Dickinson University piloted the partnership with Grubhub and CampusCash for its Teaneck, N.J., and Madison, N.J., campuses. Associate Vice President for Auxiliary Services, Bob Valenti, said, “Fairleigh Dickinson University is always looking for new and creative ideas to better serve our students. New ideas are easily implemented when you have partners willing to work with you for the good of the overall student experience. We’re fortunate enough to have established relationships with Transact – CampusCash and Gourmet Dining.

As the COVID-19 pandemic became increasingly more severe, we were forced to limit our hours and dining options available on campus. We were faced with the dilemma of not only keeping our students safe, but also of providing them options outside our normal hours. With Grubhub as part of our program, we were able to offer students expanded hours, increased popular and local dining options, and the flexibility they needed to get them through some very rough times. Our students were so pleased and we’re happy to announce the partnership will continue to be included in some of our meal plans for the upcoming academic year.”

For more information about the partnership and to bring the off-campus program with Grubhub and Transact to your institution, please visit campus.grubhub.com/transact.