“They make nice, slick ads begging us to come see one of their ‘Master Chefs’ and extolling the virtues of 50 kinds of nuts, surely they can advertise about the Crimson Cash program,” he writes.

While Simon echoes Chapa’s desire to expand the program, she also adds that “a lot of students are frustrated” that they can’t use Board Plus—$50 placed on ID cards at the beginning of each semester—at off-campus locations.

Cross says HUDS does not plan to expand the program beyond Crimson Cash.

“There’s tax reasons, there’s other implications about it,” Cross says. “The answer’s no, it’s not being considered at this time.”

But buying food with Crimson Cash will soon become easier, as HUDS has recently allowed merchants to accept Crimson Cash for food deliveries to dorm rooms. Mayer also says students can expect to find Crimson Cash machines in more Square eateries in the near future.

There are no plans, however, to extend the program to stores that specialize in non-food items.

“Currently we are limiting our expansion to food outlets only,” Mayer writes in an e-mail. “Originally we offered it to pizza and convenience stores. We have received requests from other types of stores in the Square but at this point we are looking only at food.”

But Cross says that students may determine whether Crimson Cash will make the jump to other types of stores.

“It’s really demand-driven by the students. We’re really right now just dealing with food,” Cross says. “We’re not getting a lot of demand for non-food items right now.”

“If the student body decides there are places they really want to use it, I’m sure that would be considered,” Cross adds.

—Jessica R. Rubin-Wills contributed to the reporting of this story.

—Staff writer Derek A. Vance can be reached at vance@fas.harvard.edu.