Pay school fees in small amounts and never miss an update
Thousands of Malawian children are forced out of school by poverty, weak government funding, and Covid-19 fallout, despite repeated promises of free universal education.
SukuluPay allows parents to pay school fees in daily or weekly micro-installments using mobile money. Schools send attendance and performance updates directly to parents via the app or USSD. Teachers can send voice notes to entire classes. Everything works for both smartphone and feature phone users.
Impoverished rural and urban families in Malawi with primary- and secondary-school-aged children
Hybrid smartphone + USSD experience that reaches both rural feature phone users and urban smartphone families, with built-in group savings pools (chilimba) to help families meet fee deadlines together.
professional
Pay school fees daily or weekly via mobile money with automatic reconciliation
All core functions available via *384# style USSD menus for feature phones
Teachers mark attendance that instantly notifies parents
Teachers record one voice message sent to all parents in a class
Parents form groups to save together toward school fees
Digital report cards with parent acknowledgment workflow
Schools see collection rates and predict cashflow
Simple chat with voice messages for individual conversations
PDF and voice receipts for every payment
| Column | Type | Nullable |
|---|---|---|
| id | uuid | No |
| name | text | No |
| code | text | No |
| created_at | timestamp | No |
Relationships:
| Column | Type | Nullable |
|---|---|---|
| id | uuid | No |
| phone | text | No |
| name | text | No |
| preferred_method | text | No |
| created_at | timestamp | No |
Relationships:
| Column | Type | Nullable |
|---|---|---|
| id | uuid | No |
| parent_id | uuid | No |
| child_name | text | No |
| class_id | uuid | No |
| fee_amount | int | No |
| balance | int | No |
Relationships:
| Column | Type | Nullable |
|---|---|---|
| id | uuid | No |
| enrollment_id | uuid | No |
| amount | int | No |
| transaction_id | text | No |
| created_at | timestamp | No |
Relationships:
/api/ussdHandle all USSD session requests from Africa's Talking
/api/payments/initiateStart mobile money payment request
/api/attendance/markTeacher marks student attendance
/api/voice/broadcastUpload and queue voice note for class distribution
/api/reports/generateGenerate digital report card
No voice broadcasting
None
Per school per year
| Month | Users | Conversion | MRR | ARR |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Month 1 | 420 | 12% | $1,260 | $15,120 |
| Month 6 | 3,100 | 19% | $14,820 | $177,840 |
Pay what you can, when you can. Get attendance and performance updates instantly. Works on any phone.
Approach 8 private and community-based schools in Blantyre and Mzuzu that are struggling with fee collection post-COVID. Offer 6 months free School tier in exchange for being reference customers and helping refine USSD flows with their parents.
Established in neighboring country
No USSD experience and no savings group feature
Deeper Malawi mobile money integration and chilimba group savings
Some government pilots
Complex interfaces not suitable for rural parents
Simple USSD + voice first design
Deep integration with all three major Malawian telcos for USSD and mobile money plus trust built with early-adopter schools creating a strong network effect.
Mobile money transaction volumes in Malawi grew 47% in 2023 while school fee default rates remain high after COVID, creating perfect conditions for installment-based collection tools.
Handling school fee money requires regulatory approval
Act strictly as a technology provider with funds flowing directly from parent to school accounts
USSD menu complexity leading to user drop-off
Conduct 5 rounds of user testing with low-literacy parents before launch
Success: Clear agreement that micro-payments + USSD would solve 70% of their problems
Success: At least 65% of parents make at least 4 micro-payments and schools report improved collection rates
Success: Reach $3,000 MRR within 45 days
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