Schoolable: Ensuring Quality Education Through Affordable Finance

In Nigeria, only a small percentage of parents can pay private school fees upfront, while a majority of schools experience a cash flow deficit from the first day of the school term. The first month of every term is the most pensive month for parents. This is because they have to pay children’s school fees and other expenses for books, shoes, sandals, uniforms, etc. In such circumstances, many parents who are not buoyant or are experiencing financial stress are often left stranded and in need of loans targeted at solving educational needs. Although there are fintech and Edtech solutions developed by Nigerian startups, it’s only a few that can solve this problem like Schoolable.

The belief that access to affordable finance is the greatest obstacle to quality education in Africa influenced what it does today. It makes finance easily accessible and available across the education ecosystem in Africa, supporting families and Schools in the process. It brings all the services needed to foster affordable, accessible finance in one place as well as helps parents to plan, save, borrow and pay for school fees through their mobile app. It also enables schools to collect fees, manage their expenses, and bank online, through their web platform.

Schoolable offers end-to-end transaction, credit, and financial management for schools, creating education savings accounts and payment plans for parents, as well as loans to schools for capital improvements and other large purchases. The Schoolable service application can be accessed by downloading on the google play store or the iOS app. It can also be accessed on the website.

For parents, Schoolable allows them to do the following:

1. Create a savings plan.
2. Get loans with low interest to pay school fees.
3. Pay school fees directly to your children’s school and get a receipt.

It is worthy to note that parents can only make payments to schools that have an account with Schoolable, it is to this account that payments for the schools are remitted. The platform also comes with several unique features which make it very easy to use and understand. These features enable the school to effectively manage its school finances. They are:

• Easy Reconciliation

• Easy Student Invoicing

With Schoolable invoicing, schools can keep track of how much every student in every family owes your school. They can track part-payments, manage discounts and automatically remind parents of their outstanding bills.

• Multiple Payments Channels

School owners no longer have to insist that families pay through bank deposits with tellers. They can just move money into their unique family account and clear all their outstanding bills in the school.

• Manage Employee Payroll

Taxes, bonuses, deductions, and monthly salaries can be calculated and disbursed into the bank accounts of employees using schoolable.

• Pay Vendors & Suppliers

Using Schoolable to manage expenses helps to categorize transactions properly for better insights to keep track of supplies and amounts to pay vendors.

• Expense Management & Approval Flow

It helps business owners to organize their school’s expenses with proper approval flow for all outbound transactions in the school.

Schoolable Trust Fund Service

The trust fund service is only available to users in schools that accept tuition fees through its platform. Presently, Schoolable is used by 350 schools across Nigeria. Out of those schools, the Trust Fund is currently available to 7 schools, all of which are on Lagos Island. To use the trust fund, a user has to lock up 33% of annual tuition fees in the fund, just like a deposit. When the time for tuition payment arrives, Schoolable pays the entire sum and allows the user to pay back at an agreed monthly rate.

The initial amount put in the trust fund is invested and may be withdrawn by the user afterwards if the total payment has been completed. After the deposit has been made into the trust fund, the platform pays the tuition to the child/ward’s school when it is due while the user can pay back on an agreed monthly basis. Schoolable’s angle is that it allows users (parents, students, and others) to save towards an educational or more general target.

Currently, only pre-tertiary schools and parents whose wards are in that segment can make use of Schoolable to fully enjoy all the services provided. Schools have to embrace and register in the service because users can only pay to schools that are registered on the platform and the trust fund can only be used in schools that are registered with Schoolable. Every school owner wants to make life easy for themselves and at the same time, make a good profit from their businesses. This is why Schoolable Pay came to provide easy and understandable banking solutions to effectively run a school business.