One administrator, and everybody else on a leash they can see
The admin holds everything and decides, person by person, what the rest can open. Take a permission away and the session ends there and then.
School management · Kenya · CBC
One number
follows the child.
2026/0142
Her admission number is the line she is marked present on, the reference on her fee note, the account her mother pays to, and the thing her mother types to sign in. It is written once. Everything else is a query.
2026/0142 Achieng, JoyP2026/0143 Barasa, KevinA2026/0144 Cheruiyot, FaithP
Mrs Wanjiru, 08:12, no signal
Term 2 · Grade 6 SimbaAccount 2026/0142Balance KES 18,400
Posted with the term's invoice run
Paybill 4120418Account 2026/0142Amount you decide
Any amount, any day
Mwangaza Junior SchoolAdmission no. 2026/0142PIN ••••
Signing in on her own phone
A term, end to end
Written for a school where the bursar keeps one spreadsheet nobody else may touch, the register is a book, and the fee list goes out on WhatsApp.
The register, before the signal comes back
A class teacher marks the roll on a phone with no data. It queues on the device and syncs when the network returns, without a duplicate and without overwriting a correction somebody else already made.
Report cards that speak CBC
Learning areas, strands and sub-strands. Performance levels 1–4, not percentages. Core competencies and values on the same card. KPSEA at Grade 6 and KJSEA at Grade 9 where they belong.
A fee note on your own letterhead
Your crest, your postal address, your paybill, with the admission number as the account reference. A parent pays any amount they like, on any day — through M-Pesa, at the office, or through the bank. All three reach the same ledger.
Instalments, so the arrears list is true
A family paying to an agreed plan is not in arrears, and the ladder does not chase them as though they were. Whole shillings, because M-Pesa cannot send a fraction of one.
A timetable that argues back
Drag a lesson and the cells that cannot take it say why: the class is busy, the teacher is in another room, the lab is taken, the teacher is past the hours they agreed. Draft until you publish it.
The end of the year, in one pass
Every learner proposed a place in the next year, from the ladder and the released results. Move one, hold one back, mark one as gone. Nothing is deleted — last year's enrolment is closed with a reason, because last year's marks hang off it.
Built to be argued with
A board will ask who could have done this, and who could have seen that. These are the answers, and each one is enforced in code rather than in a policy document.
Every school sealed from every other
Two schools can both use 2026/0001 and both use office@. Neither ever sees the other's ledger, roll or parents' numbers. There is a test that tries, on every change.
A safeguarding restriction that holds
A guardian a court order keeps out is not messaged about that child — not by a fee reminder, not by a newsletter, not by whoever writes the next feature.
Results are not a debt-collection tool
Withholding a child's report over fees is off unless a school deliberately turns it on, and turning it on is written to the audit log with a name against it.
What it does not do yet
There is no library, transport or school-store module. WhatsApp sends through your own Meta business number, which you register; until that is done, messages queue and stay visible but do not leave. Bank feeds are imported rather than live. We would rather list this than let you find it in week three.
Questions we are asked first
- Does it work when the internet is down?
- The attendance register does. A teacher marks the roll with no network at all; the marks queue on the device and sync when the signal returns, without duplicating a mark or overwriting a correction somebody else made. Fees, report cards and the timetable need a connection.
- How do parents pay?
- Through your school's own M-Pesa paybill, using the child's admission number as the account reference — both printed on the fee note. A parent chooses the amount; nothing dictates it. Payments taken at the office or through a bank are recorded by hand and reach the same ledger.
- Is it built for the CBC?
- Yes. Learning areas, strands and sub-strands; performance levels 1 to 4 rather than percentages; core competencies and values on the report card; KPSEA at Grade 6 and KJSEA at Grade 9.
- Can one person run the whole school on it?
- Yes. Each school has one administrator who holds every permission and decides, person by person, what everybody else can open. A small school can run on that one account; a larger one can separate who sets a fee from who approves it.
- Can another school see our data?
- No. Two schools can both use the admission number 2026/0001 and neither ever sees the other's ledger, roll or parents' contact details. It is enforced in the queries themselves and there is a test that tries to break it on every change.
- What does it cost?
- Write to info@relatax.org and tell us how many learners you have. We would rather quote against your actual roll than publish a price that fits nobody.
Already using it? Sign in as staff, or check your child’s balance.