TontinApp
The shared ledger of your savings circle.
A savings circle works perfectly well without software. What gets lost is the record: who paid, when, and who witnessed it. TontinApp keeps that book, and nothing else.
What the app does not do
Money never passes through the platform. It moves between you, as it always has - by hand, by transfer or by mobile money. The app records that it happened. It holds nothing, takes nothing, and can block nothing.
That is a choice, not a technical limit. A platform that collects money must be licensed, supervised and insured. This one stays a ledger - which is what makes it free and harmless to your money.
Starting a circle
Create the circle, give it a name, an amount per round and a rhythm - weekly or monthly. You become its treasurer.
Invite members with the invitation code. While the circle is in preparation, everything can still be changed.
Set the payout order: who receives the pot in the first round, the second, and so on. It is the most debated decision in a circle, and the app freezes it once and for all - nobody can later claim they understood otherwise.
Appoint a deputy. They counter-sign the treasurer's own contribution - otherwise the treasurer would confirm himself, and the ledger would lose the very thing that gives it value.
A round, week after week
Each member pays their contribution outside the app, then declares it: cash, transfer or mobile money.
The treasurer confirms - or rejects with a reason. A rejected contribution can be declared again; nothing is lost.
A button now offers to tell the treasurer on WhatsApp with a ready-written message - circle, round, amount, method. The app sends nothing itself: it opens your WhatsApp, and you attach your screenshot if you wish. That message notifies; it confirms nothing - confirmation stays in the app.
When every contribution is confirmed, the pot is complete. The treasurer hands the money to the round's beneficiary and declares it; the beneficiary confirms receipt. The round closes and the next one opens.
The ledger
Every confirmation writes one line, append-only. Nothing is edited and nothing is deleted - not by the treasurer, not by us. That is what makes it trustworthy six months later.
Even if someone deletes their account, their trace remains as « deleted member ». Erasing the line would erase the proof the others gave.