Fintech startups are driving the adoption of digital payment systems in public + private schools in Egypt: Schools in Egypt — both private and public — are increasingly moving towards adopting fintech solutions and integrating tech into their payment systems, particularly after covid-19 encouraged higher adoption rates of online payments. A handful of startups — including Spare and Klickit — have been cropping up to create specialized digital systems for parents to pay for various school-related expenses such as tuition fees, canteen services, transport costs, and school supplies through online platforms or mobile applications.

Who they are at a glance: Klickit, which was founded in 2017, is a digital payment platform that facilitates education-related payments and offers a fee management tool for educational institutions. Spare, meanwhile, was founded in 2018 and is a digital platform that helps schools go cashless and automates internal processes using contactless technology. Whereas Spare is geared more towards students by providing a contactless wristband or card to pay for food and activities, Klickit is specialized in fee collection and management.

How big are these startups? Klickit’s services are available at 55k schools around the country and have served more than 1.5 mn students, according the company’s website. Spare, meanwhile, has 50 international schools across five countries in its portfolio, CEO and co-founder Mohamed Tawakol told us.

And they’re growing fast both here and abroad: In addition to their presence in the Egyptian market, Spare has tripled its presence in the UAE and is launching in Bahrain in September, the platform is also looking to expand in the African market soon, Tawakol said. “We are in the process of onboarding 125 schools in the UAE and are also expanding in Africa,” Klickit founder and CEO Saeed Talaat told Enterprise.

Klickit has services for parents and schools alike: The company offers different payment methods for tuition fees, including paying in installments through valU, as well as financing services for schools. “Our newest service is a revenue guarantee, where any school that has been a client with me for six months, can now take their money up front for cashflow, and I can collect the money from the parents, through a partnership with EFG Hermes Corp Solutions,” Talaat said.

This technology isn’t just for private schools — public schools are also getting on the digitization bandwagon: The majority of schools in Klickit’s portfolio are public schools in Egypt, Talaat told us, with private schools accounting for just 200 out of its 55k clients. “We’re the official fee management system provider for the Education Ministry,” Talaat said. In addition to schools operating here in Egypt, the platform also manages fees for Egyptian expats sitting for national curriculum exams abroad in 150 countries, he told us.

Taking public schools digital was far from a simple process: Traditionally, parents would pay school fees through banks or in person at schools, with accounting staff members logging all the information manually and wading through mountains of data that was prone to human error. Klickit helps schools log all this information digitally on one unified platform, allowing them to create a database of all completed and outstanding payments, Talaat explained. Still, the uptake of the technology has been an uphill battle, as many parents shy away from digital payments. “Around 60% of school-related transactions are still made with paper banknotes, which is why Klickit still has many cash options and partnerships with providers like Fawry and Paymob. But wherever the parents go to pay their fees — whether it’s an ATM, online, at the bank, or in person at school — we can still monetize the transaction,” Talaat said.

For the more tech-savvy parents and students: With Spare, students use contactless wristbands or cards to make purchases at school canteens or for other selected activities, essentially acting as a debit card that only works within the bounds of their school. Parents are able to charge their kids’ payment accessory either with direct in-person payments at school or online using a credit or debit card, Tawakol said.

Beyond the payment functionality, these accessories also create a wealth of useful data: Parents are able to get insights into their child’s spending and nutritional habits through Spare’s app, with access to “tools such a spending limits and product restrictions to help guide their kids to make better decisions in terms of spending and nutrition at school,” Spare co-founder Mohamed Zohair told us. Data collected through Spare’s platform indicates a trend of increasingly unhealthy eating habits among students, Zohair said. “We have enough data now to rely on these sorts of analytics to help make a difference,” he said.

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