Stok-Vel
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Straight answers — no small print surprises

Questions, answered plainly

Everything committees and members ask us, in one place. Can't find yours? Ask us directly — details at the bottom.

The basics

Do you hold our money?

No. You keep your own bank account — we only keep the records. The app never receives, holds, or moves your savings. The only payment we would ever process is our own subscription fee, and we are not charging anything at the moment.

Do we change how we run meetings?

No. Keep meeting and paying cash exactly as you do today. An admin records who paid what in seconds — the app replaces the paper book, not your way of saving.

Who is Stok-Vel for?

Burial societies, grocery and December stokvels, investment and savings clubs — any South African group of 5 to 200+ members that pools and saves together.

Is this another payment app?

No. Payment apps process transactions and leave the administration behind. Stok-Vel is the operating platform for the whole group: records, committee roles, communication, attendance, statements, and reporting — purpose-built for stokvels.

Signing in

I forgot my password — how do I get back in?

Open the sign-in screen and tap "Forgot your password?" under the Continue button. Enter the email address your stokvel has for you and we'll send you a link and a code. Either one lets you set a new password straight away.

Reset your password

Do I have to open the email on the same phone?

No. The link works wherever you open it — your phone, a laptop, a family member's computer — and the same email also carries a code you can type into the app instead, whichever is easier for you.

I was invited but I never set a password

Use the same "Forgot your password?" screen. It works for setting a password for the first time, not just for changing a forgotten one, so you don't need a fresh invite from your admin.

Set your password

I can't get my 6-digit security code

That's the two-factor app on your phone, which is separate from your password. If you still have the recovery codes you printed when you set it up, one of them will reset it. If you don't, your group's admins can restore your access from your member profile — you don't lose your account or your savings record either way.

Use a recovery code

Money & records

Can members see each other's savings?

No — each member sees their own savings plus the group total. Loans are the one deliberate exception: they are visible to the group because they affect the group pot.

What exactly is a loan?

A member taking part of their own savings early, and paying it back. Nobody lends the member anything — the money is already theirs — and the app blocks any loan larger than the member's own available balance.

What about the December payout?

The year-end close pays savings back to each member on record and splits bank interest per your group's rules, equal or pro-rata. It is calculated, logged, and irreversible — not argued over a notebook.

What happens when the committee changes?

The record doesn't live in anyone's drawer. New committee members get their own logins, the full history stays exactly where it was, and the audit trail keeps every past action attributed to the person who took it.

Can we get our records out?

Yes. Members get their own printable statements, and group admins can export the group's records. Your data belongs to your group.

Trust & privacy

Is our data safe?

Encrypted in transit, isolated per stokvel at the database level, protected by mandatory two-factor security for admins, and covered by a tamper-evident audit trail. Full details are on our Security page.

What are our rights under POPIA?

You can ask what personal information we hold about you, have it corrected or deleted, object to certain processing, and complain to the Information Regulator. Our Privacy Policy and PAIA manual explain how, step by step.

Who watches the admins?

Your group does. Every admin action is logged under a named person, and an optional floor representative — chosen from the members — has read-only sight of all of it.

Cost

What does it cost?

Nothing right now. We are onboarding our first stokvels in person and no group is being charged, with every feature included. When we do introduce a subscription, it will be one price for the whole group — never a per-member fee and never a percentage of your savings — and your stokvel will get clear notice well before anything changes.

Who would pay the subscription?

The stokvel does, through its admins — like any other group expense. Individual members never pay us anything, now or later.

Can we cancel?

Any time, in your account settings. Nothing is being charged at the moment, so there is nothing to cancel — and once subscriptions do start, cancelling takes effect at the end of the current paid period. Where the 7-day ECTA cooling-off right applies, you get a refund less the value of services already used.