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An officer of the chama invites you by email or phone number — whichever they have on file for you. You'll get an email or SMS notification depending on which one was used. Open the app and the chama will appear in your profile under "My Chamas".

On the web, click "New chama" under the chama switcher in the sidebar; on mobile go to Profile → tap "+ Create New Chama". Follow the setup steps: enter a name, set contribution frequency and amount, configure your loan policy, and optionally set up your mobile money (M-Pesa or Airtel Money) payment destination.

A chama officer creates a contribution cycle with a start date, end date, and amount, and members record payments against it — officers can mark contributions as paid and track who is behind. If your chama uses Flexible Savings instead, there's no fixed cycle or due date: members deposit any amount, any time, and everyone's running total is shown as a simple leaderboard.

Go to Loans → Apply for Loan (only available if your chama has loans enabled). Your maximum loan amount is based on your total contributions multiplied by the chama's loan multiplier. Submit your application with a purpose and repayment period. Officers will review and approve or reject it.

Fines are issued by chama officers for missed contributions, late repayments, or other policy violations. You can view fine details and dispute a fine with a written reason if you believe it was issued in error.

When you initiate a payment via the app, you choose your mobile money network yourself, then you receive an STK push (payment prompt) on your phone from that provider — nothing is picked for you and it isn't guessed from your number. M-Pesa prompts are supported; if Airtel Money prompts aren't available yet, the app says so — pay with M-Pesa instead, or ask an officer to record your Airtel Money payment. Enter your PIN to approve. The transaction is processed by your mobile money provider — kikobas records the reference for your chama's records.

Go to Profile → Settings and request a phone or email change. Enter the new number/address and you'll get a verification code (by SMS or email) — entering it applies the change immediately, no officer approval needed. A chama officer can also do this for you from the Members page; the code still goes to your new number/address, so you'd read it back to them.

If you belong to multiple chamas, tap the chama name in the sidebar (web dashboard) or the menu (mobile app) to open a switcher. Select the chama you want to manage.

No — the Chama Advisor only knows about whichever chama is currently open in the app. If you belong to more than one, switch to the other chama first, then ask it there. It also only shares information your role already has access to in kikobas — for example, a regular member won't see the full arrears report or billing history, since those are officer-only views in the app too.

A Merry-Go-Round is a rotational savings scheme where each member takes turns receiving a fixed payout. Officers create an MGR cycle, assign the payout order, and record each payout as it is made.

On the web dashboard, go to Reports in the sidebar — view summaries, loan books, arrears, and statements, and export as PDF or Excel. On the mobile app, open Reports from the menu (it's not one of the bottom tabs) and export as PDF or CSV using your device's share sheet. Reports are available to the Chairperson, Treasurer and Secretary; the Secretary sees the Group Summary only.

kikobas requires an internet connection to load and submit data. If you lose connectivity, cached data remains visible but changes cannot be saved until you reconnect.

Web: Settings → My Profile → Delete account. Mobile: Profile → scroll to Delete account. You'll confirm with your password (or by typing DELETE if you signed in with Google). Your account is then scheduled for deletion after a 14-day grace period — during that time it's read-only, and you can cancel from the same place. You can't delete your account while you're the only Chairperson of a chama that still has other members, while you have an outstanding loan or an open welfare request, or if you're a platform admin — the screen tells you exactly what to sort out first. When it completes, your personal details are removed and your name shows as "Former Member" on chama records. Financial history your chama needs (contributions, loans, fines and so on) stays, anonymised, and audit records are kept for 7 years as the law requires.

Yes. Web: Settings → My Profile → Download my data. Mobile: Profile → Download my data. You get one JSON file with your profile, your memberships, and your own contributions, loans, fines, dividends, welfare records, meeting attendance, Advisor chats and your own activity history. It never includes your password, security secrets, or other members' private details. You can download up to 2 copies per 24 hours, and we email you a notice each time.

Two options, both at the bottom of Chama Settings (web: Settings → Chama Settings; mobile: Profile → Chama Settings), visible to the Chairperson. Archive is for a chama that's finished its work: it freezes new activity and keeps every record readable. It needs every active member to approve within 30 days (any member can decline), and only the Chairperson can unarchive it later. Permanent delete is only for a chama that was never used — it's refused as soon as there's any contribution, loan, fine, payment or other financial record, in which case archive it instead. Both need the Chairperson to type the chama's name to confirm.

You get a 5-day grace period, and the Chairperson and Treasurer are warned. After that, members beyond the plan's limit become read-only: they can still sign in, see their balance and statement, and download their data, but can't take any action — including paying what they owe or applying for a loan. Officers always keep full access, and by default the most recently joined members are the ones who become read-only — the Chairperson can instead choose who keeps full access in Settings → Subscription. Nothing is deleted, and renewing the plan restores everyone automatically.