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Recurv's two-stream pricing model lets an SA school's SGB choose whether the school or parents carry the per-debit collection cost, instead of a single bundled fee set by the provider.
A question that comes up early in most conversations with a Bursar, Finance Officer, or SGB Finance Rep is some version of: who actually pays for the debit-order collection itself, the school, or the parent? It's a fair question, because most incumbent debit-order providers in South Africa blend the two costs together in a way that isn't always transparent from the outside.
This piece sets out how Recurv's pricing actually breaks down, and, the part that matters most to an SGB weighing its options, where the school gets to choose.
How most providers price school billing today
Most existing SA debit-order providers charge schools a per-transaction fee for every debit raised, bundled to cover the rail cost, mandate administration, retry handling, and the provider's own margin. Some schools absorb that per-debit cost as a school expense. Others pass it through to parents as a line item on the statement, often labelled an "admin fee" or "transaction fee", without always making clear to parents what that fee actually covers or how it compares to what it would cost elsewhere.
Either way, in most incumbent models the cost is a single bundled number, and the school doesn't necessarily have a clean way to decide, deliberately, whether the school or the parent carries it. The default is usually whatever the provider's contract set at signup, sometimes without much revisiting since.
The two-stream model
Recurv separates the cost into two distinct streams, and gives the school a deliberate choice about how they're allocated.
Stream one is a fixed monthly platform licence, covering platform access, mandate hosting, the recon view, multi-stream billing across tuition, transport, activities, and once-off fees, and ongoing maintenance. It's a single, predictable line on the school's budget, unaffected by how many debits run in a given month.
Stream two is a per-debit transaction fee, charged each time a debit is raised. This is the part most existing providers bundle invisibly into a single number, Recurv separates it out and gives the school the choice of who carries it.
The school's choice: absorb the per-debit fee as a school cost, or pass it through to the parent as a transparent, itemised line on their statement, typically at a rate that's meaningfully lower than what most incumbent providers charge when they bundle the equivalent cost into their pricing. Either way, the amount is visible and set deliberately, not buried inside a bundled number the SGB never explicitly reviewed.
Why the choice matters to an SGB
Different schools have different views on this, for legitimate reasons tied to their own community and fee philosophy. Some SGBs prefer to absorb transaction costs entirely into the school's operating budget, treating fee collection as a pure administrative cost like any other. Others prefer full transparency with parents, itemising the small per-debit cost so parents can see exactly what it covers, rather than having it folded invisibly into the headline tuition figure.
Both approaches are defensible. What matters is that the SGB Finance Committee is making the decision deliberately, with a clear number in front of it, rather than inheriting whatever a provider's original contract set years ago without ever revisiting it.
What this means for the school's budget
The fixed monthly platform licence is the one number that needs to go into the annual operating budget, unaffected by term-to-term collection volume or the number of once-off charges raised in a given month. It doesn't move if the school grows its intake, doesn't move if a busy month has more once-off tour or event charges running through it, and doesn't carry a hidden per-transaction add-on layered on top.
The per-debit fee, wherever the school decides it should land, is the second, separately visible number, one the SGB can set policy on and revisit if its view changes, rather than a number baked invisibly into a provider's bundled rate.
What this isn't
It isn't a claim that the platform licence is free or that the school pays nothing. The fixed monthly licence is a real, budgeted cost. What's different is that it's predictable and doesn't carry a hidden per-transaction surcharge riding on top of it.
It isn't a one-time decision the school is locked into. An SGB that initially chooses to absorb the per-debit fee can revisit that choice later, and vice versa, as its view of the fee-transparency question evolves.
It isn't a claim that Recurv's total cost is always lower than every incumbent provider's total cost in every scenario. The claim is narrower and more useful: the two streams are separated and visible, so the school can make an informed, deliberate choice about who carries which cost, a choice that's harder to make well when a provider's pricing is a single bundled number.
Related reading
See how Recurv handles recurring billing for schools & education.
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