A bantaba is where people meet to settle things together
Under the tree in the middle of the village, business gets done, a dispute gets heard, and a susu gets counted out in front of everybody who put money into it. This is that, on a phone, for four things Gambians already do every day.
Five services, one account
Bantaba is an online platform for buying, selling, saving, renting and delivering in The Gambia. Use one service and ignore the rest; they share one account, so nobody needs a second one.
Marketplace
Bantaba Market
An online marketplace where Gambian shops list their products. Anybody can browse; buyers order from a shop or message the seller on WhatsApp, and follow their orders to delivery.
Shop tools
Bantaba Business
Tools for running a shop from a phone: a till for recording sales, stock held per branch, customers and what they owe, suppliers and purchases, expenses, staff and sales reports.
Susu savings
Bantaba Save
The traditional Gambian susu, written down: members save on a schedule into savings circles run by Bantaba or by approved organisers, see their own ledger, and withdraw what is theirs at the end.
Rentals
Bantaba Rent
Listings of rooms, apartments, compounds, shop space and land to rent, with the rent, deposit and first payment shown up front. Renters enquire and book viewings; landlords manage their places and tenancies.
Delivery
Bantaba Delivery
Parcel and order delivery across The Gambia by approved riders and delivery businesses, with a tracking link and a photo taken at drop-off.
Who runs Bantaba
Bantaba is operated by CHAW TECH, registered in The Gambia (SRN 1720121228). Manjai Jiddah, Serekunda, Kanifing Municipality, The Gambia. +220 533 0884.
- Operator
- CHAW TECH
- Registration (SRN)
- 1720121228
- Address
- Manjai Jiddah, Serekunda, Kanifing Municipality, The Gambia
- Phone
- +220 533 0884
- [email protected]
The susu already works. The notebook does not.
Gambians have been saving together for generations, and the system is sound. A group agrees an amount, everybody pays it in, and the money goes round. It works because the people in it know each other.
What does not work is the record. One notebook, one person holding it, and no way for the other fourteen members to check what is in it without asking. When somebody falls behind, nobody agrees on when it started. When the pot is short, nobody can show why. Most of the time it is an honest mistake in somebody's handwriting, and it still ends a group.
So Bantaba keeps the record instead. Every contribution is a line with a date on it, in a ledger only you can be paid out of. Every draw is recorded with who was eligible and who won, and every member is told the result, whether they were in the room or not.
The other three parts grew out of the same group of people. The members of a susu are very often traders, and traders need somewhere to sell, a way to keep stock, and a roof they are paying rent on. Building those separately would have meant asking the same person to create four accounts.
Written down
Every dalasi in and out is a dated line in a ledger, and the ledger is what the balance is calculated from. Nothing is typed in by hand at the end.
Recorded
Every rotating draw is logged with who was eligible and who won. A member who has already won cannot win again.
Separate
Shop money and susu money never touch. A till is a till and a susu is a susu, on the same account.
Read by a person
Every shop and every rent listing is looked at by somebody here before it appears to anybody else.
What you save is what you get
It sounds obvious. It is the thing most often broken, so it is written here as a promise rather than left as an assumption.
Your ledger is yours
Your balance is worked out from your own contributions, not from a shared pot somebody else is counting. You can open it at any hour and see every line.
A pot holds only real money
A rotating pot is funded from contributions that have actually been confirmed. Nothing is counted in because it was promised.
Nobody else spends your money
A member falling behind costs that member, through the penalty the group agreed. It never reduces anybody else's balance.
The same rule is why money going out is a request that a person approves rather than a button that empties a balance, and why a locked amount tells you the date it unlocks instead of only telling you no.
Free while we grow
Every platform fee is currently set to zero. There is no registration fee, no monthly fee, nothing to pay to start a susu, no commission on a let, and no commission taken on a marketplace sale. That is not an introductory month with a date on it. It is where the settings stand today.
It is paid for the way a young thing usually is: out of pocket, because there is more value in a market that people actually use than in a small fee charged to the few who arrive first.
One day some of it will carry a charge, most likely a share of a completed marketplace sale rather than a fee for holding an account. When that happens it will be published in the terms as a new version, and you will be asked to accept it before it applies to you. No charge is ever taken under a version of the terms you have not accepted.
What is not open yet
Money coming in is closed while the Wave integration is being finished. Deposits, susu contributions and marketplace checkout are not available today, and they are hidden rather than left there to fail.
Everything else works. You can browse the market, fill a cart, message a seller on WhatsApp, run a shop and its stock, list a place to rent, and set up a susu and its members.
When payments open, a marketplace payment will be held in escrow until the buyer confirms the goods arrived, with an automatic release after a few days and a dispute that stops the clock if something is wrong.
Five people, and you may be more than one of them
Nothing here assumes a shop, a smartphone contract or a bank account. The lowest bar is a phone number.
Somebody buying
You want to see what a shop actually has before you cross town for it. No account needed to look, and none to fill a cart.
A shopkeeper or a trader
You keep stock and you would rather not keep it in your head. The till, the stock and the books are free, and listing in the market is optional.
Somebody looking for a place
You want the rent, the deposit and where it actually is, before you pay anybody a dalasi to show you around.
A saver
You already save with a group, or you want to and cannot find one you trust with the counting.
An organiser
You run susus for other people and you are tired of being the notebook. Set one up, and the arithmetic looks after itself.
Somebody in the diaspora
You send money home and you would like to see where it went. A ledger travels better than a phone call.
Where would you like to start?
Something you want to ask first? Write to us, or see whether it is already answered in Help.