The household's fear

Theft of cash, phones, fuel and food. Keys copied. A child left unattended. A worker who disappears with a month's advance. No way to check anyone, because the "reference" is a phone number written on a scrap of paper.

The worker's fear

Wages withheld. No contract. Confiscated NRC. Fourteen-hour days with no rest day. Accused of theft with no hearing, blacklisted in the compound by rumour, and no way to clear her name.

Why nothing has fixed it

Informal hiring has no record. Maid centres operate in isolation with paper files. Nobody validates certificates. Nobody tracks when a police clearance expires. And no platform has ever protected both sides at the same time.

Palette

Deep green reads as trust, land and steadiness. Copper is the Zambian copperbelt — warm, local, and a deliberate step away from the cold blue-grey of foreign tech platforms.

Voice

• Plain, not corporate. "Your police clearance expires in 42 days" — not "verification lifecycle event".
• Both-sides framing. Never describe only the employer's risk.
• No fear marketing. Sell peace of mind, not paranoia about "your maid".
• No degrading nouns. Ever, in any language.
• Honest about limits. A clearance is a snapshot, and we say so.

Logo direction

The mark is a warm, rounded letter S that doubles as a protective curve around a home — keeping wrapped around the household. It reads as a monogram at small sizes and as a shelter up close.

Avoid: broomsticks, aprons, dusters, houses with roofs, hands holding hands, globe-and-swoosh. Those reduce the professional to the job.

Taglines

• "Your home, kept safe."
  Primary — trust and protection
• "Verified on both sides."
  Trust and fairness
• "Who is in your home?"
  Employer-facing campaign
• "Your work. Your record. Your rights."
  Worker-facing campaign

Client

• Flutter — one codebase, Android-first (Zambia is overwhelmingly Android), iOS later
• Offline-first: SQLite local store, background sync, queue writes when offline
• Data-light: compressed images, aggressive caching, works on 2G/EDGE
• USSD + SMS gateway for feature phones — registration, job alerts, check status
• WhatsApp Business API for notifications — where Zambians actually read messages

Backend

• NestJS or Django + PostgreSQL — relational integrity matters here
• Redis + BullMQ for check queues and retention jobs
• Object storage for documents with envelope encryption, per-record keys
• Append-only audit log (write-once, no UPDATE or DELETE grants)
• Every PII field encrypted at column level with a KMS-managed key
• Field-level access control so a support agent cannot read NRC numbers

Integrations

• National Registration — NRC identity validation (partnership required)
• Zambia Police — clearance verification workflow
• TEVETA — certificate validation against the issuing register
• RTSA — driving licence and record check for driver roles
• NAPSA / NHIMA — registration status checks
• Mobile money — MTN MoMo, Airtel Money, Zamtel Kwacha for wages
• Liveness / face match vendor for anti-spoof identity
• PACRA — agency licence verification

Revenue lines

Why households pay

• Replacing a worker who steals or vanishes costs far more than a subscription
• A written contract and documented process removes family arguments
• Expiry tracking means never being caught with a lapsed clearance
• Two-way reviews reveal which households are good employers — and which workers will actually accept the job

Why agencies pay

• Their paper files become a digital, verifiable roster
• Their certificates get validated instantly and lift their people's tiers
• They stop losing placements to unlicensed competitors
• Their upheld-complaint rate becomes a selling point, not a rumour

Why workers stay

• Free, permanently
• A portable, verifiable reputation they own — it survives leaving an employer
• Visibility of who is looking at them, and why
• Evidence when an employer withholds wages
• A way to clear their name if accused
• Training that upgrades their tier and therefore their wage

Commercial

• Clear the name: PACRA search, domain, trademark class check
• Sign MoUs with 5 Lusaka agencies for the pilot
• Interview 20 households and 40 workers — test the pricing and the rights charter with real people

Legal

• Engage Zambian counsel on the Employment Code, the current minimum-wage order and data protection
• Draft the worker consent text in English, Nyanja and Bemba
• Draft the publication policy for upheld flags

Technical

• Open conversations with Zambia Police and TEVETA on verification access
• Build the consent ledger and audit log first — they are the foundation, not a feature
• Prototype the worker app on a low-end Android device on a 2G connection