Centre management and parent app for a tuition group.
The group grew from one centre to three in two years. Each centre kept its own spreadsheets, and parents received timetables, homework reminders and invoices through four different WhatsApp groups.
Centre managers were spending Sunday nights chasing invoices and reconciling who attended what.
Our approach
- Start with the centre manager’s dayThe dashboard opens on today: classes, rooms, tutors, and anything overdue.
- Invoices that reconcile themselvesMonthly invoices are generated from enrolments. Parents pay by PayNow from their banking app, and payments are matched back automatically.
- A parent app with one job per tabTimetable, homework, invoices, messages. Parents with more than one child switch with a tap.
- Design system for three brandsA shared component library lets each centre keep its own colour without a separate build.
How AI sped up the admin side
The admin screens follow very regular patterns, so AI coding tools did a lot of the first drafts there. We also used them to generate realistic seed data so we could test with “full” centres from week one. Payment reconciliation and the permissions model were designed and reviewed line by line.
- Admin screens built in roughly half the usual time
- Seed data for 1,200 synthetic students and 40 tutors
- Every permission rule covered by tests written by hand
What we’d do differently
Messaging was harder than invoicing. Parents kept replying in the old WhatsApp groups for months, and tutors ended up answering in both places. We should have planned the switch-over with the centres instead of assuming a better app would be enough.
“Our Sunday nights are back. Parents pay on time because it is easier than not paying.”
Services on this project: SaaS, Mobile app, Design system.