Documentation

Mobile repayments

Mobile repayments allow clients to pay loan repayments through mobile money using a self-service USSD interface.

How it works

Mobile repayments use a Provider-First approach for incoming money:

  1. The client initiates a repayment request through USSD
  2. A payment request is sent to the mobile money provider
  3. The client approves the payment on their phone
  4. The provider confirms payment was received
  5. ONLY THEN is the repayment recorded in Microbanking and applied to the loan

This approach ensures that money is received BEFORE it's recorded on the loan, preventing crediting repayments that were never actually paid.

Process

On a mobile phone, enter the USSD shortcode provided by Symba Global Support. This shortcode will be different in different countries. A USSD session will start and the user will be presented with a series of menus.

After successfully going through the menus, the user will receive a mobile money payment request using the provider configured for their mobile network. The status of the transaction can be monitored in Symba Payments (see Monitoring).

When repayments get stuck

A mobile money repayment becomes "stuck" when the payment provider's response is ambiguous. This can happen in these situations:

  • Payment request timeout - The request timed out before the client responded
  • Provider server error - The provider returned an error with unclear payment status
  • Recording failed - Payment was confirmed received but failed to record in Microbanking (CRITICAL)
  • Unknown error - An unexpected error occurred

If a repayment gets stuck, it must be manually resolved by verifying whether the payment was actually received and choosing the appropriate action.

CRITICAL scenario: If you see a stuck repayment with "CRITICAL:" in the status message, this means the client's payment was received but not recorded on their loan. This requires immediate resolution to ensure the client is properly credited.

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