Refilling Phone Credit Ideas

Users
1

Hey,

Forwarding my original email to cc-users for input.

Thanks for any suggestions/comments/experiences.

Nick

Nick P. Amland

CommCare Field Fellow
Dimagi, Inc.
Dodoma, Tanzania
Google Voice: 253.642.7790
Email: namland@dimagi.com namland08@gmail.com

··· ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Nick Amland Date: Mon, May 23, 2011 at 10:12 AM Subject: Refilling Phone Credit Ideas To: Neal Lesh , Jonathan Jackson , Daniel Roberts , Clayton Sims , dtreatman , Brian DeRenzi , asagoff , droos

Hey guys,

I'm trying to figure out a refill credit strategy here in Mozambique for a
World Vision project (~30 users) we're going be to kicking off soon. I was
hoping to gather suggestions and also hear what other CC deployments are
doing to accomplish this. I also have a secondary question which involves
converting the credit into data.

But first, how are other projects topping up the CHWs with credit?

In the Dodoma project I'm working on, this process is simplified because we
have a planned meeting with the CHVs on a weekly basis which gives us the
opportunity to top up if needed. We ended up pretty much topping up the
credit on an ad hoc basis because the CHVs level of work differs drastically
across the group (where some send up to 50 forms a week while others 10-15).

For this MZ project, I don't think there is a planned meeting with all CHWs
in MZ., but I need to confirm that. However, the CHWs here will have a
pretty fixed schedule by visiting 15 households a month (15-30 forms). We
could potentially estimate how much credit it takes to send that amount of
forms and then "send"the CHWs credit via a mobile to mobile transaction on a
monthly basis. That seems laborious to do for each CHW though.

My secondary question is about converting the credit into data. Converting
credit into data restricts the CHW from using the credit for voice and SMS
services. In Dodoma, many CHWs don't know how to use other "data" services
(i.e. internet, email, other apps using internet, etc.) on their phones, so
this effectively isolates the credit to only be used for CommCare. However,
Vodacom and mCel (haven't checked Mcel yet but guessing) have very short
expiry dates after you convert the credit into data.
Vodacom unbelievably offers a 1 day expiration after you convert to 125MB.
That is the smallest credit to data conversion offered by Vodacom!

If we leave it in credit, the CHWs could use this for voice and SMS
services. Have any other projects knowingly experienced CHWs mis-using
their credit? Minor misuse I guess could be considered an expected working
hazard, but major misuse is straining from top up coordination and financial
standpoints.

Thanks!
Nick

Nick P. Amland

CommCare Field Fellow
Dimagi, Inc.
Dodoma, Tanzania
Google Voice: 253.642.7790
TZ Mobile: +255 762 740 996
Email: namland@dimagi.com namland08@gmail.com

2

Unless you go post-paid, someone is going to have to do the top-ups, either
with scratchcards in person, or remotely. That person likely will be Chris.

Past experiences with post-paid have shown it to be a major headache that
leads to lots of unexpected costs.

I think someone should also be monitoring the balances of the phones, at
least in the initial stages of the project. This gives you a sense of
average usage, lets you spot excessive usage, and makes the CHWs aware that
how they use the phones is being monitored. In general it has been possible
to get the account balance of another account, but it can take some work and
will probably require talking to customer service. Once you know the
balances, you can top up at the appropriate times.

··· On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 9:39 AM, Nick Amland wrote:

Hey,

Forwarding my original email to cc-users for input.

Thanks for any suggestions/comments/experiences.

Nick

Nick P. Amland

CommCare Field Fellow
Dimagi, Inc.
Dodoma, Tanzania
Google Voice: 253.642.7790
Email: namland@dimagi.com namland08@gmail.com

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Nick Amland namland@dimagi.com
Date: Mon, May 23, 2011 at 10:12 AM
Subject: Refilling Phone Credit Ideas
To: Neal Lesh nlesh@dimagi.com, Jonathan Jackson jjackson@dimagi.com,
Daniel Roberts droberts@dimagi.com, Clayton Sims csims@dimagi.com,
dtreatman dtreatman@dimagi.com, Brian DeRenzi bderenzi@gmail.com,
asagoff asagoff@dimagi.com, droos droos@dimagi.com

Hey guys,

I'm trying to figure out a refill credit strategy here in Mozambique for a
World Vision project (~30 users) we're going be to kicking off soon. I was
hoping to gather suggestions and also hear what other CC deployments are
doing to accomplish this. I also have a secondary question which involves
converting the credit into data.

But first, how are other projects topping up the CHWs with credit?

In the Dodoma project I'm working on, this process is simplified because we
have a planned meeting with the CHVs on a weekly basis which gives us the
opportunity to top up if needed. We ended up pretty much topping up the
credit on an ad hoc basis because the CHVs level of work differs drastically
across the group (where some send up to 50 forms a week while others 10-15).

For this MZ project, I don't think there is a planned meeting with all CHWs
in MZ., but I need to confirm that. However, the CHWs here will have a
pretty fixed schedule by visiting 15 households a month (15-30 forms). We
could potentially estimate how much credit it takes to send that amount of
forms and then "send"the CHWs credit via a mobile to mobile transaction on a
monthly basis. That seems laborious to do for each CHW though.

My secondary question is about converting the credit into data. Converting
credit into data restricts the CHW from using the credit for voice and SMS
services. In Dodoma, many CHWs don't know how to use other "data" services
(i.e. internet, email, other apps using internet, etc.) on their phones, so
this effectively isolates the credit to only be used for CommCare. However,
Vodacom and mCel (haven't checked Mcel yet but guessing) have very short
expiry dates after you convert the credit into data.
Vodacom unbelievably offers a 1 day expiration after you convert to 125MB.
That is the smallest credit to data conversion offered by Vodacom!

If we leave it in credit, the CHWs could use this for voice and SMS
services. Have any other projects knowingly experienced CHWs mis-using
their credit? Minor misuse I guess could be considered an expected working
hazard, but major misuse is straining from top up coordination and financial
standpoints.

Thanks!
Nick

Nick P. Amland

CommCare Field Fellow
Dimagi, Inc.
Dodoma, Tanzania
Google Voice: 253.642.7790
TZ Mobile: +255 762 740 996
Email: namland@dimagi.com namland08@gmail.com

3

In MZ, I've personally had the horrible experience of remotely 'sending'
credit to the phones and then getting hit with that expiration due to
unexpected delays. It's not systematic, but we ended up doing on-demand
credit top-ups remotely, or having a point person (supervisor) in the field
who had the power/budget to provide the user with more credit.

As far as monitoring balances on the phones, we averaged the cost of
submitting our form, and then compared that number to the amount of credit
that had been used and the amount of forms that had been submitted when
someone requested topping-up. If it was significantly more than it should
be, we could remind/confront workers individually.

··· On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 11:40 AM, Drew Roos wrote:

Unless you go post-paid, someone is going to have to do the top-ups, either
with scratchcards in person, or remotely. That person likely will be Chris.

Past experiences with post-paid have shown it to be a major headache that
leads to lots of unexpected costs.

I think someone should also be monitoring the balances of the phones, at
least in the initial stages of the project. This gives you a sense of
average usage, lets you spot excessive usage, and makes the CHWs aware that
how they use the phones is being monitored. In general it has been possible
to get the account balance of another account, but it can take some work and
will probably require talking to customer service. Once you know the
balances, you can top up at the appropriate times.

On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 9:39 AM, Nick Amland namland@dimagi.com wrote:

Hey,

Forwarding my original email to cc-users for input.

Thanks for any suggestions/comments/experiences.

Nick

Nick P. Amland

CommCare Field Fellow
Dimagi, Inc.
Dodoma, Tanzania
Google Voice: 253.642.7790
Email: namland@dimagi.com namland08@gmail.com

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Nick Amland namland@dimagi.com
Date: Mon, May 23, 2011 at 10:12 AM
Subject: Refilling Phone Credit Ideas
To: Neal Lesh nlesh@dimagi.com, Jonathan Jackson jjackson@dimagi.com,
Daniel Roberts droberts@dimagi.com, Clayton Sims csims@dimagi.com,
dtreatman dtreatman@dimagi.com, Brian DeRenzi bderenzi@gmail.com,
asagoff asagoff@dimagi.com, droos droos@dimagi.com

Hey guys,

I'm trying to figure out a refill credit strategy here in Mozambique for a
World Vision project (~30 users) we're going be to kicking off soon. I was
hoping to gather suggestions and also hear what other CC deployments are
doing to accomplish this. I also have a secondary question which involves
converting the credit into data.

But first, how are other projects topping up the CHWs with credit?

In the Dodoma project I'm working on, this process is simplified because
we have a planned meeting with the CHVs on a weekly basis which gives us the
opportunity to top up if needed. We ended up pretty much topping up the
credit on an ad hoc basis because the CHVs level of work differs drastically
across the group (where some send up to 50 forms a week while others 10-15).

For this MZ project, I don't think there is a planned meeting with all
CHWs in MZ., but I need to confirm that. However, the CHWs here will have a
pretty fixed schedule by visiting 15 households a month (15-30 forms). We
could potentially estimate how much credit it takes to send that amount of
forms and then "send"the CHWs credit via a mobile to mobile transaction on a
monthly basis. That seems laborious to do for each CHW though.

My secondary question is about converting the credit into data.
Converting credit into data restricts the CHW from using the credit for
voice and SMS services. In Dodoma, many CHWs don't know how to use other
"data" services (i.e. internet, email, other apps using internet, etc.) on
their phones, so this effectively isolates the credit to only be used for
CommCare. However, Vodacom and mCel (haven't checked Mcel yet but guessing)
have very short expiry dates after you convert the credit into data.
Vodacom unbelievably offers a 1 day expiration after you convert to 125MB.
That is the smallest credit to data conversion offered by Vodacom!

If we leave it in credit, the CHWs could use this for voice and SMS
services. Have any other projects knowingly experienced CHWs mis-using
their credit? Minor misuse I guess could be considered an expected working
hazard, but major misuse is straining from top up coordination and financial
standpoints.

Thanks!
Nick

Nick P. Amland

CommCare Field Fellow
Dimagi, Inc.
Dodoma, Tanzania
Google Voice: 253.642.7790
TZ Mobile: +255 762 740 996
Email: namland@dimagi.com namland08@gmail.com

4

Thanks for the feedback!

Unfortunately, I don't think we'll have easy access to the CHWs after
training. The only person monitoring the project will be the project
coordinator who is based 16ks away from the district the CHWs operate in.
He is planning a visit to the district every 2 weeks, and we think this is
the best time to check up on balances. I'm going to look into that remotely
checking balances Drew mentioned.

One thing that simplifies this process is that we have limited top-end
growth for form submissions because in the pilot phase of this project the
CHWs will only have 15 households to supervise. That number of households
will not expand, so form submission will be much easier to predict and
therefore credit expenditure will be easier to predict.

Thanks!
Nick

Nick P. Amland

CommCare Field Fellow
Dimagi, Inc.
Dodoma, Tanzania
Google Voice: 253.642.7790
TZ Mobile: +255 762 740 996
Email: namland@dimagi.com namland08@gmail.com

··· On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 6:46 PM, Sarah Searle wrote:

In MZ, I've personally had the horrible experience of remotely 'sending'
credit to the phones and then getting hit with that expiration due to
unexpected delays. It's not systematic, but we ended up doing on-demand
credit top-ups remotely, or having a point person (supervisor) in the field
who had the power/budget to provide the user with more credit.

As far as monitoring balances on the phones, we averaged the cost of
submitting our form, and then compared that number to the amount of credit
that had been used and the amount of forms that had been submitted when
someone requested topping-up. If it was significantly more than it should
be, we could remind/confront workers individually.

On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 11:40 AM, Drew Roos droos@dimagi.com wrote:

Unless you go post-paid, someone is going to have to do the top-ups,
either with scratchcards in person, or remotely. That person likely will be
Chris.

Past experiences with post-paid have shown it to be a major headache that
leads to lots of unexpected costs.

I think someone should also be monitoring the balances of the phones, at
least in the initial stages of the project. This gives you a sense of
average usage, lets you spot excessive usage, and makes the CHWs aware that
how they use the phones is being monitored. In general it has been possible
to get the account balance of another account, but it can take some work and
will probably require talking to customer service. Once you know the
balances, you can top up at the appropriate times.

On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 9:39 AM, Nick Amland namland@dimagi.com wrote:

Hey,

Forwarding my original email to cc-users for input.

Thanks for any suggestions/comments/experiences.

Nick

Nick P. Amland

CommCare Field Fellow
Dimagi, Inc.
Dodoma, Tanzania
Google Voice: 253.642.7790
Email: namland@dimagi.com namland08@gmail.com

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Nick Amland namland@dimagi.com
Date: Mon, May 23, 2011 at 10:12 AM
Subject: Refilling Phone Credit Ideas
To: Neal Lesh nlesh@dimagi.com, Jonathan Jackson jjackson@dimagi.com,
Daniel Roberts droberts@dimagi.com, Clayton Sims csims@dimagi.com,
dtreatman dtreatman@dimagi.com, Brian DeRenzi bderenzi@gmail.com,
asagoff asagoff@dimagi.com, droos droos@dimagi.com

Hey guys,

I'm trying to figure out a refill credit strategy here in Mozambique for
a World Vision project (~30 users) we're going be to kicking off soon. I
was hoping to gather suggestions and also hear what other CC deployments are
doing to accomplish this. I also have a secondary question which involves
converting the credit into data.

But first, how are other projects topping up the CHWs with credit?

In the Dodoma project I'm working on, this process is simplified because
we have a planned meeting with the CHVs on a weekly basis which gives us the
opportunity to top up if needed. We ended up pretty much topping up the
credit on an ad hoc basis because the CHVs level of work differs drastically
across the group (where some send up to 50 forms a week while others 10-15).

For this MZ project, I don't think there is a planned meeting with all
CHWs in MZ., but I need to confirm that. However, the CHWs here will have a
pretty fixed schedule by visiting 15 households a month (15-30 forms). We
could potentially estimate how much credit it takes to send that amount of
forms and then "send"the CHWs credit via a mobile to mobile transaction on a
monthly basis. That seems laborious to do for each CHW though.

My secondary question is about converting the credit into data.
Converting credit into data restricts the CHW from using the credit for
voice and SMS services. In Dodoma, many CHWs don't know how to use other
"data" services (i.e. internet, email, other apps using internet, etc.) on
their phones, so this effectively isolates the credit to only be used for
CommCare. However, Vodacom and mCel (haven't checked Mcel yet but guessing)
have very short expiry dates after you convert the credit into data.
Vodacom unbelievably offers a 1 day expiration after you convert to 125MB.
That is the smallest credit to data conversion offered by Vodacom!

If we leave it in credit, the CHWs could use this for voice and SMS
services. Have any other projects knowingly experienced CHWs mis-using
their credit? Minor misuse I guess could be considered an expected working
hazard, but major misuse is straining from top up coordination and financial
standpoints.

Thanks!
Nick

Nick P. Amland

CommCare Field Fellow
Dimagi, Inc.
Dodoma, Tanzania
Google Voice: 253.642.7790
TZ Mobile: +255 762 740 996
Email: namland@dimagi.com namland08@gmail.com