EDUBILLS:AS A PARENT, Sandra Maguire was very familiar with regular requests from her children for money for school. "One day it was for a trip, another day for insurance and another for milk or speech and drama classes. I kept wishing I could just get all the payments over in one go," she says.
When Maguire started working as a school secretary she had the experience of handling payments from the other side of the desk. She suddenly found herself on the receiving end of an ongoing stream of small amounts of money that had to be verified and kept safe.
“It was then it hit home that when the school sends out a letter looking for money the school secretary or administrator has to open and check huge numbers of envelopes – in my case over 400 – often with an intimidating amount of cash. I felt there had to be a better way,” she says.
Maguire, who has a background in financial services, began thinking about how to solve this dual problem and in March 2010 she launched EduBills, an online ordering and payments system that aims to make life easier for parents, schools and school suppliers.
“With EduBills schools can upload their book lists and other charges, parents can log in, order and pay for schoolbooks and other school expenses and suppliers can download orders and fill them,” she says.
The company makes its money by charging parents a small handling fee on the transaction.
Maguire, who is now taking part in the DIT Hothouse programme for budding entrepreneurs, received start-up assistance from Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown Enterprise Board and was helped to commercialise her idea by the Innovation Vouchers scheme from Enterprise Ireland. This scheme provides funding for an entrepreneur to work with a third-level institution to develop a product or service. Maguire teamed up with DCU and was assisted with market research and website development.
EduBills has been piloted in three schools and this has allowed Maguire to iron out any glitches and refine the product. The challenge now facing her is convincing schools and parents alike that online is the only way to go.
