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At the end of the month of June 2023, the government of Kenya under the leadership of His Excellency the president of the republic of Kenya Dr. William Ruto officially launched Ecitizen portal making over 5,000 government services readily accessible to its citizens.
In this blogpost, I will review the New Ecitizen portal.
Landing Page
Generally, the landing page looks clean and neatly done. The information is well organized starting with the most requested services like application for a driving license, showing on top of the page. Before you can signup or sign in, you are able to check if the service you are looking for here is available.
You can do this by typing the name of the service, ministry,department or agency on the search bar on top and hit enter on your Keyboard to search. This will display the service if available.
Website loading speed is fast and seamless compared to how it was in the past. With clean landing page design, its easy to locate the sign in and register links on top of the site once you are here.
Here, services are classified in two categories namely National and County. Aside using the search bar to find the service you are looking for, you can access them using the menu links on top and below the website.
Logging In, Registration and Security
If you are new to Ecitizen, you will need to register in order to access the services here. Click on register to get started.
You will taken to a page to confirm the account type that you would like to create. Depending on your background, you can choose either citizen, resident, diplomat or foreigner.
For Citizens, you are required to provide your ID number, contact, password and profile photo. Some of the things needed today on the platform was not required in the past. E.g The profile photo.
For those who already have an account on Ecitizen, you just simply login with either your e-mail or national ID number as username and enter your password. One thing that you will notice when logging in is that 2Factor authentication has been introduced, something that was not there in the past. This is a good move to a more secure digital future for Kenyans.
One Time password Verification can be done via e-mail or phone. This is the phone number and email you signed up with.
Account Dashboard
Once you are logged in to your account, you will taken to the dashboard that looks like the image below. On top, you can see summary of your personal details. Also on top you can find menu links to manage your profile and account.
From here you can start searching for the service you want.
Profile & Account Management
When you click on profile, you can view your identity documents like your national ID and driving license. As it looks, the details on the previews available here are not complete. However, there is a note below the preview to notify users that its only for illustrative purposes.
There are other new menu tabs under your profile which I believe it will be active once population of data from relevant organizations is complete. As it looks, in future, the government will have all your data including your health, income, taxes, family and more. When that time comes, no one will be excluded from government activities.
Under the Account Management menu tab, make changes on your account critical data like phone number, e-mail and password. Also, you can choose to disable the 2 factor authentication here.
There are other additional menu items that are not active yet like biometrics and electronic signature which I think it will be active in future.
With all this information, what else will the government need in order to control it’s citizens? absolutely nothing. I am just saying.
Help & Support
If you encounter problems while accessing services on the portal, there is a dedicated team ready to assist you with your problem. Click on help and support menu on top and you will be taken to this page here.
Here you can choose which way you would like to get help and support. There is a phone number and e-mail address that you can use to contact support team. Alternatively, you can visit Huduma Center to get the help you need.
But before you reach out, its always wise to go through all the Frequently asked questions (FAQs) and see if the answer you are looking for is there. I have reached out several times to the support team on Ecitizen in the past and I got the assistance I needed. So, good news is that the contacts you find here are working.
Downsides
While ‘recent applications‘ tab is visible on the dashboard, it’s no yet active. Same thing with notifications. The only way to see the request you have made in the past is going to the site that you requested service in and you will be able to view your request. E.g BRS portal if you had applied to register a business or company.
Secondly, there used to be a live chat feature which only a bot responded to in the past. That was a clever idea. With more and more government services being linked to Ecitizen, its important to also reintroduce live chat so that users can get help via chat in real time.
Finally, the portal is sometimes down. I guess it is due to the amount of traffic/visitors to the portal. It notifies the user that their internet network is down yet in reality, the internet connection is ok.
At the time of doing this review, the site was down for almost a whole week and I had to hold the review until it was back. The government through the ICT cabinet secretary later responded to the downtime saying there was a cyber attack which was not successful. He said that the technical team was able to block the attackers IP address on time.
Conclusion
Unless the service you are looking for requires you to be there physically, there is no need of paying a visit to the government office issuing the service. First check if they have the service on Ecitizen portal. If they do, well and good, make your application online.
Technology is here to simplify work and make everything convenient. Take advantage of it because you can. Moreover it’s cheaper that way.
And that’s it from me.
Have you made any applications on Ecitizen portal? How was your experience like? Let me know your thoughts in the comments section below.
And if you need help to create and produce professional video tutorials or any other video production service, reach out to me here.
Until next time, bye bye and take care. Please follow me on twitter @cheptiony and also check out my YouTube channel here.
Cryptocurrency cloud mining service is now the in thing where interested users are wooed to invest a given amount of money in return for a set amount of Bitcoin profits mined everyday. This might be the next biggest scam in history.
Watch video – I Spent $420 On Cryptocurrency Cloud Mining Services And Lost- Don’t Be The Next Victim- Bytebus, Brb Mining
The companies offering these services have offices mostly in the UK and Islands of Europe and Asia. What users buy is cryptocurrency mining rigs in an undisclosed warehouse location (for privacy reasons). The higher the mining rig hashing power the higher the price that users pay.
Based on their plans and pricing, cryptocurrency mining is highly profitable to those who invest huge amounts of money😁. Mining rigs with high hashing power are able to bring an investor up to $10,000 worth of Bitcoin a day for a period of 365 days. That’s a lot of money if you do your math.
The mined cryptocurrency is deposited to a users cryptocurrency wallet every 24 hours. There, they can withdraw and exchange it for cash.
But is this claim really true?
You will never know the answer until you invest in them. That’s why I took the risk and invested in two different platforms-Bytebus and BRBmining.
A Quick Search Online of Cryptocurrency Cloud Mining Service
If you go online right now and search for Cryptocurrency Cloud Mining Service, you will realize that there are many companies offering this service. This is aside many blogposts listing the TOP cloud mining cryptocurrency sites.
That was how it started for me. I clicked on an article suggestion by Google. Before I knew, I was already signed up for two of these services. One of them offered free starting bonus of $10 for beginners.
I later used search engines to research on these companies I had signed up on before resorting to invest my money. This process tooked me 2 months.
So what made me resort to invest in them?
Bytebus
Bytebus.com championed themselves as a platform that anyone could join for free without investing anything. They said they had more than 360k users.
When one signed up, they got their account credited with $10 bonus. With this, one was able to purchase a mining plan of $10 and get a return of $1 daily. The catch was, one was required to login and purchase a plan everyday. The $10 plan was limited to one purchase per day. When your balance reaches $100, you could withdraw your funds. I created two accounts.
In one of the accounts, I deposited $100. My accumulated amount on that account was $57 at the time of deposit. I then withdrew $147 and it was successful. This motivated me to reinvest thinking it was genuine.
I deposited the amount to the second account which had $65. With it I could invest in higher mining rigs of $100 with a return of $2 day.
That was the end of my investment. I never saw my investment back. What you see from the screenshot above, is the amount I deposited plus the profits I made from my mining investment. At their last days of vanishing, the site blocked all the withdrawals and demanded users to deposit $1200 for them to process their withdrawal. They claimed all accounts were illegal.
That was the end of the company. The site was gone in a few days. In the mid of desperation on their last days, they carried out campaigns themed ‘new year special offer‘ to deceive more users to deposit $100 or more and get twice the amount deposited onto their account balance. E.g you deposit $1000 and you get $2000. This is crazy. I mean scammers have a way of milking existing users dry with a promise of making them rich.
BRB Mining
BRB mining is another cryptocurrency cloud mining service with it’s offices in UK.
When you sign up, you will be taken your account dashboard. Here you will see your cryptocurrency wallets.
In order to start mining Bitcoin, you have to purchase a mining rig of your choice. So you go to ‘start mining’ and select purchase a plan. When investing, I purchased a $12 and $320 plan. As you see here, I expect to earn $31 daily with the plan and $930 monthly from the $320 plan. This is good money.
The catch comes once you have purchased your plan and it’s time to withdraw your funds. When you place your withdrawal request, it will be placed under review and after an hour, you will receive an e-mail telling you it’s been rejected because you have an outstanding electricity bill to pay. For my case the bill is $803. This is an amount that is not communicated upfront when planning to buy a plan.
This amount cannot be deducted from the mined coins either even if you have Bitcoin mined worth $1000. They want you to deposit the electricity fee amount for you to withdraw the bitcoins. This is a red flag in my opinion. How sure are you that they will not slap you with another bill? When I complained about this, they asked me to check their terms of service. Their decision is covered under prices and payment clause which gives them authority to introduce expenses at any point of users contract.
Going by the way things are going on right now based on our conversation on Telegram, I am finding this as ‘an advanced version of cryptocurrency scam.‘ They upsell you with expenses.
How am I sure that what I see on my Bitcoin wallet is only numbers that keeps counting in the name of bitcoin?
Its not confirmed yet, but I might loose the funds invested if they insist that I deposit electricity fee which I will not. Once bitten twice shy. Btw, they offer their customer service on Telegram. They respond as they wish. Some enquiries are attended to and some are not.
So who owns BRB Mining?
BRBmining is a company registered in the UK with it’s directors of a Nigerian nationality.
While they claim to have been on business for 5 years, a quick check on who.is of their domain, it shows it was registered on September 2022. I wish I could have seen this before coz it contradicts their claim.
I think their cloud mining service is a scam coz if cloud mining is really a profitable venture, why can’t they convert bitcoin balance and pay for electricity bill? As we speak my bitcoin mined balance is worth $890. This is enough to pay electricity bill.
Another thing is their website domain registration date compared to their claim to have been in business for more than 5 years. Their domain was registered with Godaddy on September 2022.
When I asked them on this they said, they were changes in their company and the changes affected their company address too. This is a very common act by many scammers. When many people want to withdraw their cryptos and they have no funds because there was no mining taking place, they close down and open again under a different domain name. That is exactly what Bytebus.com did on January.
So How Do These Cloud Mining Companies Manage To Get Away With Crime?
They have terms of services and privacy policy that can be altered anytime in their favor. The changes they make is never communicated to their users. In parts of their terms they state plainly that cryptocurrency is unregulated currency and you can loose everything. This gives them freedom to get away with your investment.
They want you to pay in cryptocurrency. That means you need to first buy bitcoin/USDT and use it to purchase a plan. This way, they can easily get away with your money in form of cryptocurrency.
They tell you only good things about the plan on offer. When you want to withdraw the funds, they slap you with a huge electricity bill that they know you will not afford to pay. That way, you will not say they scammed you. Who knows the next bill you will be slapped with after paying for electricity.
They keep changing domain names when they are got. Also, they use different domain addresses for e-mails. The one for e-mail marketing is different from the one for customer care and that one of the website. Only keen people with recognize this.
One user can open many accounts.
They operate mostly from the UK.
They always have crazy offers. You are told to deposit say $1000 and you get $2000 in your account to use in purchasing a mining rig. This way, one is tempted to invest because of huge profits promised.
Your first withdrawal will be successful if it is a small amount. With this you will be motivated to invest more knowing that you can withdraw.
There is a lot to talk about cryptocurrency cloud mining sites.
But let me leave it there today. I hope you have learnt something. Have you ever invested in cloud mining services?
How was your experience like?
Let me know your thoughts in the comments section below.
And until next time take care and don’t be the next victim of cryptocurrency mining service scam.
And if you need professional video production services, you can request a quote here.
Freelancing online has been on a steady rise in the past decade and it’s showing no signs of stopping. According to industry studies, the worldwide freelance marketplace is estimated to be worth $1.5 trillion in 2022. In US alone, there is 70.4 million freelancers and is forecasted to grow up to 90.1 million by 2028.
5 Freelance Platforms That Are Safe And Secure To Work On in 2023
On this blogpost, I will share with you 5 freelancing platforms that you should consider if you want to become a successful online freelancer and an entrepreneur.
Upwork is a freelance company based in the US and has been there for more than a decade. Upwork is among the pioneers of online freelance services. Originally it was called Odesk before it merged with another premium freelancing platform called Elance to form Upwork in 2013. Elance used to have more high paying projects than Odesk before the merge. Also, Elance was the first freelancing platform to offer Escrow services on fixed contracts.
Since the merge, Upwork has grown to accommodate all kinds of jobs. Also, their security has been heightened to protect freelancers and clients from fraud. It is reported that Upwork has more than 12 Million registered freelancers.
Upwork offers 5 ways to find work based on the freelancers experience using their platform. The first one is through bidding. This is a situation where a client posts a job; and freelancers on the platform bid on it. The client chooses the proposal that addresses their needs and meets their requirements. They then award the contract to the winning bidder.
The second way is though Creating project offers. The freelancer can create a project offer catalogue around the skills that he/she possesses and posts it on the platform. This will be displayed to the prospective clients. If a clients likes a certain catalogue, they will purchase it.
The last one is through Freelancer Enterprise client invitations and Direct hires. This is where a freelancer is interviewed and hired through Upwork Enterprise. Only freelancers with Top Rating and Top Rating Plus qualify for this offer.
Among the most competitive skills that are highly paying on the platform include Technical skills, customer service skills, digital marketing skills, creative and design skills, copywriting and more.
You can withdraw earned income to your Paypal, Local Bank , Payoneer, Mpesa digital wallet and more.
Fiverr is a Freelance platform founded in the year 2010 with it’s headquarters is in Tel Aviv Israel. Fiverr is popular for offering every service for $5 bucks. Freelancers can post their $5 service offers in many different categories.
Today, the company has grown and now hosts an estimated 3 million people comprising of buyers and sellers/freelancers.
Also, their $5 service offer approach has evolved over time. Sellers can scale up their offers from $5 to $1000+ per offer depending on the service they are offering through packages/pricing table.
Unlike Upwork, Freelancers can only post what they offer on Fiverr in a catalogue format and wait for buyers to find it through search. This means that if one spends enough time optimizing their offer, buyers will find it and they will in turn get many orders.
With Fiverr, you can sell any service as long as it can be sold digitally.
You can withdraw earned income to your Paypal, Bank , Skrill, Payoneer digital wallet and more.
Freelancer is an Australian freelance marketplace that was founded in the year 2009. It connects freelancers with clients across the world. Freelancer has more than 900 job categories to choose from. As of June 2022, it had over 59 million users.
Like Upwork, clients posts jobs for freelancers to bid on. They also offer escrow services on all contracts. On the other hand, they have a special offer called freelancer design contests. Here, the client posts design contests with a set price and any freelancer can submit their mock designs. The design that the client picks is the winner. The winner is made public and is rewarded with the set prize.
This is an ideal place to start if you are not sure of the category you will want to work in. Also, it is here that you can identify different skills that are hot in the market then learn how to do them and then look for freelance jobs on the platform.
Freelancer offer a wide range of withdrawal methods including Paypal, bank and Skrill.
Peopleperhour is a UK based freelance platform. It connects freelancers and clients across different categories of skills. One can sign up as a freelancer or a client. Once your profile is approved, you can proceed to search and apply for jobs that matches your skills.
Freelancers here also have an option to create a project catalogue telling prospective clients what they can do in a hour for a given price.
Most clients on Peopleperhour are genuine since they are required to confirm their preferred payment methods before they are allowed to hire. They are also required to fund escrow before a freelancer can start to work on their projects. At the end, freelancers are required to proof that they completed the discussed job by coordinating their communications strictly on the platform.
You can withdraw earned income to your Paypal, Bank , Skrill and Payoneer digital wallet.
Guru is the pioneer freelance marketplace with it’s headquarters in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania US. It was founded in the year 1998 and has had less hype since it’s inception. They still approach freelancing using the traditional methods of posting jobs and letting freelancers to apply them.
Despite that, they have many long time clients across the world. At the time that I freelanced on Guru, one could easily be scammed by a new client. That has changed today.
However, one needs to be vigilant and ensure that the client has funded escrow before they start work. All in all, freelancing on Guru offers individuals a room to get more clients. Competition by bidders on Guru on jobs posted is not that fierce.
While competition is not that high, the number of projects to bid on here is very small. Generally, they have more tech related jobs than any other category. This is a freelancing site to bundle up with others until you find a bearing.
Big Downside of These Freelance Platforms
They don’t accept cryptocurrency as a payment method. This is despite the growing number of people using crypto as a digital currency. Cryptocurrency is here to stay. It is therefore something that all freelancing platforms should consider.
Conclusion
There are hundreds of freelancing platforms online today that you can find work on and get paid. Some platforms, specialize in providing certain services like writing, transcription, video production, design, coding e.t.c. If you want to take freelancing fulltime, consider signing up on some of them that you find suitable and begin bidding on jobs posted there.
You never know where your luck lies. You need to keep trying until you succeed.
Freelancing is a sustainable career that can make you up to $1000/month part time working from home.
You only need to commit some of your time daily to achieve the desired results. I have personally made up to $5000 a month on one freelancing platform.
And these are the 5 Freelancing Platforms That Are Safe And Secure To Work On Today.
Which is your favorite freelancing platform and why? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.
And if you need help to create professional content to market your business, get in touch with us here. On the other hand, if you need professional video production services, you can request a quote here or start consultation here.
Today I will be reviewing 4 Digital lending apps or loan Apps that I have used. Most of the apps I will be mentioning here operate in the Kenyan marketplace.
Disclaimer: I am writing this article based on my experiences with loan apps. None of the information shared here is sponsored by any of the apps mentioned here . So, this article is solely to educate and inform the public . Use your own judgment when deciding on which loan app to download and borrow from.
How People Finds Themselves Taking Loans from Mobile Apps
People have different stories on how they got to know about loan apps. Many are like me; they were in a financial distress, and they were looking for a quick fix after all their friends failed to help. They then decided to search for answers on Google. Google then redirected them to GooglePlay store where they found the solution.
But at what price does this solution come with?
Since loan apps have been in existence long enough, nearly all tech savy people have an idea of how they work. Some apps have evolved to suite current customers needs while others; well, are yet to be hit by the reality.
One crucial thing that many people forget to look at when they are in financial distress is the details they give out in exchange for a loan.
That’s why I am here to take you through some things I have learnt after using digital loan apps.
Popular Keywords Used On Playstore
Loan Apps, digital lenders, instant loan, Quick loan. Searching using one of these keywords will display several loan applications. With more than 50 Apps showing up, that’s a lot of Credit at Hand if you think about it.
How you make you choices from here matters.
How much time do you have with you to decide on the app to take loan with? In my opinion, don’t rush. Take your time. Spend a day at least to look through these apps.
In this review, I will focus on the App UI design, Customer Data Collected, Profile Review time, Loan Processing Duration, Repay Time Frame, Fees and Customer Service.
Tala loan app has been there since the year 2011. I first learnt about the app in the year 2014 from billboards but had never used it to borrow a loan. Two months ago, I was propelled to try it out after the long electioneering period. So here are my thoughts so far after using the app.
Tala Loan App
App UI– App UI looks good and polished. What you see displayed as screenshots from the app on PlayStore is how the app looks like after signing up.
Loan Application Process– This is where I felt a bit uneasy. More personal and business related data is required for eligibility. Also, the lender is interested to know how much money you make in a month and the frequency in which you receive the payment.
They also want to have your National ID number. This is a lot of private data if you think about it. So you have a choice to tell the truth or lie.
Another downside about the information you provide is; once you share the data, you are not able to access them again on the app via your profile.
Loan Application Time and Interest Rates – When making my first loan application it took less than 5 minutes for it to be approved. I was given a starting loan limit of Ksh.3,000 which on request, I received instantly on my Mpesa. So in terms of application review and loan approval, they are excellent. Their interest rate is at 0.3-0.6 % daily which is not bad compared to others when it comes to transparency.
Customer Service And Credit Collection– In terms of customer service, they are also above average. I was called once by their customer representatives reminding me to pay the loan on time so that my limit would increase. Other than that, I regularly received well drafted SMS reminders.
Repayment Deadlines – While I borrowed the loan for 30 days, I had up to 60 days to repay back. No penalty was imposed on the loan I borrowed.
Overall, this is a good app for anyone to borrow short term loans so long as they repay back on time.
Branch App
Branch was launched around 2015. Unlike other mobile lending apps, branch does more than offering loan to users. Users can save, pay bills and manage their finances on the go.
App UI Design– Branch has excellent app UI design. What you see on playStore is what you get when you sign up.
Branch App
Loan Application Process – The process of applying for a loan is simple once you sign up with your phone number. You cannot apply for any loan unless you grant the app permissions to see installed apps on your phone, contacts, SMS and location. This is normal for most loan apps to secure your account once you login.
When applying for your first loan, you are required to confirm how much you earn in a month. Also, you need to take a selfie and upload it as part of the evaluation process.
Loan Application time and Interest rates – From the time I downloaded the app to the time I received the first loan, it took me 20 minutes. This is quite fast for a loan of Ksh.3400 considering I don’t have history with them. Their interest rate for 61 days is 35%. That’s about 17.5% per month. This is high compared to Mshwari loan whose charge is 8.5%. So the interest is on the downside.
Additionally, Branch charges transactional fees to withdraw the money from the app to Mpesa.
Customer Service and Credit Collection – Compared to Tala, branch credit collectors are a bit aggressive. They will call you once your first installment is due. They claim to use this to calculate the amount of credit you will receive next. Also they will encourage you to repay on time to qualify for a higher loan limit. In a month they called me and sent me 3 messages which was detected as spam on my phone.
Repayment deadline – You have to choose a period starting from 30 days. If you choose 60 days, they will request that you repay them back in two installments of 50/50 after every 30 days. They insist on this, something, which doesn’t go well when you haven’t gotten the funds to repay.
Overall, this is not a bad app for borrowing emergency loan going by the fact that they will charge you 17.5% interest on initial loans.
Truepesa
TruePesa promises to give people instant loans. That is true, but not that fast. You have to first have the app on your phone for 2 weeks before they give you the first loan. Secondly, the loan duration they promise in the description area on Playstore is not practical. I will be getting to that in a minute.
Truepesa App
App UI Design – The app UI Design is clean. One thing you will quickly note with this app is, the UI design resemble the many loan apps on Playstore where once you install, there is a slider on the launch screen with a question; How much loan do you want? For Truepesa, the slider starts at Ksh.80,000. This is mouth watering to one in dire financial need.
So if you choose that you want Ksh. 80,000, will you get that amount? Let’s find out.
Loan Application process – You are required to sign up with your phone number and create a secret pin. Before your do this, the app requests for permissions on your phone which includes SMS, contact list, installed apps, external storage and phone location.
I feel this is too much considering you are taking your first credit. After you agree, it’s followed by the privacy policy. It’s important to read and understand what you are agreeing to.
Once you agree you will be signed up. This is where the show begins.
Loan Application Time and Interest Rates – When you sign up, they ask you few questions when applying the loan like what you do and your national ID number. After you complete the application, you will not get the loan. They want you to remain with the app installed on your phone for 2 weeks and they will be able to give you a loan.
Imagine remaining with an app on your phone that you have granted many permissions. Very risky.
On the other hand, if you were looking for an instant loan, this will be a big disappointment.
I uninstalled and installed the app 2 weeks later and I still had to wait for 2 days with the app installed on my phone for them to set a loan limit.
They have a weird credit disbursement process. For instance, if you request a loan of Ksh. 2,500, you will receive Ksh. 1,800. They will deduct their interest rates of 24% a week and send you the balance. This is 3 times what Mshwari charges their customers for 30 days.
Moreover, their loan period is 8 days and not 61 days they promise on Playstore.
Customer Service and Credit Collection – This guys will not contact you until the 7th day -a day to loan expiry. That’s when you will receive several scary messages like the one below.
Screenshot of an SMS from a Truepesa Loan app credit collector
3 days later, I had over 40 similar messages on SMS and WhatsApp. This to me is very unprofessional. That’s aside calling me more than 3 times a day using different numbers to ask me to repay their loan. Not everyone falls in this category to be intimidated. Am sure this app will only attract crooked customers who tolerates such communication manners.
Repayment deadline – They do opposite of what they promise on Googleplay. They tell you their loan tenure is 90-365 days with APR of 14-33%. You will be in for a shock when you sign up and wait for 2 weeks. That’s the rates they will charge you in 7 days. That’s a breach of contract. Not forgetting the amount of private information they have collected from you.
Overall, this is an app I wouldn’t recommend to anyone who is looking for a quick loan. That’s unless you are ready to be embarrassed and overcharged.
Zenka
I first learnt about Zenka loan app at the height of Covid-19 in the year 2020 . There was a video campaign on most social medias advertising the app.
They promise to give you loan for a period of 61 days to 1 year.
App UI Design – The app UI is clean and sleek. They use unique fonts in their app as well. The screenshots you see on Playstore is exactly how the app looks like when you download and sign up.
Loan Application process – The process of applying for a loan with Zenka is easy. You only sign up and share your national ID number and phone. Next, you fill in a questionnaire before you are allocated a loan limit, a process which takes 5 minutes.
Loan Application Time and Interest Rates – From downloading the app all through to loan approval and depositing to my Mpesa took me around 15 minutes.
I was allocated a loan limit of Ksh.3,000 on the first loan I applied with zero interest rate for 61 days.
This is an offer that none of the lenders on Googleplay does. Am yet to see the practicality of their APR interest they promise of 170-224%.
Customer Service and Credit Collection– Since I I took the loan, I have received only one marketing message from them. Compared to others, this is one of the peaceful loan I have taken from an app.
Who knows, maybe I will begin to see their true colours once the loan deadlines approaches.
Repayment Deadline – The deadline to repay the loan is from 61 days to 1 year. This a good time for anyone to look for money and repay the loan.
Overall, Zenka is good app that you can take loan from owing to the time period you are given to repay back. Also, the peace of mind one get while using the app is worth.
And thats it on Loan apps.
Conclusion
Loan apps are here with us to stay. It’s up to you as a user to practice discipline when borrowing. Sadly, once you take a loan, you can only run away from it but you cannot hide.
On the other hand, digital lenders have many loopholes they need to seal.
With more negative reviews and flagging of the loan apps on googleplay, their services will risk suspension and the people who had borrowed money from them will be left celebrating they luck.
Also, Central Bank of Kenya and Office of the Data Protection Commission is on their case in a bid to regulate them.
Every digital lender therefore need to listen to the customer feedback and do as the customer request. Customer is the king here. For them to buy from you, respect and dignity has to be upheld.
As I close, if you need help with video production services, you can request a quote on www.techtubestudio.com.
Online service delivery is proving to be very efficient and convenient in Kenya. 2 years ago, you could not get an e-mail reply from many of the government institutions’ websites if you contacted them via their contact form. That’s still the case today in a some of them.
Watch Video – Kenyan Websites That Topped My List in 2021
I used and reviewed some of the Kenyan websites in 2021 which include government, parastatals and banks. Based on my experience, all of them got good rating when it came to resolving issues related to their services.
On this blogpost, I will highlight some of the top sites and mobile applications which many Kenyans use on their daily basis. Almost all of the services that I am going to review here saved me a great deal in 2021.
I love this app for what it does. Let me start with its ability to allow users to transact globally. Some of the clients I work with reside in different parts of the world and pay me using Paypal. Being able to receive payments from PayPal in minutes to Mpesa with good exchange rate is great deal.
Paypal to Mpesa and vice versa
Inside the app, you can see the link to either top up PayPal or Withdraw money from PayPal. The process is as easy as paying a bill. Also, you will receive your money within few minutes. The second beautiful thing I love about Mpesa app is being able tag expenses each time you spend. E.g when you pay for shopping, you can tag the expense as ‘shopping.’ At the end of the month, you will be able to see how much money you spent on shopping. This really helps in managing expenses and being accountable.
The third feature I have been using and love is the Mpesa mini-apps. The mini-apps within the Mpesa app is quite convenient to those using the app. E.g With mini-apps, am able to book a flight, train, buy electricity tokens, pay for insurance e.t.c.
If you are someone who is looking for ways to save time and money, then you will enjoy using Mpesa App for the convenience that it brings.
KRA iTax portal is another very convenient website for me that I use in filling my monthly Tax returns.
I visited the iTax portal a lot in 2021 to file returns, request for waiver, update my personal information and more. The portal really saved me time and money. You don’t have to pay someone to help you file returns if you have little transactions every month. It’s easy to file returns once you learn how to do it. One can use iTax portal to file returns, generate payment receipts’, clear all penalties associated with their PIN and more.
Also, I used the portal to request for a Tax Compliance Certificate (TCC).
On BRS portal, I was able to update my registered businesses’ contact information directly on the portal. Also, I updated the beneficiaries of my company as per companies act 2015.
At the the comfort of your home, you can apply and pay for business registration on the BRS portal today.
This is the site for requesting company closure or strike off.
Closing a company in Kenya
Towards the end of the year 2021, I initiated the process of striking off Trendline Network Ltd here. You can access the portal on the address www.ag.ecitizen.go.ke. When you make an application to strike off your company, it will take up 5 days to be reviewed. It will either be approved or rejected.
You can find useful resources related to law on Kenya law website.
I found this site last year when looking for the weekly Kenya Gazette publication. The Gazette is free to download on the site. After my application for company strike off was approved, I was advised to regularly check the weekly Kenya Gazette, for the first publication on the first month, andthe last publication after 90 days. Kenya Law website has been very helpful to me when following up on company closure.
NHIF selfcare portal was very helpful to me in 2021. After many years of not paying for my medical insurance, In 2021, I was able to finally update my personal data via the NHIF self care portal. Also, I was able to change the outpatient hospital via the portal.
It’s easy and secure to use NHIF online services besides being able to do everything at home.
I did a review of ArdhiSasa portal in 2021 and published it here. During the review, I tried different things on the site and I was contented with the portal speed and ease of use.
Ardhisasa Kenya Review
On Ardhisasa, you can search and transfer property, order a plan and order a tittle of any property in Nairobi county. They say they aim to expand the service to contain land information from all other counties in Kenya.
I signed up for online banking with Diamond Trust Bank (DTB), KCB Bank and I &M Bank owing to the fact that I have an account with the banks. My experience with their online banking services was satisfying. I was very happy with each one of them.
They embrace 2 factor authentication which is a good practice when it comes to safety online. With the introduction of online banking in Kenya, customers now have an additional option of transacting money from their bank accounts when other options fails or are not available.
From transacting over the bank counter, using mobile short codes, debit and credit cards and bank mobile apps; one is not limited on how they can transact.
Conclusion
Technology is proving to be the effective in many sectors of the economy in Kenya. Being able access many of these services online anywhere across Kenya is a good thing. This is the way to go for many small and big companies/businesses.
And that is it from me on the 8 Top Sites and Apps I Used Most in 2021.
If you need help to create video reviews for websites, apps or software’s, you can request a free quote on www.techtubestudio.com.
As one grows as a freelancer, there is a need to own a website where you can share your skills and ideas. WordPress is one of the best and most popular platform to host your website.
It’s easy to use. Moreover you can start publishing on the platform for free. All you need to do is sign up. This means that you can build your online business from scratch on WordPress.
While anyone is capable of building their website on WordPress, along the way as workload increases, they will need a helping hand. By hiring a freelance WordPress website designer, you will save time and money.
In this blogpost, I will be sharing my process of hiring a WordPress website designer as well as some of the things I look at when hiring one.
Where to Hire
Hiring a freelancer through the freelance marketplaces is what I will focus on in this blogpost. It’s the safest and most reliable way to hire a freelancer. This is owing to it’s Escrow payment protection, ability to get a variety of freelancers, affordability e.t.c.
One of them is through referrals. If you know individuals who offers web design services, I urge you to contact them directly on their websites and discuss with them your project. If their quote is within your budget, go ahead and give them a contract. It’s a good deed.
Video: How I Hire a Freelance WordPress Website Designer
With this said, lets now dive into what I look at when hiring a freelance WordPress Website designer.
It Starts With Cover Letter
If you are a freelancer, you know that cover letter is everything a client needs to make that decision of hiring you. CV’s here don’t work. Your profile and past client reviews is what someone will look at if they need further clarification on your portfolio before they hire.
That’s what I also do. I base their experience with the number of happy clients they have served.
So in this case, what do I look at when reviewing a cover letter?
Cover Letter Greetings
How do they address me? This is very important. Some addresses me personally by my name and others prefer to use ‘sir/madam.’ This tells me that the freelancer is kind and respectful.
On the other hand, someone who just writes ‘Hi or Hello‘ to me sounds a bit mean and unprofessional.
Reading further the cover letters of most of second type of freelancers confirms that truly they are unprofessional because they don’t know what they are talking about.
Most of them send generic cover letters. That is why I think every detail in the cover letter matters.
Addressing The Problem
When you Post A Job, you as the client is supposed to describe in detail what you are looking for in a WordPress web designer. Also, you need to describe the tasks you want accomplished on your WordPress website.
I expect a freelancer applying to my job post to mention something about my needs in the first paragraph.
In many occasions, I decline 40 to 60% of the applications. This is because their cover letters are generic. In this I mean they have one copy of cover letter which they reuse on all their applications.
Links To Their Portfolio
This is another most important aspect. Have they designed a WordPress website before? How do their past designs look like? Does any of them impress me? If I like some of their past designs in their portfolio, I proceed and shortlist the candidate right away.
Depending on my urgency, I can proceed and send them a message informing them that I have seen their application and I like specific website designs they have in their design portfolio.
I then remove or decline all applications without links to any past project.
This is unless I have few freelancers applying to the job post.
Cost
By the time I am looking at the applicants quoted price, I would have filtered about 80% of the applications. For the ones remaining, I will look at their costs and compare it with the value they intend to offer.
While cost does not come first, its an important aspect that I look at when evaluating a freelance WordPress designer.
Timelines
How much time do I have with me to focus on this?
While this is communicated upfront while posting the job-depending on how experienced and committed the freelancer is- I expect them to propose their own timelines for completion of the project during the interview.
If my preferred freelancer does not propose a different timeline, it means they are fine with the timeline I proposed to them. This for me is a perfect candidate for the job.
Revisions and Bug Fixes
At my early stages of hiring a freelance WordPress designer, there was a lot of bug fixes and revisions that I requested fixed each time. I suspected the errors was created by the designer so that I could give him more work and hence more money.
Today, if you are hiring a designer, you will find out that some guarantee you 30 days FREE maintenance on your site. Someone who can make such an offer knows what they are doing.
They mean business and you rarely request revisions from them.
Long Term Commitment
This for people who foresee building and making changes on their websites over time. Once you find a suitable freelancer, tell them about your plans to continue improving on your website. Having a consistent designer to your site is good. They get familiar with your website the more they work on it.
Conclusion
Communication still stands out when hiring a freelancer online. Someone who is able to communicate well via e-mail is a suitable candidate so long as they are honest. I rarely interview freelancers via video call unless its absolutely necessary.
Escrow protection on payments is a security assurance for both parties in the freelance marketplaces. You only release payment when you are satisfied with the work delivered.
So, don’t tolerate poor communication on e-mail exchanges during the interview process. It’s that important.
And that is it.
What is it that you look at when hiring a freelance WordPress website designer? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.
And if you need professional screencast video production services or production of GIF’s for your website, you can request a free quote on www.techtubestudio.com.
Its accessible on www.nairobiservices.go.ke. Through this portal, you can make payments for any public service easily and quickly. If you live and operate your business within the Nairobi County- then you might be aware of Nairobi eServices Portal after having received an SMS from them.
If you live and operate your business within the Nairobi County- then you might be aware of Nairobi eServices Portal after having received an SMS from them.
Nairobi eServices Portal
It is aims to serve tech savvy people time which they could have spent queuing and waiting to be served in the county offices within Nairobi area.
In this blog post, I will be reviewing the Nairobi eServices Portal.
Registration Process
In order to start accessing the services via the Nairobi eServices Portal, you need to create an account. You can create an account as an individual or a business. The first step is choosing your Citizenship then entering your National ID serial number then clicking next.
Signing up on Nairobi eServices Portal
As an individual, you will be required to enter your mothers first name as per the ID. I guess this is aimed at locking out fraudulent users who may attempt using other people’s credentials to sign up. Next, enter your KRA PIN and click register.
On the new screen, create a password and check on the small box to complete your sign up process. From here, you can proceed and choose the service you are looking for.
In Demand Services
In demand services are the services that you need in order to successfully carry out your day to day business activities. These includes Paying for parking within the CBD, obtaining permits for social events within the city, business licensing, public health management, payments for county properties and more.
Services on Nairobi eServices Portal
These are few among the many services that you can access on Nairobi eServices portal. This in my opinion is a good move by the county government to make paying for in demand services easy.
Communication and Support
You can get support easily incase you get stuck while signing up on the portal or proceeding to make payments for any of the listed services. You can write to them a message , send them an e-mail or give them a call using the contact information provided on the contacts page.
Before you contact support, it’s always good you check on the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) page for answers.
Parking Management
Once you have signed in to the portal, you can choose a parking package. This includes daily, seasonal, off-street and reserved parking. For the service that you choose, you will be prompted to enter Vehicle Number plate and the Parking Zone. Then enter your MPESA number and an M-pesa payment request shall display on your phone. Enter your M-pesa PIN and click OK.
There is USSD option where users can make payments by dialing *647#.
If you get stuck in the process of signing up or trying to get a particular service on the portal, again, I recommend that you go to the FAQ page first.
Its important to note that the Nairobi eService Portal is managed by the Kenya Revenue Authority(KRA).
I hope this review was helpful to you.
Have you tried accessing Nairobi Services via this portal? How was you experience like? You can share your feedback in the comments section below.
And if you need help to create and produce professional screencast videos for your website or software, let me know here.
Mindset is the key to success in freelancing. While we all learn from failures, there is a particular savage mindset that bars many freelancers who are talented in many fields from exploiting their full potential.
When one is gifted with many skills, greed creeps in. Many new and established freelancers are gifted hence they think that by offering services for every skill they possess, they will make more money and hence become stinking rich. I mean who doesn’t want to be rich anyway?. It is a fact we all do.
Watch Video
Motivational gurus will tell you this ‘Challenge yourself and learn new skill every month.” This quote can only apply if you are not contented with your current skills and is looking for something you are passionate about. Otherwise, for what purpose should you learn the new skills anyway?”.
In this blogpost, I will share with you how to unbecome Jack of trades.
How Jack of All Trades Quote Apply in Freelancing
I will use my skillset as an example to break this down for you. I am aFreelance Video Producer. This therefore means I fall in the video production category. On a freelance platform like Upwork, video production is broken down into many other subcategories as shown in the screenshot below. This is a good place start and experiment on various related skills.
Jack of all Trades
You can be a jack of all trades when starting up. I suggest you don’t do it for a long time. Narrow down to something that you find exciting to do This is the most important stage. The problem most of the time is freelancers inability to settle on one skill after many years. This thus takes me to the next point.
The Greed That Comes Attached to Being a Jack of All Trades
I know of a guy in my village who offers basically every service. If someone needs veterinary service for their livestock – he is there, if you laptop crashes – he will fix it, if your toilet tap leak- he is the guy to call, if you need a surveyor to measure your land- he is the go to expert. I mean he does almost everything well. Such people are talented.
Their potential for success is very high. But the reality on the ground is, they are not that much successful at all. They live reckless life’s. They tend to be careless spenders and poor at saving their earnings.
This behavior is as a result of being greedy. When you are greedy to do every job, you will not have time to plan and invest your income. It’s common to think that you are achieving more by doing many things but in the real sense, you are loosing it. That is why I recommend narrowing down your ‘trades‘ to one skill that you love and it guarantees you constant income.
In Short, Don’t Be A ‘Jack of All Trades’
I applaud freelancers who are talented in many skills. Fact is, you cannot exhaust all the skills in this world. You will get tired, old and confused if are obsessed with learning everything without settling down on one thing.
Be the ‘Jack‘ when you are starting up and grow into a master of one. Mastery is where freedom lies.
Most freelancing jobs require that you use a certain software to do the job. If you have to offer lets say 6 skills that uses 6 different software’s, you will then need to pay for each software annually. On average, software cost about $200 a year. This means you will spend about $1200 a year on software’s alone. Then, more time perfecting your skills to use the software’s.
And don’t tell me about using cracked software’s because its professionally unacceptable.
One downside of this is that you may find yourself using one of the software 2 to 3 times a year for jobs with value of less than $200. This makes it a poor investment.
Conclusion
Being a Jack of All Trades at the beginning of your freelancing career and a Master of one at the end is good. Once you have found a skill that you are passionate about, become a master and stick to it. There will be high and low tides on your way up. The power lies in your persistence.
And that is it from me here. What freelancing skills have you mastered? I would like to know about it in the comments section below.
