COLLECTING OUTSTANDING DEBT
The following question on one of our Heads’ WhatsApp groups resulted in a flurry of responses, and an issue of Heads Up on the matter (Volume 7 Issue 8 of Heads Up, 2 March 2026).
Our SGB Finance Committee is trying to tighten up on outstanding extra-curricular fee non-payments in respect of things like festivals and tournaments. Do you require an acknowledgement of debt to be filled in for each tour by the parents, or is there a clause in your Admission Pack to acknowledge debt for school fees and any other costs incurred?
The most detailed response:
I have been very impressed with the Northwood systems in place for tours and asked Shaun (my Head of Sport) to put it together for me… It is long, but I share it with you for if it is useful… Here it is.
We insist on getting notice of tours out at least a month before the time, obviously longer for the bigger, more expensive tours. A general cost forecast at the end of each year, for the year ahead…
And then there’s two payment options. There’s a direct EFT – I’ll explain the reference method we use because it helps the process significantly. We use a specific tour ledger number with the surname of the parent putting the surname in, so 111 Shaw, or 506, for example, is St. John’s Basketball, so 506 Baker is for that kid for that particular tournament. When that payment comes into the school, it’s immediately allocated by the back end to the ledger. What I was finding when I first took over is that a lot of payments had been made by parents who had been transferred to the school fee accounts or if there wasn’t a direct reference given, or if it just said St. John’s. So that tightened up that process was huge in the value of chasing up the local parents who actually had paid and it was sitting in the deep dark bank account somewhere.
Karri App is next level. That brings in a serious amount of payments. Very quick, very easy. Yes, there’s a commission that we lose on it. We factor that amount that gets lost into our tour budgets. We don’t use Karri for tours over R5,000, because that percentage loss just makes things that much more expensive again.
We also have payment plan options. This year, we’ve trialled something for Term 1 and it’s been exceptional. Our Basketball payments are the highest they’ve ever been. We expect a 50% minimum before tour. And what that’s done is it’s really highlighted those who can and can’t, and then we can put our plan B, C, and D in place for those individuals or parents who just withdraw them knowing that they won’t be able to honor. And yes, we go with slightly weaker teams, but the cost of debt that we’ve carried in previous years has just got a little bit too much if you want to be competing in all these tournaments and be there as a school.
For plans B, C and D, particularly this year, has really made a difference. So the first thing that’s been introduced is boys can coach within the sports that they or serve, not necessarily coach, they can serve. So in water polo, we have guys that do tech table, help set up the pool. We have guys in hockey who coach, particularly in the Knights of Excellence program, coaching junior school kids. Basketball, soccer, hockey, cricket all have successful coaching opportunities for boys at lower levels. Instead of paying them a coaching rate, whatever their coaching rate is (usually about R150 for schoolboys). So they do a claim form like an outside coach would, but then we just make sure that the backend process is that instead of a payment, into the tour ledger, and then it will have their name there as a reference.
The other things that we do is we run fundraisers. Our two biggest ones that we run, I’m about to launch one today, is the Northwood Sports raffle. That brings in, last year that brought in about R120,000 worth of income. About R30,000 of that is general, so I get to use that in anyway for boys who can’t afford, maybe a pair of shoes, or a tour at 50% if you know there’s just no money at home But otherwise, the raffle counts for the individual who sells the ticket. Whatever raffles they sold, that income goes directly to their names. One set of brothers last year sold about R12,000 worth of raffle tickets, so their tour account is offset by that amount.
Then we run the School Sports golf day where, if a family puts a four ball in or get a four-ball bought by a neighbour or a company or whatever, the cost of a four ball minus expenses is accredited to them. Same with the sponsorships. Income from the tables, raffles or auctions, an sponsorships that we source as a school, etc. is general income for us to allocate as we see fit.
And then, lastly, a portion of the Boarding House income on festivals we host – we see that as a bonus income for the Boarding House, and so allocate a portion of that to general tours as well.
And then the last, last thing to say is that we sometimes directly help offset tour costs for boys where we know a team has a big load through the year, especially of expensive tours. The minor ones will be charged at full cost, but when we’re going on a north-south Cricket for example, that’s quite an expensive tour, anything to Cape Town on an airplane, we’ll use those larger funds available to offset the entire tour cost, not just for boys’ who can’t afford – that entire tour cost will be offset.
Here are some other valuable/interesting responses:
- Parents have the option to make an arrangement to settle the amount in instalments, or if they cannot afford the full two amount, they can make an offer. Most of the parents who cannot afford them on how exemption list and they are treated accordingly.
- Except for international tours which are not penalised the boy for the sins of his parents.
- Whole to stand to be corrected but I believe it is against the South African schools act excluded learners from school to others? (This latter point was addressed in We have tightened up on tour payments and unless a payment plan is in place and being honoured we don’t allow subsequent tours. It hurt us recently on one of our tours, but a line in the sand was necessary.
- We exclude boys whose parents have been avoiding our finance office and all attempts to sort out school fee payment arrangements etc.
- We use Karri. It makes the tour 3 to 5% more expensive, but a collection rate has improved significantly. We are in a third year with the system and our default rate is around 1% on tour payments.
- We use the Karri app for all tour payments. If a boy is unable to pay the full amount a payment plan must be in place before he can depart. Both of the above have been successful.
- We also use Karri. We allow financial arrangements prior to the tour. We have established a tour fund to assist in special circumstances.