Just words {{ FIRSTNAME }}? Local SMEs are claiming that large companies like Netflorist were maliciously targeting small SA florist shops on Google. There might be a different reason for it entirely, with important lessons in online marketing for companies of every size. 📢
In This Open Letter
Right At Home: Empowering SA households and workers.
Local: Bought for a billion Rand & the WhatsApp clock-in.
Global: Next, you’ll be buying your concert tickets on Spotify.
Tech Jobs: New jobs in Angular, machine learning & more.
Company Evolution: This is Apple through the years.
Joburg, are you ready?
The Open Letter is coming to town to host our next JHB event: How AI is shaping FinTech across Africa, on 16 April 2026. And we’re bringing some heavy hitters:
Shola Akinlade, Cofounder and CEO of Paystack, will be there, along with Emmaniel Lubanzadio, Africa Lead @ OpenAI, and Archana Arakkal, Head of AI @ Araxi — you know, the company that’s in today’s news for buying Pay@ for R1bn.
Last time, all the early-bird tickets sold out on day one, so don’t miss out.
TRENDING NOW
The R74bn Home Finance Play
Few domestic workers receive payslips, so they can’t access financial tools – but this venture wants to drive financial inclusion from inside SA homes…
There are over 1.1 million South Africans employed in private households.
75% of them work as domestic workers, which, at Gov’s minimum wage of R28.79 per hour, amounts to more than R74.1 bn in wages every year. (And that’s not even counting part-time/ad-hoc workers.)
It’s an entire parallel wage economy operating largely in private homes across SA.
Formalising domestic worker employment
In the past, domestic workers were excluded from formal labour protections. But that changed through the years:
1997: Basic Conditions of Employment Act formally recognises domestic workers as employees, giving them regulated hours, leave, contracts and workplace rights.
2002: Sectoral Determination 7 introduces minimum wages and sector-specific rules.
2003: Employers have to register domestic workers for UIF.
2018: The National Minimum Wage Act includes domestic workers.
2020: A Constitutional Court ruling confirms domestic workers must be covered for workplace injury compensation.
On paper, the protections are there.
But in reality, the system is still largely informal: Estimates are that 70% of domestic worker employment agreements remain informal, only 20% are actually registered with the UIF, and less than 1 in 10 receive a monthly payslip.
The domestic credit problem
Without formal records, workers struggle to access credit, savings products or insurance. At that income level, the difference between informal lending and fairly priced financial services is not small.
The thing is, the gap between compliance and practice is often driven by logistical and administrative hurdles rather than someone wanting to exploit domestic workers.
Contracts, UIF registration, payroll calculations, leave tracking, payslips. Most households are not HR departments. So it often simply just doesn’t get done.
The local player making compliance easier
AskMandla is a WhatsApp-based HR platform that formalises domestic worker-employer relationships.
For a once-off setup fee and R49 per month, it handles compliant contracts, UIF registration, payroll, leave tracking and monthly payslips, turning a household into a compliant micro-employer, without the hassle of paperwork.
The big thing is that the structure gives domestic workers a financial identity: Every payslip is proof of income, which unlocks credit access, insurance and other financial products.
Financial inclusion does not always start in boardrooms. Sometimes it starts in the suburbs, in the systems we build for the people who keep households running.
AskMandla founder, Peter Adolphs, has been part of our founder community, The Founder Collab, since the early AskMandla days, and it has been powerful to watch the evolution up close.
Have your say…
FROM OUR FRIENDS AT BELAY
Leadership Can’t Be Automated
AI can help you move faster, but real leadership still requires human judgment.
The free resource 5 Traits AI Can’t Replace explains the traits leaders must protect in an AI-driven world and why BELAY Executive Assistants are built to support them.
IN SHORT
Easing you into the weekend…
⏰ Clocking in On WhatsApp. SA HR platform Jem has just launched its WhatsApp-based Time & Attendance feature, allowing employees to clock in and out directly in WhatsApp with geo-verified attendance built in. Very cool.
💰 Mega SA FinTech Deal. JSE-listed technology group Araxi Limited has acquired an 80% stake in Pay@ for a cool R1bn, strengthening Araxi’s payments offering and positioning it to deliver a broader suite of enterprise solutions. Nice one.
🎟️ Tickets, Get Yer Tickets! Music streamer Spotify and ticketing platform SeatGeek have announced an integration that will allow users to purchase concert tickets directly within the Spotify app at SeatGeek’s 15 major U.S. venue partners. Very interesting.
⚡ Charge It Up. The University of Johannesburg is planning on converting 200 fuel-based combustion vehicles into electric vehicles to be sent to 10 SA municipalities as part of an EV innovation project. Alright, alright, alright, alright.
💬 Sales, Not Spam. Poetry already had the brand and the audience. So Chat Inc turned WhatsApp into a high-conversion sales channel that pulled in 14.8k shoppers to generate R1.58 million in revenue at 269% ROI. Ask them to do the same for you.*
* From our partners. Find all the best service providers for your business in our Founder Stack.
WHAT YOU SAID
Movin’ on up…
Yesterday, we showed you how LaunchPath’s bringing smart recruitment tech to SA, asking about your most legendary bad hire. For most, toxicity’s the killer…
🟨🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 😳 They offended a key client or partner (15%)
🟨🟨🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️ 💀 6 months later, we were still finding their mistakes (21%)
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 🧪 They turned the whole team toxic (40%)
🟨🟨🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️ 🧑⚖️ Legally, I’m not allowed to say (18%)
🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 🎄 Why we no longer have company Christmas parties (6%)
Your 2 cents…
“I once hired just anyone, to see the results. That’s why we don’t have Christmas parties anymore.”
Ho ho, sounds like there’s a really crazy story behind that one, Hugo. 🎅
READY FOR A MOVE?
Jobs in Tech
OfferZen proudly sponsors Jobs in Tech
The name in SA tech employment for over a decade, OfferZen needs no introduction, and their ability to get you placed is only as legendary as the time, energy and money they save employers in finding top skills.
TECH THROUGH THE YEARS
The evolution of Apple
In April 1976, Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak and Ronald Wayne started building computers in Jobs’ parents’ garage. Their second iteration, one year later, became the most successful and influential personal computer of its time.
By 1980, the company went public and in 2018 was the first publicly traded U.S. company valued at $1 trillion (R16 trillion+).
AROUND THE WEB
Have some fun…
🚀 Tool to Try: SubSight tracks team members’ subscriptions in one dashboard so you can manage renewals, seats and SaaS spend without surprise charges.
🎸 That’s Interesting: Jimi Hendrix learned to play upside-down because left-handed guitars were hard to find early in his career.
🤸 Next Level: Watch 15-year-old Alexsa Kachan’s junior world-championship winning tumbling routine.
📱 Hack: A cool guide to all the types of metals inside a smartphone.
🌐 Wow Site: Paywall Skip lets you bypass many international paywalls.
