The problems schools face
- Admissions season floods the phones. Parents ask about fees, entrance exam dates and school bus routes, often on WhatsApp late at night.
- Applications in a spreadsheet. Missing documents and decisions are tracked by hand, and families wait weeks to hear back.
- Fees to chase. Part payments arrive by transfer, POS and cash, and the bursar pieces together who still owes.
- Circulars nobody can trace. Notices go into WhatsApp groups, and there is no record of who received them.
- Registers on paper. Class lists and attendance live in exercise books that are hard to search and easy to lose.
How NETICS solves them
Admissions answered from your prospectus
Upload your prospectus, fee schedule, term calendar and admission requirements to the Knowledge Base. NETICS answers parents on your website chat and, once your number is connected, on WhatsApp, in English, Nigerian Pidgin, Yoruba, Igbo or Hausa. It answers only from what you published; when a question is not covered it offers a person instead of guessing, and the Knowledge gaps page shows what parents asked that you have not answered yet. See AI customer agents, Knowledge Base and WhatsApp.
Applications that wait for a human decision
Choose "Processes applications or claims" during onboarding and NETICS prepares an application workflow: Submitted, Under review, Additional info needed, then Approved or Rejected. When a parent applies in your website chat, NETICS gathers the details, reads them back and, once confirmed, opens an application for your admissions team. Approving or rejecting always needs a person. School tours and interviews go into NETICS CRM > Bookings, against the admissions office or a staff member. See Bookings.
Students, classes and registers
On Growth, the backend-only setup lets you pick School or training centre ("Students, classes and registers"). In Website Builder > Database & Apps you describe a list in a sentence, such as "students with name, class, date of birth and a parent's phone", and NETICS sets up the fields. Each list is a table you search, add to and change, with CSV import and export, so a class list or a daily register can live there. Weekly classes added during setup are ready for check-in. A school that builds its own website gets a server key, a public feed of its sessions, and member sign-in by emailed code through the API. See the developer platform.
Fees and payments
ERP Route > Finance raises numbered invoices. Send invoice emails the parent a link to view and print it. Record payment takes transfer, cash, POS, card or cheque, part payments included, with a receipt for each. Who owes you groups unpaid balances by how late they are, and Send reminders chases many at once. For online payment, an order's Create payment link gives a secure checkout that settles to the school's bank account. See ERP and finance.
Reaching parents
Send email or SMS broadcasts from CRM workspace > Broadcasts to parents who opted in. Every email carries an unsubscribe link, and the CRM shows what was delivered, opened and clicked. Verify your school's domain under Tools > Email setup so broadcasts leave from your own address. See Email and SMS broadcasts.
A school website
On Enterprise, Website Builder's School or training centre layout starts with Home, Admissions (how to apply, a fees FAQ and a booking section for school visits), Academics and About. NETICS writes every word from your own facts. See Website Builder.
An example day
A private secondary school in Ibadan during admissions:
- 6:30. A parent asks on WhatsApp for the JSS1 entrance exam date and fees. NETICS answers from the published admissions sheet.
- 8:30. The admissions officer reviews two applications and moves one to Additional info needed, asking the family for a birth certificate.
- 10:00. The bursar records three transfers against fee invoices, one of them a part payment.
- 12:30. A family books a Saturday school tour, and the admissions office sees it in Bookings.
- 14:00. A teacher adds two new students to the class list in Database & Apps.
- 16:00. The school emails subscribed parents the date of inter-house sports.
Which plan fits
Starter (NGN 50,000 a month) covers admissions and fees: one NETICS agent on your website and WhatsApp, the Knowledge Base, Bookings, NETICS CRM, Finance invoices, 1,500 AI answers a month and three seats. Broadcasts can be paid per message from usage credits. Pay as you go has the same features with one seat and no monthly fee: you pay from credits as you use them, 3 credits (NGN 45) for each AI answer.
Growth (NGN 200,000 a month) adds Database & Apps for students, classes and registers, the backend for your own website, 15 seats, 10,000 AI answers a month, email campaigns with no per-email charge (SMS is NGN 10 a message from credits on every plan), Payroll, and a phone line answered by NETICS.
Enterprise, agreed with the NETICS team, adds Website Builder with the "School or training centre" layout and Subscriptions for fixed monthly or yearly fees. See the pricing page or start the 3-day free trial, which needs no card.
Frequently asked questions
Is there a school template that sets everything up?
No template preloads school fields. The industry you choose is a label. What shapes the workspace is how you work, such as "Takes appointments" for tours and "Processes applications or claims" for admissions, plus the lists you design in Database & Apps.
Can parents pay fees online?
Yes, through a payment link. Create an order for the fee and press Create payment link; the parent pays through a secure checkout and the money settles to your bank account. Transfers, POS and cash payments are recorded against Finance invoices.
Can NETICS message every parent on WhatsApp?
Not as a broadcast. Broadcasts go by email and SMS to parents who opted in. On WhatsApp, NETICS answers parents who write to you, and your team replies from the Omnichannel Inbox.
Will NETICS decide on an application?
No. NETICS gathers the details and opens the application, but approving or rejecting it always needs a person on your team.