In Zimbabwe, complying with authorities tax guidelines might be dearer than paying the tax itself. Small enterprise homeowners are anticipated to purchase particular digital units, rent consultants, and in some circumstances, make casual funds simply to adjust to the nation’s tax authority. However a brand new software, priced at simply $10 month-to-month, is providing a lifeline for these entrepreneurs.

Roundihmp, quick for Spherical Inside Hub Administration Portal, is a software program platform constructed by a self-taught developer in Zimbabwe. The software permits small companies to concern receipts, invoices, and quotations that meet the Zimbabwe Income Authority’s (ZIMRA) requirements—with out the necessity for costly, government-approved machines or skilled intermediaries. 

The app works on cellular, making it accessible and reasonably priced for Zimbabwean small companies who pay taxes. There’s additionally a provision in-app for them to adjust to ZIMRA fiscalisation. This course of requires companies to make use of particular machines, known as fiscal units, to ship each receipt and bill from their enterprise operations to ZIMRA in actual time.

These units are removed from reasonably priced. A single fiscal machine can value as much as $1,000. Setting it up usually requires hiring specialists or brokers, which provides one other $200 to $300. 

Moreover, companies find yourself paying an additional $250 to expedite the method which is normally painfully sluggish. But, non-compliance is just not an possibility as penalties value as much as $1,000.

“Folks had been being compelled into compliance with out being given instruments that work for them,” stated Thamsanqa Bhala, Roundihmp founder and CEO. “That’s why I constructed this.”

Bhala started constructing Roundihmp in 2023, two years after instructing himself to code on YouTube. Since then, he’s been including new options primarily based on suggestions from early customers. He at the moment runs the platform alone, sometimes bringing in freelancers when wanted. His purpose is to develop the startup, construct a group, and increase to different Southern African international locations like Zambia, South Africa, and Malawi.

Proper now, the app is just out there in English, however Bhala is engaged on including native languages reminiscent of Shona and Chichewa to make it simpler for extra individuals to make use of. One huge problem he faces is the excessive value of cellular knowledge in Zimbabwe. With 1GB costing over $43.75—one of many highest charges in Africa—many customers can’t keep on-line for lengthy.

“We get a surge of customers, after which they go away due to knowledge costs,” Bhala instructed TechZim. But, he believes the platform’s worth will maintain customers coming again. “They must pay taxes, and I’ve made it easy for them. I imagine they’ll all the time return.”

Serving to small companies get out of a repair

For a lot of of Zimbabwe’s estimated 3.4 million micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs), the federal government’s digital tax compliance  course of is solely out of attain. Authorities stories counsel that solely 14% of small Zimbabwean companies are formally registered, partially due to how costly and bureaucratic the ZIMRA fiscalisation course of is.

Munyaradzi Tumbare, a enterprise advisor and web site developer in Harare, Zimbabwe, stated Bhala’s software has grow to be a precious a part of his tax-paying course of. “Roundihmp has confirmed to be environment friendly and quick for my shoppers’ fiscalisation wants,” Tumbare instructed TechCabal. “With Roundihmp, I can full filings rapidly and precisely, making certain well timed compliance because the fiscalisation is finished in actual time to ZIMRA’s Fiscal Administration Knowledge System (FMDS).”

“You must pay round $250 to income officers and different individuals that will help you set it up,” stated a gadget store proprietor in Harare, who requested to stay nameless. “It might take a number of days, and it’s irritating.”

In keeping with Bhala, your complete setup on his app might be accomplished in beneath 12 hours.

The platform runs fully within the cloud as a Software program-as-a-Service (SaaS) mannequin. It additionally helps customers keep away from the errors and transaction delays which have plagued the federal government’s system, the Tax and Income Administration System (TaRMS), which launched in October 2023.

To its credit score, ZIMRA has acknowledged challenges with the system and has made some efforts to enhance entry to digital tax companies. TaRMS was launched as a modernisation initiative geared toward streamlining filings and decreasing handbook paperwork, changing the previous SAP TRM. However for a lot of enterprise homeowners, the system stays tough to navigate, suffering from sluggish response occasions and restricted usability on cellular units.

In an effort to deal with these shortcomings, ZIMRA additionally introduced plans to launch a cellular app tailor-made to the wants of small enterprise homeowners by March 2025. That app has but to reach. Within the meantime, customers are left with a technical self-service portal or bodily tax kiosks—each of which might be inaccessible to these with out formal coaching.

“The federal government’s instruments are constructed for big firms with computer systems and employees,” Bhala defined. “Mine is for enterprise homeowners who don’t have something however a telephone or laptop.”

 Zimbabwe’s tax compliance challenges replicate a deeper stress between inflexible methods and the realities of casual economies. Whereas ZIMRA works towards institutional reforms, instruments like Roundihmp reveal how locally-built options can fill vital gaps—not by way of complexity, however accessibility.

For now, Bhala’s imaginative and prescient stays modest: maintain refining, maintain simplifying. However in a area the place small companies energy economies but battle with visibility, such improvements counsel a path ahead—one the place compliance doesn’t come at the price of survival.