Sarabjot SinghCo-Founder & CEO of ScrewCash Published On: Monday, August 22, 2016 Views 2291

ScrewCash is the one-stop mobile application that encourages people not to use cash and instead, go for mobile payments at nearby stores like restaurants, chemists, kirana stores, etc. Apart from the comfort of going cashless, users are incentivized via cashbacks, loyalty programs, etc., which are 100% funded by SMBs. All these benefits are seamlessly integrated with the act of payment, so that users do not have to undergo the trouble of searching various portals/ apps for offers to save money. Customers can make payments through any of these – debit card/ credit card/ net banking/ wallets like FreeCharge, Citrus. ScrewCash also helps users manage shared expenses. Using the mobile application they can a) easily split bills b) Keep record of outstanding amounts at individual and group level c) Transfer money to others (only mobile number required) d) Send automatic reminders to people who owe them money. From SMBs perspective, we are helping them increase revenue by providing platform which helps them in customer acquisition & retention. ScrewCash acts as a ‘payment + marketing’ platform for them without any requirement of extra hardware, not even a smartphone, even basic feature phone is enough. Apart from being able to collect payments via mobile, they can run their own customized offers/loyalty program as per their own business need to acquire, engage & retain their customers.

After I did my MBA from MDI, Gurgaon, I joined American Express where I was responsible for managing India Corporate business. As a risk manager, the objective was to identify opportunities to grow the business profitably but at the same time manage credit risk for the market. There I got opportunity to work closely with SMBs & understands challenges they face in managing their finances. During that tenure only, I identified opportunity to create a technology platform, potentially useful for millions of SMBs in India which helps them grow their business. The idea was to create a payments driven mobile marketing platform which helps SMBs in not only acquiring new customers but also retain them by providing better service & engaging them regularly. When I shared this idea with Raksh (co-founder), he also got excited & there in we left out corporate jobs last year to start building ScrewCash.     

Listen to everyone but do what you believe is the right thing

Talking about challenges, initially it was difficult to convince merchants to come on board due to 2 reasons

1) I had no sales experience

2) Merchants did not had great experience with other apps they worked with. But now with more than 200 merchants on board, it’s no more a major problem for us.

Ground realities can sometimes be very different from your own perception of things. Therefore, I overcame initial challenges by being more open and talking regularly with our customers & partner merchants

We are currently bootstrapped, building ScrewCash from our personal investment

1) Being persistent

2) Someone who graciously accept failures & learn from them

3) Has faith in his/her own abilities

Slack is one good tool, which I always recommend

Every morning spending some time alone on my terrace (without any electronic gadget) & plan for the day

I would like to work on time management

• One tip to success:

Start with something you believe but listen to your end users & keep on evolving

• One mistake you believe every individual must avoid:

Entrepreneurship is not sexy so make sure you do not jump on for it just because of all the hype around it

• One most important lesson that you have learnt till now:

Managing people is a great skill set; sooner you learn, better it is

We would like to capture & grow ScrewCash in at least five metro cities in next 3 years

I will give more preference to work which helps me develop different skill sets which interests me rather than what brand/company I am working for

1) Mcleodganj 2) Rishikesh 3) Goa

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life.”