Gabanya privacy policy
Last changed 14 October 2026. Gabanya is published by Tugabane. This policy covers the Gabanya app (called Tab until October 2026) and the pages at app.gabanya.com and tugabane.com that the app links people to. Kakasa, a separate app from the same team, has its own policy.
In one paragraph. Gabanya splits a bill and keeps a book of who owes whom. It never holds or moves money: people pay each other on Mobile Money, and the app only records what they say and what the owner confirms. To do that it keeps your phone number, the bills you make, the names and numbers you type for the people on them, and receipt photos. A receipt photo you scan is sent to a reading service (Google or Anthropic) to turn it into lines. We do not sell data, show adverts, or track you across other apps or sites. You can delete your account from inside the app or at app.gabanya.com/delete-account.
What we collect, and why
Your account
- Your phone number, verified by a code sent by SMS. It is how you sign in and the only identity an account has.
- A display name, if you give one. It appears on the bills you make, so the people on them know whose bill it is.
- Your pay-to details: the Mobile Money number and name you want people to send their share to, and whether to show them. Only shown to people on your bills, and only while you choose to show them.
- Your plan and balance: which plan the account is on and the record of fees and top-ups, if any. Plans are switched on by our team by hand; nothing is charged to a card.
Your bills and your book
- Bills: the name, the items and prices, the number of people, the category you pick, and when it was made.
- The people on a bill: the names and phone numbers you type or pick for them. A number you give a person makes them a contact in your book, with a running balance across your bills. We never read your phone's contact list: when you pick from it, your phone hands us the one name and number you chose.
- What each person claims, says they have paid, and what you confirm: amounts and times. These are records of what people said and confirmed, not payments — no money passes through us.
- Entries you add by hand to a person's balance, with the note you write.
- Statement links you send a customer, and the seat links each bill makes. Anyone holding a link can open what it shows; links are long random tokens and are never listed anywhere public.
Receipt photos
- The bill's copy. A bill made from a scan keeps a watermarked copy of the receipt so you, and the people on the bill if you allow it, can look at it later.
- The reading service. When you scan a receipt and the server reads it, the photo is sent to a reading service to turn it into lines: Google (Gemini) or Anthropic (Claude), depending on the server's setting. They receive the photo and the instruction to read it, nothing about you. Your phone's own reader (Google ML Kit, on the device) also runs and sends nothing anywhere. The lines come back to you to check and edit; nothing is ever charged from a photo automatically.
- The scan log. We keep each scanned photo, what each reader read from it and the list you confirmed, to measure how well the readers do and improve them. This log is for that purpose only and is not shown to other users.
- Receipt photos you send for the collection, if you choose to help teach the app to read handwriting. The screen says so before you send any, and the photos go to our team for that purpose and to nobody else.
Your phone and your connection
- What the app is: its build number, which server it talks to, your phone's operating system and model. The app sends this with every request so we can find out why something did not work on a particular phone. No identifiers, numbers or names are in it.
- A notification token from Firebase Cloud Messaging, if you allow notifications, so the server can tell your phone when someone claims or pays. Removed when you sign out or when the token stops working.
- Server logs: the usual web server records, including your IP address, and a line for each request the server refused and why. Used for keeping the service running and finding faults.
Who else sees it
| Who | What | Why |
|---|
| People on your bill | The bill's name, items and prices, the names people chose for themselves, what each person owes and has paid, your display name, your pay-to number and name if you show them, and the receipt photo if you share it. | That is the bill. They open it from a link you send; they install nothing and we never message them. |
| A customer you send a statement to | Their own lines in your book and your pay-to details. | You sent them the link. |
| Staff you add to your account | Everything on the account's bills and book, under their own sign-in. | You added them. They cannot change the account's settings or plan. |
| Twilio | Your phone number, when a sign-in code is sent by SMS. | They send and check the code (Twilio Verify). |
| Google (Gemini) or Anthropic (Claude) | A receipt photo you scan, and the instruction to read it. | Reading the receipt on the server. |
| Google (Firebase Cloud Messaging) | Your notification token and the text of each notification — a bill's name, a person's name and an amount. | Delivering notifications to your phone. |
| Our hosting provider | Everything above, on servers they rent us. | Running the service. The servers are in the United States. |
Nobody else. We do not sell or rent data, we show no adverts, we use no analytics or tracking services, and the pages at app.gabanya.com set no cookies.
How long we keep it
- Your account and bills: until you delete your account, or we delete it at your request.
- Sign-ins: a sign-in lasts 90 days from its last use; ended sign-ins are removed after 30 days. Codes last 10 minutes and are removed after a day.
- A bill's receipt photo: 30 days on the Free plan; on a paid plan, for as long as the plan includes it.
- Closed bills with nothing on them: removed after 90 days.
- Notification tokens: removed when unused for 180 days, or 30 days after they stop working.
- The scan log: kept while we evaluate the readers. There is no automatic limit on it yet; a scanned photo in it is not removed when its bill is.
- Backups: a copy of the database is taken nightly; we keep 14 daily and 8 weekly copies, so deleted data can remain in a backup for up to about two months before it is gone.
- Server logs: kept for operating the service and rotated as space requires.
Your choices
- Show my number — off, and the people on your bills are told to pay you the way they normally would.
- Share the receipt — per bill, whether people on it can open the photo.
- Delete a bill — it is closed and marked settled; its links stop working.
- Remove a person from your book, or rename them.
- Take back a collection photo within 24 hours of sending it, from the collection screen.
- Notifications — your phone's settings; the app works without them.
- Delete your account — in the app, under Where people pay you, or at app.gabanya.com/delete-account. Your sign-in ends on every phone, your number and name are removed, every bill you made is closed and marked settled and its photos removed, your book and any statement links go, and your collection photos go. What other people recorded about you in their own books — a shop's record of what you owed and paid — stays, without a link to your account, because it is their record.
How we protect it
Every connection is encrypted (HTTPS). Sign-in tokens and codes are stored hashed, so a copy of the database is not a way in. All money arithmetic is done on the server; the app never computes or trusts an amount of its own. We never hold, move or have access to anyone's money: paying is done on Mobile Money between the people themselves, and the app records what they say and confirm.
Who this is for
Gabanya is for adults. A Mobile Money account in Uganda requires you to be 18, and so does this app. We do not knowingly keep an account for anyone younger; tell us and we will delete it.
Changes and contact
When this policy changes, the date at the top changes with it. Questions, or a request about your data: privacy@tugabane.com.