The short answer
- In Ghana, susu means two different things: a rotating savings circle (everyone pays in, one member takes the pot each round) and a susu collector, who picks up clients' deposits every day and hands the savings back at the end of the cycle.
- Collectors usually keep one day's deposit per month as their fee, roughly a thirtieth of what you saved.
- Since 2011 the Bank of Ghana has treated collectors as a regulated "Tier 4" activity: they must belong to an umbrella body such as the GCSCA, stick to collecting deposits and stay in a defined area.
- In the Caribbean, the rotating circle is the partner in Jamaica, sou-sou in Trinidad and Tobago, box hand in Guyana and sòl in Haiti, run by an organiser called the "banker". In the US, UK and Canada, many people still say susu.
- Either way, the risk is people: a member who stops paying, a collector who vanishes. Written rules and a shared ledger prevent most losses.
One word, two systems
Our global guide to savings circles mentions this in a single line. It deserves more, because mixing the two up can cost you money. When a trader in Accra says she "does susu", she could mean either:
| Rotating susu (circle) | Susu collector | |
|---|---|---|
| Who holds the money | Members, in turn | One professional collector |
| How often | Weekly or monthly | Daily, often at the market |
| What you get back | The whole pot, on your turn | Your own savings, at the end of the cycle |
| Cost | Nothing, unless agreed | About one day's deposit per month |
| Credit | Yes, for early recipients | No, unless the collector also lends |
| Legal status | Private arrangement | Regulated by the Bank of Ghana |
Who holds the money
Rotating susu (circle)Members, in turn
Susu collectorOne professional collector
How often
Rotating susu (circle)Weekly or monthly
Susu collectorDaily, often at the market
What you get back
Rotating susu (circle)The whole pot, on your turn
Susu collectorYour own savings, at the end of the cycle
Cost
Rotating susu (circle)Nothing, unless agreed
Susu collectorAbout one day's deposit per month
Credit
Rotating susu (circle)Yes, for early recipients
Susu collectorNo, unless the collector also lends
Legal status
Rotating susu (circle)Private arrangement
Susu collectorRegulated by the Bank of Ghana
The circle is a classic ROSCA (rotating savings and credit association). The collector isn't rotating anything: it's a doorstep deposit service. The anthropologist William Bascom described the Yoruba esusu as early as 1952, and both the Ghanaian and Caribbean circles belong to that West African family.
Rotating susu: a worked example
Eight traders at Makola Market in Accra each pay GH₵200 every Saturday. The pot is 8 × GH₵200 = GH₵1,600. Each Saturday one trader takes it; after eight weeks, everyone has paid GH₵1,600 and received GH₵1,600.
- receives this round
- has paid
- hasn’t paid yet
The first recipient effectively gets an interest-free loan: GH₵1,600 now, repaid over seven payments. The last one is doing disciplined saving with no return. Everyone in between gets some of both. For a market trader, that first payout can mean restocking in one go, without a bank or collateral.
Susu collectors: how they earn a living
The collector, often called the "susu man", does a daily round. You pick a fixed daily amount, the collector records it in your passbook, and at the end of the cycle you get the total back minus the fee.
Take Ama, who sells fabric in Kumasi. She hands over GH₵20 a day for a 31-day month:
- total paid in: 31 × GH₵20 = GH₵620;
- collector's fee (one day's deposit): GH₵20;
- paid back: GH₵600.
The fee is 20 / 620, about 3.2% of the month's savings. Over twelve months Ama gives up twelve days of deposits: 12 × GH₵20 = GH₵240. That's expensive for savings that earn nothing. So why do so many people pay it? Because it buys something real. The cash leaves the house every evening, out of reach of thieves and of relatives asking for help, and a collector knocking every day creates a savings habit most of us would struggle to keep alone.
The fee model is well documented. Ernest Aryeetey and William Steel described it in Savings and Development in 1995, and Nava Ashraf, Dean Karlan and Wesley Yin's 2006 paper on deposit collectors sums up their calculation: a collector's monthly income equals one-thirtieth of the deposits collected. The same paper cites an earlier survey by Aryeetey and Gockel (1991): over 75% of women using credit markets in three major Ghanaian cities also saved with collectors, and 40.3% of savers surveyed had lost money to a collector who ran off. Those figures are three decades old, but they explain why the state stepped in.
What the Bank of Ghana requires
In 2011, Bank of Ghana notice BG/GOV/SEC/2011/04 split the microfinance sector into four tiers. Susu collectors, individuals or registered susu businesses, fall under Tier 4. The main rules:
- Membership: every Tier 4 operator must belong to an umbrella association such as the Ghana Cooperative Susu Collectors Association (GCSCA). A susu business's registered name must include the word "susu".
- No minimum capital, but members pay into an insurance fund set up by their association.
- Collection only: the periodic collection of deposits and their refund "at the designated times for a fee". A collector is not a bank.
- A defined area: a market, suburb, town or city, and no branches without the Bank of Ghana's written approval.
- Reporting: the association sends statistics on its members to the central bank.
In August 2012, the Ghanaian press reported that 246 collectors and susu businesses, out of more than 450 applicants, had been licensed through the GCSCA, with ID cards, standard passbooks and branded jackets. The Bank of Ghana urged the public to steer clear of unlicensed collectors.
The rules have tightened since. The Banks and Specialised Deposit-Taking Institutions Act 2016 (Act 930) is now the main law for deposit-taking. In May 2019, the Bank of Ghana revoked the licences of 347 microfinance companies, some insolvent and some already out of business. Those were companies, not individual collectors, but the lesson carries over: check the licence.
Partner, sou-sou, box hand, sòl: susu in the Caribbean
Across the English-speaking Caribbean and Haiti, the rotating circle is an old practice that its members trace back to West Africa. Caroline Shenaz Hossein, who has studied these "informal banks" in Jamaica, Guyana, Haiti, Trinidad and Tobago and Grenada, records the local names: partner in Jamaica, sou-sou in Trinidad and Tobago, box hand in Guyana and sòl in Haiti. In Caribbean communities in New York, Toronto or London, you'll hear all of them, plus plain "susu".
The words change; the mechanics don't. You "throw a hand": each hand is one share of the contribution, and some people throw two. The banker, often a respected woman in the neighbourhood, collects the hands, sets the payout order and hands over the pot, known in Jamaica as your "draw".
The most cited research is by Sudhanshu Handa and Claremont Kirton, published in the Journal of Development Economics in 1999 using a sample of Jamaican partner members. Three findings matter to anyone running a circle:
- Circles where the banker is paid for the work last longer. A small fee buys reliability.
- The more members a circle has, the smaller the contribution, and vice versa: big hands are thrown among a few people who know each other well.
- Payouts mostly go on durable goods: appliances, building materials, equipment.
According to the World Bank's Global Findex 2021, 25.6% of adults in Jamaica and 19.6% in Ghana saved using a savings club or someone outside the family in the past year.
Banks don't always understand the practice. In late 2019, as Trinidad and Tobago replaced its old $100 note, the president of the country's Bankers Association said banks would not accept "sou-sou money" as a legitimate source of funds because they couldn't verify it. The backlash was loud. The practical lesson: if you plan to bank a large payout, keep a written record of the contributions. The circle's ledger becomes your proof.
Protecting your money, circle or collector
- Collector: shows a GCSCA card or works for a licensed institution
- Collector: every deposit goes in a passbook you keep
- Collector: the fee is agreed in writing (one day's deposit, no more)
- Collector: the payback date is fixed in advance
- Circle: amount, schedule and payout order written down and shared
- Circle: newcomers go at the end of the order
- Circle: late payments and dropouts are handled by rules agreed up front
Two more tips. With a collector, don't let savings pile up for months: take the money back at the end of each cycle, even if you redeposit it the same day. In a circle, walk away from any promise that you'll get back more than you put in. A genuine susu doesn't create money; it only changes when you receive it. The FTC has warned about fake "savings clubs" that rely on recruiting new members. For written rules and handling late payers, see our guide on how to run a savings circle.
Keeping your susu on Binome360
Binome360 doesn't collect money and doesn't replace the collector or the banker. It keeps the record, which is exactly where disputes start.
For a rotating circle, the savings circle module lists members in payout order, ticks off contributions as they come in, works out the pot and shows who receives this round and the next. Set up in a shared assistant, the circle is visible to the members you invite.
Yaa and Ama paid their 200 for the Makola susu
Done: Yaa and Ama ticked for week 4. All eight members have paid, so Adwoa takes GH₵1,600 and Yaa is next. Save it?
Nothing is saved until you confirm. The money still moves in cash or by mobile money, outside the app.
Try Binome360 for freeFor a collector, create a savings goal called "Susu with Kwame" and log each deposit in one sentence. At the end of the month, compare your total with what the collector pays back: GH₵620 paid in, GH₵600 expected. If the numbers don't match, you have the dates to discuss it.
Frequently asked questions
Is susu legal in Ghana?
Yes. A rotating circle among people who know each other is a private arrangement. Collecting deposits from the public is regulated: collectors must be licensed under the Bank of Ghana's framework, through an umbrella body such as the GCSCA.
How much does a susu collector charge?
The usual fee is one day's deposit per month: about 3.2% of a 31-day month's savings, slightly more in a 30-day month. Agree the exact fee in writing before you start.
Is a Jamaican partner the same as susu?
A partner is a rotating circle, so it matches rotating susu, not the collector. The banker sets the order and hands out the draw; some bankers take a small payment for the work.
Can you run a susu online, across countries?
Yes. Many diaspora circles pay in by bank transfer or mobile money. Distance makes trust harder, so keep proof of every payment, keep the circle to people you know, and use a ledger everyone can see.
In short
Susu covers two different services: a circle where everyone takes the pot in turn, and a collector who holds your daily savings for about one day's deposit a month. In the Caribbean, the same circle is the partner, sou-sou, box hand or sòl. First step: if you save with a collector, ask to see their licence card and log tonight's deposit with its date.
Sources
- Bank of Ghana, Operating Rules and Guidelines for Microfinance Institutions, Notice No. BG/GOV/SEC/2011/04, 2011: bog.gov.gh.
- Ghana Business News, "Bank of Ghana licenses 246 susu collectors", 21 August 2012: ghanabusinessnews.com.
- Bank of Ghana, notice of revocation of licences of insolvent microfinance companies, May 2019: bog.gov.gh.
- Nava Ashraf, Dean Karlan and Wesley Yin, "Deposit Collectors", Advances in Economic Analysis & Policy, 6(2), 2006 (citing Aryeetey and Gockel, 1991, and Aryeetey and Steel, 1995): poverty-action.org.
- Ernest Aryeetey and William F. Steel, "Savings Collectors and Financial Intermediation in Ghana", Savings and Development, 19, 1995.
- William R. Bascom, "The Esusu: A Credit Institution of the Yoruba", Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 82(1), 1952.
- Sudhanshu Handa and Claremont Kirton, "The economics of rotating savings and credit associations: evidence from the Jamaican 'Partner'", Journal of Development Economics, 60(1), 173–194, 1999.
- Caroline Shenaz Hossein, "Building Economic Solidarity: Caribbean ROSCAs in Jamaica, Guyana, and Haiti", in The Black Social Economy in the Americas, Palgrave Macmillan, 2018; overview of her work: africanaeconomics.com.
- Global Voices, "In the frenzy over the new $100 bill, Trinidad & Tobago's banking sector reveals its disrespect for an age-old practice", 18 December 2019: globalvoices.org.
- Federal Trade Commission, "Real or fake savings club?", 2020: consumer.ftc.gov.
- World Bank, The Global Findex Database 2021 (indicator "saved using a savings club or a person outside the family").
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