Collctiv

Tell us about your company

Founded in 2019 by Amy Whitell & Pete Casson, Manchester-based Collctiv, a group payments app, was created to help organisers collect money from groups of people for activities and large gifts in an easy, secure way.

Since then, Collctiv has helped 650,000 people from over 140 countries to collect and spend group money, from team-mates showing appreciation to a colleague leaving, subs for weekly sports clubs or parents pooling together for end-of-year teacher gifts - and everything in between!

Collctiv is different to other offerings on the market because many payments apps require the entire group of people to download the app, create an account, and link payment details. With Collctiv, the only person who needs the app is the organiser. Anyone contributing to a Collctiv pot simply clicks on a custom payment link sent by the organiser and pays using their Apple Pay, Google Pay or credit card. Instantly.

Collctiv has removed the barrier to pay, making it easy for everybody else to pay their share, meaning organisers are able to collect money they are owed in seconds. No more excuses and no more being left out of pocket!

Amy Whitell – Co-Founder and CEO of Collectiv

"Hi, I’m Amy! The idea for Collctiv was conceived whilst I was working with my now-co-founder and Chief Technical Officer, Pete Casson, at the EdTech scaleup company, Twinkl.

After I was left short of £80 on a colleague's baby shower present , I decided enough was enough and looked for a solution to collect money in an easy way. When I couldn't find anything, Pete and I set about building something to bridge the gap.
I am very proud that Collctiv is Manchester based. Manchester has established itself as an incredible hub of Fintech growth outside of London and It’s really special to be part of that.

Championing women in Fintech is really important to me. I am an Advisory Board member of FinTech North, a group of key stakeholders with an active interest in supporting and developing the FinTech ecosystem in the North of England and beyond."

What are your ambitions in New York?

With our shared language and cultural similarities, this made the United States a priority market for us to expand into and we believe this provides the next phase of rapid growth for our company.

There’s really nothing like Collctiv in the US, the digital payments space in this market is fragmented and dominated by peer-to-peer players who all cater for single P2P transactions, not group collections.

The need for a solution like ours created huge demand for Collctiv pre-launch, and we had a waitlist of users Stateside who had reached out to us through every channel possible, asking when Collctiv would be available in the US.

The US knows how to celebrate and come together on a large scale and social gatherings happen all the time and with large numbers of people, sometimes in the hundreds. This is a huge void that Collctiv is able to fill, as we continue our mission to support organisers as they bring together the people they love.

New York in particular is home to some of the world’s most exciting tech startups, especially in the fintech space. We had the privilege of being selected to join the prestigious Techstars New York accelerator programme in Fall 2022, and we hope to continue immersing ourselves in this incredible ecosystem for many years to come.

How has the Department for Business and Trade helped you?

The Department for Business and Trade has provided a huge amount of support since the beginning of our journey, from financial help through to leveraging their network and expertise to assist us.

We’re extremely thankful for the DBT's willingness to embrace early-stage startups and provide a platform to support our ambitions of growth. Collctiv has been fortunate enough to have been part of a number of DBT backed trade missions, including the Greater Manchester and Liverpool City Region delegation to Dublin in March 2022, and more recently, the New York Fintech Week delegation in April 2023.

We’ve worked closely with our trade advisor in the past couple of years and she’s always been proactive in supporting our international development plans. We have regular contact and she keeps us in the loop with personalised support and new potential opportunities that may be a good fit for Collctiv, along with various webinars and in-person activities that are relevant to us.

What one piece of advice would you give other UK companies watching the series?

If you’re an app, be that fintech or a different sector, try a soft launch in a new market first, and give yourself time to gather valuable insights before you start proactively partnering and putting paid marketing behind a push in that market. You’ll find yourself on the front foot and realise your product is fit for purpose. The data you’ll gather from use by your organic customers is incredibly valuable and will help shape your understanding of that market from day one.