Sellers get paid when the parcel lands.
Amana is escrow as an API. Your marketplace opens an escrow at checkout. The buyer's money stays held until the courier confirms delivery with a code that only the buyer has. Nobody has to chase a buyer for a confirmation.
Amana charges 1.5% on completed orders and nothing on refunds. It works with any courier that can call one endpoint.
Order ORD-4821
Tecno Spark 20
₦45,000.00
Follow the ₦45,000.
The same order as above, as a map. Money enters the vault when the buyer pays and leaves only when delivery is confirmed.
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The buyer pays
₦45,000.00 goes into escrow. The seller sees that funds are secured, and ships.
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Amana holds it
Neither the seller nor the marketplace can spend it. Every hold says who we are waiting on, and until when.
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The rider enters the code
The buyer reads six digits to the rider. The courier's system sends them to Amana, and delivery is confirmed.
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The seller is paid
When the inspection window ends, ₦44,325.00 goes to the seller and ₦675.00 to Amana. A refund would return all ₦45,000.00.
The buyer confirms nothing. The rider does.
Escrow fails when release depends on the one person who has already been paid in goods. Amana moves the decision to a party with no reason to stall.
A code only the buyer holds
When the seller ships, Amana texts the buyer a six-digit code. The buyer reads it to the rider only after taking the parcel. The courier's system sends that code to Amana, and delivery is confirmed. In live mode, sellers and marketplaces never see the code.
A window to object
Delivery starts an inspection window, 48 hours by default. The buyer can release early, or raise a problem. If the window passes quietly, the seller is paid. The buyer is texted 12 hours before that happens, with the exact time in WAT.
A person for the hard cases
A dispute freezes the money. Both sides add evidence. A reviewer decides within 72 hours and writes down why. Either side can appeal once, to a different reviewer, and that second decision is final.
The buyer goes quiet
The courier's code already proved delivery. When the inspection window ends, the seller is paid. The buyer was warned 12 hours earlier.
The rider says delivered, but it isn't
Without the buyer's code, the confirmation is recorded as the courier's word only. The buyer gets 72 hours to object, and a reviewer sees the courier's note and proof.
The seller never ships
After 72 hours the buyer is refunded in full, fee included.
The courier never reports
After 14 days a person reviews the order. Money never moves because a courier stayed silent.
The buyer raises a dispute
Money freezes. A reviewer decides to release, refund or split, with written reasons both sides can read.
A bank transfer fails
The decision stands and the payout waits in a queue. It retries until it clears and is never paid twice.
Where escrow breaks today
We read the public coverage and customer reviews of existing escrow services and looked for the same few gaps. Each one below is a gap Amana was built to close.
A silent buyer loses their protection
What's been reportedOne WhatsApp-based escrow releases funds automatically if the buyer does nothing for 48 hours. A buyer who misses that window has nothing left to appeal to.1
AmanaThe buyer is texted 12 hours before the seller is paid, with the exact time. A webhook lets your app warn them as well.
Proof of delivery depends on whose rider it was
What's been reportedThe strongest delivery evidence comes from the service's own riders. Other couriers provide tracking, and the weight of that evidence isn't explained.1
AmanaAny courier works the same way. The buyer's code is the proof. A confirmation without the code is labelled as the courier's word and gets a longer window.
Disputes are decided behind closed doors
What's been reportedCoverage of the same service describes it deciding disputes itself, with no appeal route, timelines or evidence standards given.1
AmanaWritten reasons for every decision, a 72-hour deadline that shows as overdue when missed, one appeal to a different reviewer, and an evidence pack that grades every case the same way.
Money is held and nobody says why
What's been reportedReviews of a large global escrow site mention slow timelines, funds held for long periods without clear reasons, unresponsive support and changing policies. That summary rests on a sample of 40 reviews.2
AmanaEvery escrow says who it is waiting on, when it is due and why. Each order is stamped with the terms version it was created under, so later changes never reach back.
Escrow that sellers can only use by leaving
What's been reportedLaunch coverage of a Lagos escrow marketplace describes an app, with no developer access mentioned. The WhatsApp service's coverage mentions no API either.13
AmanaA REST API with signed webhooks. Your marketplace keeps the customer, the checkout and the support inbox.
Split payments are not escrow
What's been reportedPayment gateways divide money at checkout. One marketplace guide treats holding money until delivery as a model you design yourself, without saying who confirms delivery.4
AmanaThe hold, the courier confirmation, the timers, the disputes, the ledger and the payouts, behind one integration.
Summarised from public coverage and customer reviews. These services may have changed since. One source is a sponsored page, and another is a 2022 launch article. Sources are listed at the foot of the page.
1.5% when the order completes. Nothing when it doesn't.
There is a ₦50 minimum per order. Volume rates start at 1.3% by agreement. You choose, order by order, whether the seller, the buyer or both split the fee. A refund returns everything the buyer paid, fee included.
- Buyer pays
- Amana fee
- Seller receives
Four calls and a webhook handler.
Create the escrow, mark it funded, mark it shipped. The courier's system confirms delivery. Amounts are whole kobo, errors have one shape, and every create call takes an Idempotency-Key.
Sandbox returns the delivery code in the ship response so you can test the whole flow. In live mode the code goes only to the buyer's phone.
Webhooks are signed with HMAC-SHA256 and retried with backoff for up to eight attempts. Treat the event id as a key, because delivery is at least once.
Couriers get their own key and can only confirm shipments assigned to them.
Where Amana is today
The system is built and tested end to end. Real money comes after the custody and legal work, and not before.
Customer money should never sit in Amana's own bank account. Before live launch, funds will be held by a licensed partner bank, and the structure will have had a regulatory review.
Open for integration testing. Every endpoint works, including disputes, appeals and webhooks, with simulated payments and SMS.
Starting with a small group of marketplaces and WhatsApp sellers, one courier at a time.
Not open yet. It opens after a licensed custody partner is in place and the legal review is complete.
Get sandbox keys
Email us and we will send an integrator key, a courier key and a webhook secret. Tell us about your marketplace so we can plan the pilot around it.
- Your marketplace or store name
- Roughly how many orders you ship each month
- Which couriers you use today
Questions
What if the buyer says it never arrived?
If the buyer's own code was entered, that is the strongest evidence that the goods were received, and the reviewer sees it with the courier's events. If the courier confirmed without the code, the buyer already had a longer window to object, and the reviewer weighs the courier's note and proof against the buyer's account.
Which couriers does it work with?
Any courier whose system can call the Amana courier endpoint with a tracking id and the code. Each courier is registered with its own key. We add them one at a time during the pilot.
Can a rider and a seller cheat together?
They can try, and the design makes it costly. Without the buyer's code the confirmation is flagged, the buyer gets 72 hours instead of 48, and the courier's note and proof go to a reviewer. Every code-less confirmation is recorded and labelled, so unusual patterns by courier or by seller can be spotted and acted on.
How big can an order be?
In this first version, from ₦1,000 to ₦5,000,000 per escrow.
What does the buyer see?
Two or three text messages. One with the delivery code when the order ships, one when it is marked delivered, and one 12 hours before the seller is paid. Your marketplace can show the same information in its own app through the API and webhooks.
What does Amana mean?
In Hausa, amana is something entrusted to someone's care.