KENYA · GUIDE 0200 · EDITION 4.2
Drinking water delivery coordination in Kenya: Risks and Launch Plan
Set the conditions for a safe commercial test
- unverified supplier
- damaged seals
The margin disappears when customers expect doorstep carrying beyond the agreed access point or the coordinator absorbs repeated journeys for unavailable recipients without clear terms.
A risk list is useful only when it changes a decision. For each risk, write the observable warning, who checks it and the response before the next commitment. Do not treat a reserve of money as permission to continue unsafe or unauthorized work.
Use a small, measurable pilot
Confirm supplier authorization and traceability, then test a short delivery round.
The pilot scope is: Build the coordination offer around a verified sealed-water supplier and a delivery area, clarifying responsibility for stairs, unloading, damaged packs, and customer absence.
| Gate | Evidence before continuing |
|---|---|
| Scope agreed | Build the coordination offer around a verified sealed-water supplier and a delivery area, clarifying responsibility for stairs, unloading, damaged packs, and customer absence. |
| Output acceptable | Check a trial handover against the supplier invoice and customer order, confirming seals, pack counts, product identity, and an accessible place for receiving. |
| Costs recorded | Include supplier collection waiting, loading assistance, failed delivery attempts, phone coordination, and damaged packs whose replacement requires another journey rather than a simple refund. |
| Buyer response recorded | Record supplier batch information, ordered and delivered pack counts, access conditions, seal complaints, waiting minutes, redelivery causes, and the actual cost of resolving shortages. |
Stage the launch around prerequisites
First confirm the buyer specification and activity requirements. Then compare suppliers, establish suitable facilities and prepare the operating record. Run the bounded trial when those prerequisites are in place. Review actual costs, quality failures and cash collected before increasing the commitment.
This sequence is not a promise that the complete business cycle fits into 30 days. Growing periods, qualifications, approvals, seasonal access and customer buying cycles can require longer. Revise the schedule when a prerequisite changes rather than skipping it to meet a launch date.
Choose continue, revise, pause or stop
Continue only when the scoped result is accepted and direct costs and payment timing are workable. Revise one part of the offer if the problem is identifiable and affordable to test again. Pause when required information, permission, skills or resources are missing. Stop the affected work when safety, consent or lawful authority is uncertain.
Keep a maximum test loss and unpaid-balance limit suited to your actual funds. A successful single delivery is useful evidence, but it does not establish year-round demand or justify committing every available resource.
Tie launch milestones to observable checks
| Risk signal | Evidence to inspect | Response to test |
|---|---|---|
| A water-unit seal is broken | Inspect the original twenty-litre unit and supplier/dispatch record before loading and at handover. Do not interpret a shop-applied cap sticker as the producer’s original seal. | Segregate and return the affected unit through the supplier’s process. Do not refill, recap or sell it as a sealed original unit. |
| An empty-unit deposit is disputed | First confirm whether the actual Maisha SKU uses a returnable-unit arrangement. Then reconcile authorised customer ledger, unit identity and agreed deposit conditions. | Resolve the specific mismatch before posting a credit or charge. Keep refundable deposits separate from delivery/service income; do not assume every twenty-litre container is returnable. |
| A purity claim lacks evidence | Compare the proposed claim with the actual producer’s documentation for the named SKU. Supplier branding alone does not certify treatment performed by the coordinator. | Remove unsupported wording and describe only the original sealed-unit delivery scope. Request current producer evidence before using a specific certification or quality claim. |
Illustrative acceptance decision
Fictional worked acceptance/rejection decision: Tenunits load; nineare accepted and one has a broken seal at the last stop. Record 9 deliveries and one rejected unit returned to supplier. Do not charge 10 completed deliveries or repair the cap to close the route.
This is a teaching scenario, not a reported operator result.
Outstanding go / hold conditions
- No operator trial, field test or specialist approval was performed. The acceptance decision is fictional and the specified checks remain to be carried out.
- Current stock, tax, delivery, unobserved input rates and applicable local approvals require direct verification; source scope does not validate the whole business.
Assign an owner, evidence reference and review date to each unresolved condition. Do not give every milestone a fixed calendar date when it depends on a crop, production, approval or competence cycle. Run only a suitable limited trial, reconcile accepted output and actual cash, and record whether the evidence supports holding, revising, proceeding within the limit or stopping.