I’ve been exploring an idea called GroupVault* — a collaborative treasury platform designed for shared group goals and pooled money management.
The core concept is simple:
- Multiple people join a shared pool
- Everyone contributes transparently
- The group collectively approves payouts
- Refunds happen proportionally if plans get cancelled
- Contribution history remains visible to all members
The goal is not to replace banks, wallets, or UPI apps.
Instead, the idea focuses on solving collaborative money coordination problems such as:
- trip planning
- group events
- shared goals
- temporary community funds
- pooled collections
Some important product principles:
- minimum 2 members required per pool
- voting/approval-based payout system
- transparent contribution ledger
- proportional refund mechanism
- short-term goal-based pools
- shared treasury control instead of single-person control
The broader idea behind GroupVault* is:
Shared money should not depend entirely on one person’s control.
What GroupVault does differently
GroupVault is a group wallet where money is pooled by all members and locked until the group collectively decides to release it. No single person — not even the person who created the group — can withdraw the money alone.
Here is how it works:
- Friends create a vault together (minimum 2 people, maximum 6 months duration)
- Each member contributes money into the shared pool (minimum ₹100 per person, maximum ₹50,000 total pool)
- Money leaves everyone’s accounts immediately and is held centrally
- When someone wants to release the funds, they create a payout proposal — naming a recipient and a reason
- Every member votes — Yes or No
- Only when a majority approves does the money transfer to the recipient’s bank account or UPI
- If the group cancels the plan, every member gets back exactly what they contributed — proportionally, automatically
The voting mechanism
This is the core of the product. Any member can propose a payout at any time. The proposal includes who should receive the money and why. All members are notified immediately and get a voting window (default 72 hours). Votes are visible to everyone — no secret ballots. If majority approves before the window closes, the transfer triggers automatically. If not, the money stays locked and a new proposal can be raised.
The recipient can be anyone in the group — decided by the vote, not by whoever created the vault. This makes it useful for trip bookings, group gifts, shared purchases, or any situation where a group needs to move money together with full transparency.
The refund mechanism
If the group decides to cancel, a cancellation proposal goes through the same voting process. Once approved, every member receives back their exact contribution amount automatically. The app calculates each person’s share from the ledger and triggers individual refunds. No manual sorting out. No one person deciding who gets what back.
Why existing apps don’t solve this
Google Pay and PhonePe are great for splitting bills — but the money never gets locked. Anyone can send it anywhere at any time. Splitwise only tracks who owes what — it holds no money at all. PayPal Pools and similar apps let the organiser withdraw unilaterally. None of them have a consensus mechanism that prevents any single person from controlling the funds.
GroupVault’s core difference is simple: the vault belongs to the group, not any individual.
Current status
This is the idea and spec stage. I have a full product specification written including the complete feature set, voting logic, edge cases, fee breakdown, database schema, and build timeline. Development starts this month.
If you have tried to save money with a group of friends and had it go wrong — this is the problem I am trying to solve. If you want to follow along or be an early beta tester when it is ready, feel free to reach out.
Tags: GroupVault, indie dev, fintech, group savings, side project, UPI, India
This post serves as a public documentation of the concept and architecture behind:
- collaborative pooled treasury systems
- voting-based payout governance
- proportional refund flows
- transparent shared contribution tracking
* - Can be changed in future.