Price methodology

The research team collected public websites, tariff documents, product pages, news and official social posts. Official sources were preferred; secondary sources retain confidence flags. Superseded rows are excluded. A citation is evidence of a published claim, not confirmation by an institution. The September 24 consolidation contains 5,388 records and 61 institutions. The 103 superseded records are retained in the internal source history; the site displays 5,285 records. Historical, proposed and unconfirmed records retain their status and do not enter calculations. Single quoted amounts may occupy only value_min in the research CSV.

A flat fee is quoted directly. A percentage fee is amount × rate ÷ 100, with published floors and caps. Tiered fees use the published amount band. Unparsed bounds and extra mandatory charges prevent a complete-cost comparison. Prices excluding VAT are flagged and are not grossed up.

Simple interest = amount × annual rate ÷ 100 × days ÷ 365. The configured illustration deducts 5% withholding tax from interest. ETB 50,000 at 7% for 365 days gives ETB 3,500 gross and ETB 3,325 after that deduction. Eligibility and tax treatment must be checked with the provider. A profit-sharing ratio alone cannot determine birr earnings.

Published rate cost = principal × rate ÷ 100 × days ÷ published period days. Explicitly linked upfront charges are added to the illustrated charge subtotal and shown separately. Single-repayment annualised cost = (1 + disclosed charges ÷ principal)^(365 ÷ days) − 1. This assumes full principal is received and all included charges are paid at the end; actual fee deductions, timing and instalments change APR. Unpriced charges and late/prepayment penalties are excluded. A 0.1–0.4% daily rate on ETB 10,000 for 30 days gives ETB 300–1,200 in rate cost before other charges.

For a stated full-term markup, principal × (1 + markup ÷ 100) gives the principal plus markup. A 23% markup on ETB 100,000 gives ETB 123,000 before any separately stated fees. The original markup and tenor must accompany the number. A markup that varies by an unstructured tenor cannot be ranked.

Calculated fees are ordered from lower to higher; earnings from higher to lower. Values within 0.5% of a group’s first value are labelled “About the same”, ordered alphabetically, and share a position. Each group is anchored on its first value to avoid chaining near-equal results. No advertising or payment affects the order. The current published-price tables are unranked.

The collection date is not the publisher’s effective date. Missing publisher dates remain unknown. A publisher date more than 365 days before collection is flagged. Month-only and year-only dates retain their precision; their Ethiopian-calendar equivalents are shown as spans. Pre-2020 dates may be Ethiopian-calendar dates in the source and remain flagged for review.

A missing price is never zero. Unparsed tiers, unknown bounds, rates relative to an unstated base, ceiling-only rates and unsupported charging methods cannot determine a comparable amount. Conventional and MFI loan rates stay as published; a quoted rate or flat method alone does not establish a complete repayment schedule. A percentage without an annual time basis is not an annual interest rate. Exchange rates are not in this dataset, so receiving fees do not determine birr received from abroad.