TaskPay

Inspiration

Our team was inspired by our mission to make education for the younger generation easier. Many people struggle with keeping up with schoolwork and end up falling behind, and some parents rely on motivating them with prizes, treats, and allowances. As technology continues to dominate the current world, we wanted to implement an easier way for both the parents and the children to experience transitioning to more complex education more modernized.

What it does

TaskPay allows parents to turn chores and schoolwork into profitable "jobs" for their children.

Parents create tasks like "Finish algebra homework" or "Do the dishes," and set a reward for each.
Children see the available tasks, claim one, and mark it complete when they're done.
Parents review the work. On approval, the reward goes straight to the child's balance.
Both can see the current balance and view the child's recent spending.

How we built it

React with Vite for the frontend while utilizing JSX, HTML, and CSS.
Supabase to store users, tasks, and transactions.
Node.js and Express to handle task changes and approvals.
Plaid (sandbox) to connect to a simulated bank account
Claude Code to help with debugging and ideas for improvement.

Challenges we ran into

Our biggest challenge was working concurrently in parallel. Parts of the frontend needed the backend, and parts of the backend needed the frontend, so we often wasted time waiting on development of the other. We got around it by building with placeholder data first, then replacing it with the real thing as each piece was ready.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We built a working version of the whole task loop, from a parent creating a task to the child's balance updating, in just a few days. We're also proud that a team new to these tools connected a database, a server, and a banking API into one app.

What we learned

We learned how to quickly research new frameworks, languages, APIs, and other technologies that we previously have never used before. This allowed us to develop a deeper understanding of unknown technologies in a fast-paced, time-sensitive manner.

What's next for TaskPay

Although this is a quick prototype demo, we want to be able to make the app usable with proper authentication and account services to allow real users to create accounts to log in. As of right now, the Parent and Child accounts are place holders of what future accounts can look like. We also have discussed wanting to expand the features in what types of tasks can be made and different ways the user can experience the process. However, we also have taken into consideration how we want to prioritize simplicity to make the user's experience more simple and intuitive.