Kandua, a wholly owned Santam subsidiary, has launched Jess, South Africa’s first AI-powered home companion designed to improve trust, safety and certainty in the home-services sector.
Source: Supplied.
The conversational platform introduces an “Uberised” model for home maintenance, using “Ask Jess” and “Book a Job” functionality to guide users from problem diagnosis to job completion. It connects homeowners, residents and small businesses with vetted service providers through a streamlined, AI-driven experience that simplifies property maintenance and improves service transparency.
Vinolan Pillay, chief executive officer of Kandua, describes Jess as a platform that redefines how property owners understand, manage and act on their home-repair or improvement needs.
“At its core, this is a force for good, creating better, more trusted experiences for homeowners, while unlocking sustainable opportunity and growth for vetted service providers,” he said.
“We saw an opportunity to rethink how homeowners engage with home services. By combining AI, data, and cloud, Jess creates a personalised, context-aware experience that replaces static forms and fragmented processes building a connected ecosystem that delivers better outcomes and unlocks new value for both homeowners and providers,” added Pillay.
Beyond the AI-assisted diagnosis, Jess supports users throughout the booking journey, providing cost benchmarks, flagging possible complications, and reducing drop-off by keeping users within a single conversational flow.
“Importantly, this isn’t AI for the sake of it. Jess delivers practical value by improving transparency and helping homeowners make more informed decisions as well as assisting service providers to provide an improved service,” said Pillay.
Rigorous provider vetting
The launch follows Santam’s 2024 acquisition of Kandua, which formed part of the insurer’s strategy to expand digital innovation and deepen its support for small businesses and service providers.
Jess introduces what Pillay describes as one of the most stringent vetting processes in the global home-services marketplace.
“Jess service providers are required to undergo identity verification, criminal background checks, certification validation and business-registration checks before being accepted onto the platform,” said Pillay.
Jess has also shifted away from a traditional “pay-per-lead” model, instead enabling one-to-one job matching, where service providers are only connected to work, they are fully equipped to complete. This aligns incentives across the platform and reduces wasted time and costs on both sides of the marketplace.
