Addis Ababa Institute of Technology

Center of Information Technology and Scientific

Computing
Department of Software Engineering
Billing System for Ethiopian Community
Software Requirements Specification

Team Members
Girmay Tadese
Hana Tesfaye
Kalab Amare
Kaleab Taye
Mahlet Workneh
Meron Zerihun

Advisors: Mr. Fitsum Alemu

Date
Revision History

Date Description Author Comments

April 4,2018 Version 1.0 Team Abogida Draft
April 9, 2018 Version 2.0 Team Abogida Second Edition

Document Approval

The following Software Requirements Specification has been accepted and approved by the
following:
Signature Printed Name Title Date
Fitsum Alemu Instructor, ITSE-2171
Table of Contents

DOCUMENT APPROVAL ............................................................................................................II

LIST OF TABLES ........................................................................................................................ IV
LIST OF FIGURES ....................................................................................................................... V
DEFINITIONS, ACRONYMS, AND ABBREVIATIONS ......................................................... VI
DECLARATION ......................................................................................................................... VII
1. INTRODUCTION ...................................................................................................................... 1
1.1 PURPOSE ................................................................................................................................ 1
1.2 SCOPE..................................................................................................................................... 1
1.3 OVERVIEW ............................................................................................................................. 1
2. GENERAL DESCRIPTION ....................................................................................................... 1
2.1 PRODUCT PERSPECTIVE .......................................................................................................... 1
2.2 PRODUCT FUNCTIONS............................................................................................................. 1
2.3 USER CHARACTERISTICS ........................................................................................................ 2
2.4 GENERAL CONSTRAINTS ........................................................................................................ 2
3. SPECIFIC REQUIREMENTS .................................................................................................... 2
3.1 EXTERNAL INTERFACE REQUIREMENTS ................................................................................. 3
3.1.1 User Interfaces ............................................................................................................... 3
3.1.2 Hardware Interfaces ...................................................................................................... 4
3.1.3 Software Interfaces ........................................................................................................ 4
3.1.4 Communications Interfaces............................................................................................ 5
3.2 Functional Requirements .................................................................................................. 5
3.2.1 <Functional Requirement or Feature #1> .................................................................... 5
3.2.2 <Functional Requirement or Feature #2> .................................................................... 5
3.3 USE CASES ............................................................................................................................. 5
3.3.1 Use Case #1 ................................................................................................................... 5
3.3.2 Use Case #2 ................................................................................................................... 5
3.4 NON-FUNCTIONAL REQUIREMENTS........................................................................................ 5
3.4.1 Performance ................................................................................................................... 5
3.4.2 Reliability ....................................................................................................................... 5
3.4.3 Availability ..................................................................................................................... 5
3.4.4 Security........................................................................................................................... 5
3.4.5 Maintainability ............................................................................................................... 5
3.4.6 Portability ...................................................................................................................... 5
3.5 INVERSE REQUIREMENTS ....................................................................................................... 5
3.6 DESIGN CONSTRAINTS ........................................................................................................... 6
3.7 LOGICAL DATABASE REQUIREMENTS .................................................................................... 6
3.8 OTHER REQUIREMENTS .......................................................................................................... 6
4. CHANGE MANAGEMENT PROCESS .................................................................................... 6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................ 7
A. APPENDICES............................................................................................................................ 8
A.1 APPENDIX 1 ........................................................................................................................... 8
A.2 Appendix 2 ........................................................................................................................... 8
List of Tables
List of figures
Definitions, Acronyms, and Abbreviations

CCS3- Stands for Cascading Style Sheet version 3 which is used to style web pages.
HTML5- Hyper Text Markup Language version 5.
HTTP- Hyper Text Transfer Protocol.
JavaScript- A scripting programming language that is mostly used to make websites more
interactive.
PHP – A Programming language that is used to build the back-end processes such as database
manipulation of a website.
DECLARATION
We declare that this written submission represents our ideas in our own words and where
others’ ideas or words have been included. We have adequately cited and referenced the
original sources. We also declare that we have adhered to all principles of academic
honesty and integrity and have not misrepresented or fabricated or falsified any
idea/data/fact/source in our submission. We understand that any violation of the above will
be cause for disciplinary action by the Institute and can also evoke penal action from the
sources which have thus not been properly cited or from whom proper permission has not
been taken when needed.

Group NO Team 3 Date: xx-xx-2016

 Billing system for Ethiopian community 2018

1. Introduction
This section provides the general idea of the purpose, the scope and description of this SRS
Documentation.

1.1 Purpose
The intention of this SRS document is to supply a clear and concise description of the
requirements that are intended to be met in this project. This document is intended to the
personnel in the “Lehulu Kifiya” organization that is concerned with public and social affairs and
also the system maintenance head and authorities and other related sect heads and officials that
fully understand the billing system that is currently in use.

This documentation gives an outlook of structure and implementation of the system and also its
features and functionalities. It also provides a description of the system’s interface and its
interaction with external systems or applications.

1.2 Scope
“Efoy” payment package is a web application that is intended to replace the drawbacks that are
seen in the already existing services-billing system by an online system that facilitates a simpler
and better billing service for customers as well as a simpler way for maintaining the transaction
process.

The following provides a listing of the basic features of this system:

 Users will be able to pay their bills via this system at any place they wish to perform their
transaction as long as internet is available.
 This system enables users to pay their bills directly from their bank account.
 It verifies the account of user’s and authenticates the access of authorized company
personnel.
 Company’s authorized personnel will be responsible for submitting the amount of bills
for the respective services used by customers.
 This system will be compatible to different devices like mobile phones, personal
computers and tablets.
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 Users can print out the transaction bill if they desire.

 This system enables the authorized personnel to manage users’ bill through online
database and checking without having to manually search and store papers.
 This system provides notification for the user when the deadline reaches.
 This system provides away for users to comment on the services they are provided with
and also file any complaint about the services.

1.3 Overview
This document is structured into subdivided chapters which convey particular ideas to achieve a
better understanding of the aims and structure of the system.

The second chapter will give a description of the system’s relationship with other similar systems
and the system’s functionalities. It will also give a general description of the assumed common
users of the product. It will include constraints and assumptions that should be considered while
designing the system.

The third chapter will contain a detailed explanation of the software requirements that will be
helpful in designing the system. It will also give us a general insight of how the interaction
between the user and the system will be. It will also give a highlight of the different hardware,
software and communication interfaces that are deployed to serve their interaction. It will
describe the functional, non-functional and other different requirements that are consider in the
project.

The fourth chapter will describe the measures that would be taken to manage any change in
scope or requirements that might happen during the development process of our system.

2. General Description
2.1 Product Perspective
Many countries have deployed a service-billing system that enables users perform their
transaction online. Different companies deploy online billing systems in different fields like real
estates, hospitals, hotels and many others.

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Online systems that bill customers for services like water, telecom and power have been
deployed and most of them are handled disjoint as separate services.

A regionalized water billing system was introduced in the city of Johannesburg to simplify and
improve its billing processes and enhance accuracy. The billing system enables customers to
choose their due dates to pay their bills. Making the billing system at regional level enables to
keep track of the pattern of the regional water usage for drafting and implementing regional
water efficiency programs.

Since the “Efoy” payment package is the first of its kind in our country, it will aim at achieving
the basic things that any billing system should do that is to provide a secure online based
payment system. Upgrades like tracking patterns and letting customers choose due dates will be
more appropriate after deploying the basic functionalities of the system.

The system that is going to be developed is inspired by the Johannesburg water billing system
structure n some aspects but chooses to merge the bills of the services(water, power and
telecom) since the service provider in our country is a single body which makes handling the
services together more manageable.

2.2 Product Functions

The product in general will have the following major functions:
 The product will allow users to pay their bills from where ever they want to do the
transaction using their computers or smart phones.
 The product will notify users their monthly fee deadline.
 Users will be provided with an ease of access to report their complaint regarding the
system.
 Super privileged users (company employees) will be able upload the exact amount of
usage that the user has consumed.
A more detailed and clear functionality of the product will be discussed in section 3 of this
document

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2.3 User Characteristics

[2]
In a survey conducted in 2017 only 15.3% of people living in Ethiopia had access to Internet
connection. Though growing, the access to mobile phones and computers is also not satisfactory
our country. According to these facts users of this product usually will be from urban areas and
with an access of Internet service. Users using this product must be at least be familiar with the
use and access of Internet as well as computing devices such as computer.

For professional users such as the database administrators are expected to efficiently interact
with the back-end system when update is required or the system crashes.

Finally for the super privileged users, they also need to be acquainted with the basics of
computing devices and usage of Internet. If that is not possible we will give training on the usage
of the product as discussed in section 3.8

2.4 General Constraints

General Constraints are limitations imposed on the project, such as the limitation of cost,
schedule, or resources. Simply there will be constraints that will limit the system from full
implementation.
Some of them are listed below.
a) Security- The user and system data will be kept on a server and necessary precautions ought to
be taken by professionals for the data not to be compromised. But at the time happening of
system crashing it might not be responsive for the users during transaction of their billing
system.
b) Criticality of the application- The system is important to the people for the availability of
online billing system.
c) Reliability Requirement- The system shall be available for 24 hours
d) Language Constraint-Although the website is intended for the use of all Ethiopian users and
must be able to understand the language in which the website is displayed in.But there might be
limitation with those who have not previously interacted with sites.

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2.5 Assumptions and Dependencies

The assumption we took in consideration when using the product is that users have a bank
account they can use to carry out their payment.

3. Specific Requirements
3.1 External Interface Requirements
3.1.1 User Interfaces

3.1.2 Hardware Interfaces

The system has no hardware interface requirements.

3.1.3 Software Interfaces

Since the system is a web-based platform working on any of devices like desktop computer,
Tablet, mobile phone, the browser of this devices should support HTML5, CSS3, JavaScript and
PHP.

3.1.4 Communications Interfaces

Ethiopian Billing system is a web-based system, using HTTP protocol as its means of
communication with the client computer and the server.

3.2 Functional Requirements

3.2.1 FR:01 – Registering to the system

Table 1:Registering to the system

ID FR:01
Name Registering to the system
Summary The user will have an account to access the
system.
Description The system provides the user with a list of
form that must be filled appropriately. The user
then provides the all the fields necessary
required to have a legit account. After that the
system will check for the information’s validity
and approves the user to have an account.
Dependency None

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References UC-01

3.2.2 FR:02 – Displaying the Bills of the three Services

Table 2: FR: 02 - Displaying the Bills of the three Services

ID FR:02
Name Displaying the bills of the three services
Summary The system will display the bills of the three
services.
Description The system shall display the bills of the
provided services with the proper description
of how the user is billed.
Dependency
References UC-03

3.2.3 FR:03 – Paying bills

Table 3 : FR:03 – Paying bills

ID FR:03
Name Paying bills
Summary The user will pay the exact amount of money
he/she is billed.
Description The system shall provide a sub system that
Handles the online payment of bills.
Dependency
References UC-04

3.2.4 FR:04 – Deadline notification

Table 4 : FR:04 – Deadline notification

ID FR:04
Name Deadline notification
Summary The system displays a notify message about the

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deadline of the payment.

Description The system shall notify the user about the
deadline for making payments.
Dependency
References

3.2.5 FR:05 – Imposing fine

Table 5 : FR:05 – Imposing fine

ID FR:05
Name Imposing Fine
Summary The user will be fined according to the
methods used in the current system.
Description The system shall disclose information about
the additional payment imposed on the user if
the payment deadlines are not met. The
penalization methods are the same with the
existing system that is still in action.
Dependency
References

3.2.6 FR:06 – Comments regarding the system

Table 6 : FR:06 – Comments regarding the system

ID FR:06
Name Comments regarding the system
Summary
Description The system shall provide a way to take
comments related to the billed services as well
as the actual billing system.
Dependency
References UC-05

3.2.7 FR:07- Printing the Receipt

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Table 7 : 7 FR:07- Printing the Receipt

ID FR:07
Name Printing the receipt
Summary The user will be provided with a receipt as an
approval of the transaction.
Description The system shall allow the user to print out the
receipt that shows the validation of the
transaction.
Dependency
References

3.2.8 FR:08- Allowing Company Authorized personnels to update the user’s service usage

Table 8 : FR:08- Allowing Company Authorized personnels to update the user’s service usage
ID FR:08
Name Allowing Company Authorized personnel to
Update the user’s service usage
Summary
Description The system shall authorize access for the
company employers to update the service
usage and the corresponding charge of the user
Dependency
References UC-06

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3.3 Use Cases

3.3.1 UC-01: Registering a user

Use case name: UC-01: Registering a user
Primary Actors: Ordinary user
Summary: The user will have an account to access the system
Preconditions: The user is on the System’s first page
Post-conditions:
Trigger: The user requests to sign up to the system
Main Success Scenario
1. The user chooses the sign up option.
2. The system requires the user to fill up the form that is displayed on the screen.

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3. The user fills all the necessary fields such as full name, password, Account number and
Bill number.
4. The system validates the user inputs.
5. The user now have a valid account to login in to the system.
Extensions
4a. The user doesn’t have a bank account.
4a.1. The system asks the user to create a bank account.
4b. The user doesn’t have a Bill number.
4.b.1 The system requires the user to register to one of the three services to properly
acquire Billing number.

3.3.2 UC-02: Login to the system

Use case name: UC-02: Login to the system
Primary Actors: Ordinary user and company authorized personnel
Summary: The user will be able to access the system according to his level of authority
Preconditions: The user is on the System’s first page
Post-conditions:
Trigger: The user requests to login to the system
Main Success Scenario
1. The user chooses the login option.
2. The system displays the login page.
3. The user fills his/her full name and password to the required fields.
4. The system validates the account.
5. The system displays the respective page with respect to the user’s privilege.
Extensions
4a. Incorrect password
4a.1 The user will be prompted to enter the correct password.
3.3.3 UC-03: Viewing amount of usage
Use case name: UC-03: viewing amount of usage
Primary Actors: Ordinary user
Summary: The user will have access to see the amount he/she have used
Preconditions: UC-02
Post-conditions:
Trigger: The user chooses to see the usage option
Main Success Scenario
1. The user selects the check usage option from the menu.
2. The system displays the check usage page on the screen.
3. The user checks the exact amount of usage he/she has consumed.
3.3.4 UC-04: Paying bill
Use case name: UC-04: Paying bill
Primary Actors: Ordinary user
Summary: The user will pay his/her bills
Preconditions: UC-02
Post-conditions:
Trigger: The user chooses to see the pay bill option
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Main Success Scenario

1. The user selects the pay bill option from the menu.
2. The system displays the pay bill page.
3. The system displays the amount the user used and the charge.
4. The user clicks the pay button.
5. The system redirects the user to the page where the transaction occurs.
6. The user enters his/her bank account number and password for the payment to take place.
7. The sub system checks the validity and provide the user with a receipt number.
8. The user then returns back to the pay bill page to validate the payment by the receipt
number provided from the bank.
9. The system validates the payment.
Extensions
7a. Insufficient balance
7.a.1 The system requests the user to the sufficient amount of money in his bank
account.
9.a INCORRECT receipt number
9.a.1 The system requests the user to enter the correct receipt number
3.3.5 UC-05: comments regarding the system
Use case name: UC-05: comments regarding the system
Primary Actors: Ordinary user
Summary: The user comments on the system’s functionality
Preconditions: UC-02
Post-conditions:
Trigger: The user requesting to comment on the system
Main Success Scenario
1. The user selects the comment option.
2. The system displays the comment page.
3. The user writes the comment regarding the system.
4. The user submits the comment.
5. The system confirms the user that the comment has been successfully submitted.
3.3.6 UC-06: Uploading user data
Use case name: UC-06: uploading user data
Primary Actors: company Authorized personnel
Summary: The user submits the correct amount of usage that a customer has used.
Preconditions: UC-02
Post-conditions:
Trigger:
Main Success Scenario
1. The user fills the correct amount of usage for the services that a customer has used.
2. The system stores the data for the respective user.

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3.4 Non-Functional Requirements

3.4.1 Performance
The system should perform efficiently as long as it isn’t limited by the Internet speed. The
response time of an enquiry for billing information from a client shouldn’t take more than half a
minute to respond.
3.4.2 Reliability
The system should be reliable in providing the correct billing information related to the accessed
user account. It should also save the current information so that if any malfunction occurs the
client can be able to access it.
3.4.3 Availability
The system shall be available to the user as long as Internet connection is available.
3.4.4 Security
The system shall be secured regarding the user account control and the online payment process.
3.4.5 Maintainability
The system shall be flexible to changes and shouldn’t be hard to manage.
3.4.6 Portability
The system’s interoperability shall cover almost every platform that is, it should work on
different devices such as mobile phones, tablets, laptop & desktop computers and on all
browsers.

3.5 Inverse Requirements

The system is only for users who already have been using one of the three services. It does not
support a direct registry into these services. For users who don’t currently use these services,
First they have to register to one or more of the provided services from the respective companies,
After that users shall be able to sign up to the system without any problem keeping in mind they
provide the other necessary information correctly.

Secondly, the system won’t provide any service without the use of Internet. The system won’t be
accessed by offline usage.

3.6 Design Constraints

. The project may cost more than our current financial status.

. need to be adveraized well which ask allot effort time and money.

. the project needs more time than we have.

. the system uses account to account transfer so all customers should have a back account. The
society could misunderstand the system like it have more process to apply.

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. the system to some how forces the organization to make change on the over all activity.

. the system needs few employee to manage. So if our system is going to be applied by the
organization some employees could be redundant and may be faired. So for that reason to some
how we may face nonacceptance or rejection form some employees.

3.7 Logical Database Requirements

Tables Attributes Purpose of the table

User data name Used to identify, track and store
password information about a user that is
Bill no registered and using the product.
usage
Charge
date

Authorized company personnel Name Used to authenticate super

Password privileged users in to the system
for uploading data for customers.
Bank System Account number Used to replicate or simulate a
account password bank system that will be able to
receipt number provide a receipt number after a
successful transaction.
Validator receipt number Used to validate the receipt
bill no number provided by the bank.

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3.8 Other Requirements

Training-related Requirements

In case the special privileged users won’t be sufficiently interactive with the product, we will
arrange an apprenticeship program to demonstrate the functions of the product and its benefits.
The apprenticeship will last for three depending how the apprentices respond to the
demonstration.

Packaging Requirements

The system is going to be delivered as a web based platform. As a result there is no need to
include packaging requirements such as installation supporting README files.

Legal Requirements
The owner of the system will acquire legal documents regarding when and how the system was
developed.

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4. Change Management Process

As changes are inevitable in everyday life we need to find ways of tackling them without
completely destroying our progress. If there is a request to change the scope or requirement of
the project it shall be notified to all group members prior to the weekly meeting via
communication Medias so that every team member can thoroughly think it through and give
suggestions at the weekly meeting. If the request is from a client then the team member who
contacted the client shall notify the others group members in the same manner. If the changes are
found to be effective in all scenarios by each team member or the majority, the SRC shall be
reviewed again and the changes shall be implemented.

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References
[1] Arisema Mezgebe, Eman Semsu, Hawi Tesfaye, Hayat Delil, Iman Abdulselam, Mahder
Haileslasse, Meba Feyissa (April 2016), Software Requirement Specification Document, Ayate
Ethiopian Home Remedies
[2] Internet World Stats, www.internetworldstats.com/africa , 15/03/2018, 9:14 pm

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A. Appendices

A.1 Appendix 1

A.2 Appendix 2

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