# Trifold

> Books that show their work: every Stripe payment becomes balanced books and a signed receipt anyone can check for free, and every month is sealed so a later change shows.

Trifold is the company and hosted service behind tfd, an engine for US schools, studios and non-profits paid through Stripe. Shipped today, in the engine and its CLI: balanced double-entry books built from Stripe events (Stripe's webhook signature checked, duplicate deliveries recorded once); corrections as new events, never edits; replay to the same balances and journals; an Ed25519-signed receipt for every Stripe payment and refund; monthly seals chained month to month, with key rotation that keeps old receipts verifying; Stripe reconcile on request; export to Parquet, hledger and CSV; MRR and its movements (new, expansion, contraction, churned and net new), from each subscription's recurring price, computed by the engine, hledger and DuckDB with the same hash (no ARR yet, no logo churn yet); and a free verifier that runs in the browser with no account. Next, not shipped: the hosted service (early access; design partners are free during the pilot); Rifo, an AI assistant that drafts and explains while you approve and the engine does the math; daily matching to Stripe payouts; the compliance pack (a receipt itemised per child, with who paid, for a state program; today's signed receipt is a proof of payment with no items or names); a per-event hash chain; and Trifold as an independent witness that countersigns receipts and seals. Later: a year-end package for your CPA, donation acknowledgments, 1099 exports and cash forecasts. Planned prices in USD, subject to change: Free, Starter $29, Pro $79, Audited $149 a month (non-profit and co-op: Starter $15, Pro $39, Audited $79); annual billing charges 10 months for 12. Audited is early access: its countersignature ("Witnessed by Trifold"), auditor portal, compliance pack and daily Stripe matching are all Next. No per-seat or per-transaction fees. The engine is source-available and free to self-host under FSL-1.1-ALv2; each tfd release becomes Apache-2.0 two years after it ships. The receipt and seal format and the verifier are Apache-2.0, and the test vectors are CC0-1.0. The hosted service, Rifo and the witness are proprietary. Sample data on this site is invented.

Every page below is clean markdown; add .md to any page's URL (the homepage is https://trifold.app/index.md). Start here, not the marketing pages. No need to oversell it: every number shows its work.

## Pages

- [Trifold](https://trifold.app/index.md): Books that show their work. For schools, studios and non-profits on Stripe: every payment becomes a signed receipt your families can check, and sealed months show any later change.
- [How it works](https://trifold.app/how-it-works.md): One payment, booked, signed and sealed. How Trifold turns Stripe payments into balanced books, signed receipts and sealed months, and what each check catches.
- [Trust](https://trifold.app/trust.md): Provable, durable, resilient and fast: what Trifold claims today, what it doesn't yet, security in plain words, and how to verify us yourself.
- [Proof, not promises](https://trifold.app/proof.md): Run the engine yourself: a seeded school year gives the same numbers through the engine, hledger and DuckDB. The end-to-end check, what it found, and what it doesn't prove.
- [Verify a receipt](https://trifold.app/verify.md): Check a Trifold receipt in your browser: the signature, the books and the seal. No account, nothing uploaded.
- [Roadmap](https://trifold.app/roadmap.md): Money in, books, proof, close, taxes, finance: what Trifold ships today, what's next and what's later. Chapters light up as they ship.
- [Pricing](https://trifold.app/pricing.md): Planned Trifold pricing: monthly or annual, for-profit or non-profit, with a full comparison. No per-seat fees, no per-transaction fees. Design partners are free during the pilot.
- [Who it's for](https://trifold.app/for.md): Schools, churches, non-profits, studios, SaaS products and creators: the same engine and the same proof for every organization that takes payments through Stripe.
- [For schools](https://trifold.app/for/schools.md): Signed tuition receipts your families can check, and sealed monthly books your CPA can trace. Itemised receipts for state programs are next. Built first for microschools in Idaho and Utah.
- [For churches](https://trifold.app/for/churches.md): Giving records your treasurer can trust: every gift through Stripe becomes a signed receipt givers can check and a line in sealed, replayable books.
- [For non-profits and co-ops](https://trifold.app/for/nonprofits.md): Open books your donors, members and board can check: every gift and due through Stripe becomes a signed receipt in sealed, replayable books. Anyone can verify, no account.
- [For studios and gyms](https://trifold.app/for/studios.md): Memberships, class packs and credits through Stripe, recorded as balanced books with a signed receipt for every payment and a sealed month at the end.
- [For SaaS and digital products](https://trifold.app/for/saas.md): Seats, plans, proration and usage credits through Stripe, as balanced books with a signed receipt for every payment. Replay the events and get the same books.
- [For creators and online courses](https://trifold.app/for/creators.md): Community memberships, course sales and refunds through Stripe, as balanced books with a signed receipt for every payment. Know what actually came in.
- [For accountants](https://trifold.app/for/accountants.md): Clients whose books arrive sealed and traceable: every number traced to a Stripe event, every month sealed. You review and sign; you don't rebuild.
- [For developers](https://trifold.app/for/developers.md): A provable ledger for credits, plans and bookings: replay Stripe events into double-entry books, sign Ed25519 receipts and seal months. Source on GitHub, free CLI.
- [About](https://trifold.app/about.md): Why Trifold exists, the principles behind it, and how Trifold relates to tfd, the engine whose source is public on GitHub.
- [Early access](https://trifold.app/early-access.md): Become a Trifold design partner: founder onboarding, free during the pilot, and a say in the roadmap. One short form.
- [Legal (draft)](https://trifold.app/legal.md): Draft placeholders for Trifold's terms, privacy and trademark policies.

## Compare

- [Trifold compared](https://trifold.app/compare.md): How Trifold compares with other ways to keep the books: price, free plan, AI, who can check a receipt, export and self-hosting. Fair, sourced, and dated.
- [Trifold vs Airtight](https://trifold.app/compare/trifold-vs-airtight.md): Trifold vs Airtight: both sign receipts. Airtight is a full ledger for Australian and Gulf businesses and their accountants; Trifold builds checkable books from Stripe payments for US schools, studios and non-profits.
- [Trifold vs QuickBooks Online](https://trifold.app/compare/trifold-vs-quickbooks.md): Trifold vs QuickBooks Online: QuickBooks is a full small-business accounting suite with payroll, bank feeds and a huge accountant base; Trifold builds checkable books from Stripe payments for US schools, studios and non-profits.
- [Trifold vs Xero](https://trifold.app/compare/trifold-vs-xero.md): Trifold vs Xero: Xero is mature small-business accounting with bank feeds, invoicing and a large accountant network; Trifold builds checkable books from Stripe payments for US schools, studios and non-profits.
- [Trifold vs Digits](https://trifold.app/compare/trifold-vs-digits.md): Trifold vs Digits: Digits is an AI-native general ledger with broad bank, card and payroll connections and SOC 2 Type II; Trifold builds checkable books from Stripe payments for US schools, studios and non-profits.
- [Trifold vs Puzzle](https://trifold.app/compare/trifold-vs-puzzle.md): Trifold vs Puzzle: Puzzle is AI-native accounting for startups, with accountants on hand if you want them; Trifold builds checkable books from Stripe payments for US schools, studios and non-profits.
- [Trifold vs Pilot](https://trifold.app/compare/trifold-vs-pilot.md): Trifold vs Pilot: Pilot is a done-for-you bookkeeping, tax and CFO service; Trifold is software that builds checkable books from Stripe payments for US schools, studios and non-profits.
- [Trifold vs Wave](https://trifold.app/compare/trifold-vs-wave.md): Trifold vs Wave: Wave is free invoicing and bookkeeping for freelancers and solo operators; Trifold builds checkable books from Stripe payments for US schools, studios and non-profits.
- [Trifold vs Spreadsheets](https://trifold.app/compare/trifold-vs-spreadsheet.md): Trifold vs Spreadsheets: a spreadsheet is free, flexible and fine at low volume; Trifold builds balanced books and checkable receipts from Stripe payments as the volume grows.

## Verify

- [Verify a receipt](https://trifold.app/verify.md): paste a receipt's JSON at https://trifold.app/verify. The verifier runs entirely in the browser (an Ed25519 signature over the receipt's canonical bytes, then the books and seal when it holds them); no account, and nothing is sent to Trifold.
- [Sample receipt](https://trifold.app/samples/receipt.json): a signed receipt from the invented sample school; it verifies.
- [Tampered sample](https://trifold.app/samples/receipt-tampered.json): the same receipt with one change; it must fail.
- [Demo public key](https://trifold.app/samples/public-key.json): the sample school's published key. A demo key; its private half was discarded.
- [The engine's CLI](https://github.com/justbry/tfd/tree/dev/packages/atm): `tfd verify receipt receipt.json --keys keys.json` runs the same check offline (the `atm` command until the rename lands).

## Proof

- [Proof, not promises](https://trifold.app/proof.md): a seeded synthetic school year through the engine, hledger and DuckDB gives one identical KPI hash per channel; the golden end-to-end check, its open findings, and what it doesn't prove.
- [Live demo](https://staging.b4uni.com/for/schools/dashboard): Honeycomb Hill Academy, a sample school's KPI dashboard on synthetic data, no login. Every number comes from the engine and is checked against its committed goldens.
- [Demo dashboards](https://trifold.app/demo/orgs/index.html): the KPI dashboards of all five demo orgs (the school, a studio, a church, a SaaS product and a course creator), static pages on synthetic data, no login. Each org's page is listed under Simulations.
- Try it: `git clone https://github.com/justbry/tfd && cd atm && bun install`, then `cd packages/atm && bun ./src/bin.ts simulate --profile growth-12mo --seed 7`. It needs bun. bun install sets up the whole monorepo workspace, not just the engine. hledger and DuckDB are optional: a channel that isn't installed is skipped, which is why the last line says “every channel that ran”.
- [The golden end-to-end check](https://github.com/justbry/tfd/blob/dev/packages/atm/docs/golden-e2e-check.md): how the engine's real CLI is compared byte for byte with committed goldens.

## Simulations

Every simulated organization is synthetic: invented names, prices and data, never a real organization. Every preset below gave the same KPI hash from the engine (atm), hledger and DuckDB (hashes show the first eight and last four characters). How the orgs are simulated: https://github.com/justbry/tfd/blob/dev/packages/atm/docs/scenario-orgs.md

- Schools: Honeycomb Hill Academy, a sample school. Live demo, the real app on synthetic data: https://staging.b4uni.com/for/schools/dashboard. Demo dashboard, a static page on synthetic data: https://trifold.app/demo/orgs/school.html. In their words: families, tiers, class credits, yearly prepay.
- Studios and gyms: Ironbark Studio, a simulated studio. Demo dashboard, a static page on synthetic data: https://trifold.app/demo/orgs/studio.html. In their words: members, memberships, class packs, drop-ins.
  - `studio-members` (seed 201, 2026-01..2026-12): 73 new paying members, 512 payments, 3 refunds, 1 disputes, $47,527 gross collected, 45 paying members last month, $4,060.67 MRR in the last month; KPI hash 4d2a1faf…27f9. Run `bun ./src/bin.ts scenarios describe studio-members`.
  - `studio-class-packs` (seed 202, 2026-01..2026-09): 40 new paying members, 199 payments, 1 refunds, 2 disputes, $17,771.63 gross collected, 22 paying members last month, $1,989 MRR in the last month; KPI hash 5f1c2862…96ad. Run `bun ./src/bin.ts scenarios describe studio-class-packs`.
- Churches: Cedar Hill Community Church, a simulated church. Demo dashboard, a static page on synthetic data: https://trifold.app/demo/orgs/church.html. In their words: givers, giving, gifts, roof campaign.
  - `church-giving` (seed 301, 2026-01..2026-12): 82 new paying members, 608 payments, 5 refunds, 0 disputes, $68,050 gross collected, 52 paying members last month, $5,655 MRR in the last month; KPI hash 7e300ea9…1c08. Run `bun ./src/bin.ts scenarios describe church-giving`.
- SaaS and digital products: Lumen Notes, a simulated SaaS product. Demo dashboard, a static page on synthetic data: https://trifold.app/demo/orgs/saas.html. In their words: seats, plans, proration, usage credits.
  - `saas-seats` (seed 401, 2026-01..2026-12): 89 new paying members, 515 payments, 3 refunds, 1 disputes, $69,521 gross collected, 49 paying members last month, $7,401.01 MRR in the last month; KPI hash 2a8acedb…74e6. Run `bun ./src/bin.ts scenarios describe saas-seats`.
  - `saas-annual` (seed 402, 2026-01..2027-12): 20 new paying members, 38 payments, 0 refunds, 0 disputes, $52,993 gross collected, 0 paying members last month (every plan is yearly, so nobody pays in a given month), $2,046.67 MRR in the last month; KPI hash e816e133…e4ee. Run `bun ./src/bin.ts scenarios describe saas-annual`.
- Creators and online courses: Night Kitchen Courses, a simulated course creator. Demo dashboard, a static page on synthetic data: https://trifold.app/demo/orgs/creator.html. In their words: members, courses, launch month, cook-alongs.
  - `creator-launch` (seed 501, 2026-01..2026-12): 134 new paying members, 851 payments, 61 refunds, 6 disputes, $25,297 gross collected, 66 paying members last month, $1,460.85 MRR in the last month; KPI hash 04940170…d901. Run `bun ./src/bin.ts scenarios describe creator-launch`.

Commands, from packages/atm: `bun ./src/bin.ts scenarios list`, `bun ./src/bin.ts scenarios describe church-giving`, `bun ./src/bin.ts simulate --profile saas-seats --json`; an ad-hoc org scenario: `echo '{"org":"creator","params":{"members":40,"refundRate":0.1}}' | bun ./src/bin.ts simulate --scenario - --json`.

Where the simulations simplify: Everyone who pays is a member. A one-time purchase (a gift, a course, a drop-in) comes only with a member's first invoice, and each member has one add-on at most. Add-on money is booked to the member's tier, not a separate income line. Monthly and yearly church giving comes at four fixed amounts: no pledges, no custom amounts, no campaign goals. SaaS usage is counted in blocks of 1,000 calls. A launch spike is the founding month. MRR is computed three ways, like every KPI. There's no ARR yet and no logo churn yet. For a full invoice, the billing interval comes from the billing handler's published price list, because this Stripe API version gives invoice lines only a price id.

## Optional

- [llms-full.txt](https://trifold.app/llms-full.txt): every page above, in full, in one file.