One loop instead of two
A lead from WhatsApp, a trial, a membership, attendance, payment and the teacher's payslip — one chain and one database, with no reconciliation between systems.
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Umai CRM or Kommo:
one system or two
Kommo is a strong CRM for selling in messengers: official WhatsApp, Instagram, bots and AI agents in one inbox. But it has no classes, memberships, attendance or teacher payroll — for a learning center that means a second system. Add per-user pricing in dollars and an interface without Russian or Kazakh.
Updated 08.10.2026 · prices verified against vendors' official sites
In short
Kommo is built around the conversation: official WhatsApp, Instagram and TikTok in one inbox, no-code bots, AI agents. In its niche it is one of the best tools around, and there is no point pretending otherwise. The difference is that a learning center is not only about selling. Kommo has no timetable, no attendance, no memberships with balances, no teacher payroll and no parent portals, so a center almost always ends up running two systems and reconciling them by hand. Add pricing per user in dollars with a six-month minimum, a lead cap per user and an interface without Russian or Kazakh, and the picture for a center in Kazakhstan becomes clear.
Priced per center, not per person
In Umai the subscription is flat and in tenge: hire two more admins and the bill does not change. There is no cap on leads.
Kazakh, Kaspi, servers in Kazakhstan
A Kazakh interface, subscription paid in tenge, Kaspi POS and self-service QR payment by the parent, data held in Kazakhstan.
How we counted →Four scenes from
an ordinary day at a center
On the left, what happens. On the right, a live Umai screen — not a description of a feature.
Scene 01A WhatsApp enquiry
A WhatsApp enquiry
at 10:40 pm
A mother messages you on Saturday night. In Umai the conversation opens right inside the CRM: the AI bot answers on its own, knows the timetable and the open seats, books a trial class — and one tap on «Card» unfolds the lead beside it, with phone number, stage and owner.
Six months later, when that same mother comes back to renew, the whole conversation is in her card — not on the phone of an admin who has since left.
In UmaiChats are included in the «Advanced+» plan
In KommoThis is Kommo's strong side: official WhatsApp and Instagram in one inbox, bots answering on their own
Scene 02End of the month.
End of the month.
The teacher's payslip
The amount is calculated from the classes actually paid for in the period — allowing for substitutions, co-teaching and days off. The teacher sees the same payslip in the mobile app, so there is nothing to argue about.
Seven calculation schemes: per class, per hour, a share of payments, a share of working days, per day, salary, and salary plus a share.
In UmaiBuilt in, 7 calculation schemes
In KommoNo — teacher payroll is calculated outside the CRM
Scene 03The membership is running out.
The membership is running out.
It will not renew itself
Three classes before it ends, a robot messages the parent on WhatsApp and assigns a task to the admin, while the student's card moves to the «up for renewal» stage on the client board. Nobody has to remember anything — the event happens by itself.
Eighteen such scenarios come ready out of the box and switch on in two clicks: trial reminder, first visit, missed class, overdue payment, birthday. No integrator required.
In Umai18 ready templates, two clicks to enable
In KommoPipeline automation exists from the Advanced plan, but the event «the membership is running out» simply does not exist in the system
Scene 04Who owes money
Who owes money
right now
Not at month end after a reconciliation, but as a single number on the dashboard. For every debtor: the amount, the group and a «send a WhatsApp reminder» button. The debt appears by itself when a student attends a class and there is no payment.
The parent can clear it themselves: the portal and the mobile app show the remaining classes, the amount owed and a Kaspi QR payment.
In UmaiDebt is tied to the class and the membership
In KommoNo: no memberships, no student balance, no debt against classes
A comparison by the processes
of a learning center
Not a feature list, but what your day is actually made of: enquiries, classes, money, team.
Criterion
vertical, built for learning centers
Kommo
CRM for selling in messengers
Sales and communication
Lead board and sales pipeline
✓
✓
Board for active clients — renewals and churn
✓ board by membership stage
Sales pipelines exist; no board by membership stage
WhatsApp and Instagram inside the card ?
✓ in the «Advanced+» plan
✓
Bulk messaging: WhatsApp, push, email
✓
Available from the Advanced plan
Telephony with recordings linked to the card
✓ SipUni
Through marketplace integrations
Robots and auto-tasks driven by center events ?
✓ 18 ready templates
Pipeline automation from Advanced; no learning-center events
AI bot on WhatsApp that knows the timetable and open seats
✓ «AI» plan
AI agents exist; they do not know the timetable or open seats
AI review of chats and calls: sentiment, flag to the owner
✓ «AI» plan
AI conversation summaries exist; the volume is capped by plan credits
Teaching operations
Timetable: groups, one-to-one, substitutions, rooms
✓
No
Attendance with automatic deduction from the membership
✓
No
Memberships: freezes, balances, refunds, auto-renewal
✓
No
Curricula: level → course → lesson, student progression
✓
No
Homework, grades, progress journal
✓
No
Gamification: points, stickers, coins, leaderboard
✓
No
Money
Payments, debts, student balance
✓ linked to the class and the membership
Deals and amounts exist; no student balance or remaining classes
Online payments from students (Kaspi, card acquiring)
✓ Kaspi and Kazakh banks
Not found
Self-service QR payment in the parent portal
✓
Not found
Teacher payroll: 7 schemes, substitutions, co-teaching
✓
No
Extra sales and stock tracking
✓
No
Management and team
Plan/actual report: lead → visit → retention, 18 metrics
✓
Sales analytics from the Pro plan; no learning-center metrics
Roles, permission matrix, activity log
✓
✓
Branches and a network-wide overview
✓
We found no separate branch layer
Mobile apps (iOS/Android)
2 apps: one for students, parents and teachers, the other for admins and owners
There is an app — for the salesperson, not for teachers and parents
Student, parent and teacher portals
✓
No
Local fit and terms
Kazakh interface
✓
No; the interface is in English, Portuguese, Spanish, Indonesian and Turkish — no Russian either
Data stored in Kazakhstan
✓ Kazakhstan
Not found
Price depends on the number of students and staff
No flat subscription per center
Yes — per user, plus a lead cap per user
Implementation and training
Included on «Advanced+» and «AI»
A partner network, charged separately
Support
Free and unlimited
Yes; in English and four other languages
Cost of ownership ?
from 41 $/mo when paid annually
from $15 per user per month, minimum 6-month subscription *
Launch and onboarding
1–2 days
Depends on the setup
* Information about Kommo features and pricing comes from the official pricing page and other public sources. «Not found» means we found no description of such a capability in public sources, not that it does not exist.
Test it on your own data, not on a comparison table
Set up a couple of groups and a few leads during the trial week. We move your data from your previous system for you, free of charge.
What the table
does not show
The scenes above showed how it looks. Here are three things you only see over the long run: how the product is built, what the plan includes, and what the first year actually costs.
1
Kommo sells in messengers — and does it well
Let us start with the fair part: in its niche Kommo is strong. Official Meta partner status, WhatsApp, Instagram and TikTok in one inbox, a no-code bot builder, AI agents that answer common questions. If your job is selling in conversation, it is an excellent tool, and we will not pretend otherwise.
The question is what happens after the sale. The student has to be enrolled in a group, a class deducted from the membership, their absence noticed, the teacher paid for the classes they ran, and the parent shown the remaining balance and a payment button. None of that is in Kommo — and it need not be, that is not its job. So a second system appears, and with it a second subscription, a second support desk and a monthly reconciliation.
Bottom line. Price not the CRM but the stack: CRM plus a record system plus the admin's hours spent reconciling them.
2
Priced per person, and in dollars
Kommo is priced per user: Base $15, Advanced $25, Pro $45 a month when paid for six months. Pipeline automation, broadcasts and bots only appear from Advanced. On top come the limits: 2,500 leads per user on Base, AI credits on a meter, channels tied to user count. The minimum subscription is six months, paid in dollars.
In Umai the subscription is flat and in tenge. It does not depend on the number of staff, students, groups or branches, there is no cap on leads, and the minimum billing period is one month. For a center where admins come and go and the team shrinks over summer, those are two different planning models.
Bottom line. Price it against the headcount you will have at peak season, not today's.
3
Language, currency and Kaspi
Kommo is an international product. The interface is translated into English, Portuguese, Spanish, Indonesian and Turkish: Russian is not on that list, let alone Kazakh. The subscription is in dollars, support is in English, we found no Kaspi among the payment integrations, and there is no question of data being held in Kazakhstan.
For an admin who works in the system all day, the interface language is no small thing. Umai speaks Kazakh and Russian, counts in tenge, accepts Kaspi POS and Kaspi Provider, lets a parent pay for a membership by QR straight from the app, and keeps data on servers in Kazakhstan.
Bottom line. Sit an admin in front of a demo of both systems for half an hour — the interface language settles it faster than any comparison table.
What it costs for a year
The subscription is only part of the spend. We count everything that lands in the budget.
Calculation scenario150 students · 5 staff · 1 branch · 12 months
«Advanced+»
Sales CRM for a year
500,000 ₸41,667 ₸/mo when paid annually, everything included
Implementation and process setup
Included
A system for classes and memberships
Included
WhatsApp and Instagram in the CRM
Included
Mobile apps for teachers and parents
Included
Team training
Included
Support
Free, unlimited, in Kazakh and Russian
Minimum billing period
1 month
Total for the first year
500,000 ₸
Kommo
Advanced, 5 users
Sales CRM for a year
≈ 697,000 ₸$25 per user per month × 5 people × 12 months *
Implementation and process setup
A partner network, charged separately
A system for classes and memberships
≈ 262,000 ₸ — a separate subscription
WhatsApp and Instagram in the CRM
Included — an official connectionchannels capped by plan, conversations billed by Meta
Mobile apps for teachers and parents
An app for the salesperson; no industry-specific ones found
Team training
Separately with each vendor
Support
In English and four other languages
Minimum billing period
6 months
Total for the first year
≈ 959,000 ₸
Two subscriptions: Kommo for sales and a separate system for classes and memberships. On top of that, Meta's billing for WhatsApp conversations, partner implementation services and the admin's hours spent reconciling the two systems.
* Kommo prices follow the official pricing page as of 08.10.2026: Base $15, Advanced $25, Pro $45 per user per month when paid for 6 months, excluding promotions. Converted at the National Bank of Kazakhstan rate of 1 $ ≈ 464.77 ₸ on the publication date. The cost of the record system is an indicative figure based on the «Business» plan of one widely used solution for learning centers. WhatsApp conversations are billed separately by Meta and are not included. Every center has a different stack and user count — your calculation will differ.
Centers that have already moved
Three stories from different niches — what it was like before and what changed after.
«Our whole network of children's centers moved to Umai CRM — records, communication and payments are now in one place.»
Kamilla Shungarina
Kinderly, a network of children's centers
«Before installing a CRM I studied and compared a lot of systems. Umai's main advantage is that every function we need is gathered in one system.»
Maksat Mukhtarov
«Kerbez» learning center
«WhatsApp chats and automatic notifications took the load off our admins — more sign-ups, fewer missed classes.»
Director of OLS
language center
Moving from Kommo
without pausing the center
We move the client base, deals and as much conversation history as the source will give us.
The pilot goes live in 1–2 days — classes keep running.
1
Audit
and plan
We look at how your records work today, which processes matter most, and agree a launch plan. A 30–40 minute call.
2
Data
import
We move students, contacts, groups, memberships and remaining classes to an agreed structure. We check the numbers together with you.
3
Integrations
We connect WhatsApp and Instagram, plus telephony and Kaspi payments if needed, so enquiries and payments land in the card straight away.
4
Training
and launch
We walk admins, teachers and the owner through the scenarios, run a pilot on one group and lock in the working rules.
What we move over,
and what we set up fresh
We agree on this in writing before we start — so there are no surprises on day two.
Moved as is
Students and contacts
Groups and their rosters
Memberships and remaining classes
Payment history and debts
Teachers
Timetable for the current term
Set up at launch
Pipeline and sales stages
Robots and automatic tasks
Payroll rates
Roles and access rights
Message templates
Moved partially
Conversation history — it depends on the source and on which service it ran through. We talk this through before we start.
IMPORTANT: data migration and support are never billed. Turnkey onboarding is free on Extended+ and AI plans with a 12-month subscription; on Basic it is paid separately. Exactly what we move over, and what you start fresh in Umai from launch day, we agree in writing beforehand.
Want to test
UMAI CRM for your business?
Sign up and get a 7-day free trial immediately. Full functionality, no restrictions. Our support team will help with setup if needed.
Frequently
asked
questions
How does Umai CRM differ from Kommo?
Kommo is a CRM for selling in conversation: WhatsApp, Instagram, TikTok, bots, AI agents. Umai is a system for the whole learning center: the same chats plus timetable, attendance, memberships with balances, Kaspi payments, teacher payroll, student and parent portals. On Kommo a center usually runs two systems; on Umai, one.
Are Kommo and amoCRM the same thing?
It is the international product of the same team. The pipeline and inbox logic are similar, but the terms differ: Kommo works in dollars and its interface is translated into English, Portuguese, Spanish, Indonesian and Turkish, with no Russian. We have a separate comparison with amoCRM — if you are choosing between them, take a look at that one too.
What does Kommo cost for a center with five staff?
By the official pricing — $15, $25 or $45 per user per month when paid for six months. For five staff the Advanced plan works out at roughly 697,000 ₸ a year at the rate on the publication date. On top of that you need a second system for classes and memberships: in the «What it costs for a year» block we priced the whole stack.
Does Kommo have a timetable and memberships?
No, and that is not a criticism — Kommo is not about that. It has no group timetable, no attendance marking, no memberships with balances and freezes, no teacher payroll and no parent portal. For a learning center that means a second system and manual reconciliation between the two.
Are messengers better done in Kommo?
On the channels side Kommo really is strong: it is an official Meta partner and WhatsApp and Instagram connect directly. In our case channels connect through our partner operator Aisar and are included in the «Advanced+» plan with no separate subscription and no cap on messages. The difference is that with us the conversation is immediately tied to the membership, attendance and the student's debt — not just to a deal.
Does Kommo have a Russian or Kazakh interface?
The official site offers the interface in English, Portuguese, Spanish, Indonesian and Turkish. We found neither Russian nor Kazakh. In Umai the interface, notifications and mobile apps work in Kazakh, Russian and English, and each employee picks their own language.
Where is student data stored?
We found no information about Kommo holding data in Kazakhstan. Umai stores Kazakh centers' data on servers in Kazakhstan — which matters when a center handles children's personal data and has to comply with local law.
Can you accept payments through Kaspi?
We found no Kaspi among Kommo's payment integrations. Umai has Kaspi POS and Kaspi Provider connected, and a parent can pay for a membership by QR right in the mobile app — the payment lands in the student's balance immediately, with no manual allocation.
How do you move data from Kommo to Umai?
We export contacts, deals and card fields and move them into the lead board and student cards. Conversation history we move as far as the source will give it — that is agreed in writing before we start. Timetable, groups and memberships are set up at launch: Kommo simply does not have them. The import is free and the pilot goes live in 1–2 days.
Who is Kommo a better fit for than Umai?
A business whose whole cycle is conversation and a deal: agencies, online shops, services with no timetables or memberships. Teams working in English or Spanish and selling outside Kazakhstan. And anyone who needs TikTok as a sales channel and deep pipeline automation, with class records already covered by something else.
Still have
questions?
Write to us on WhatsApp or leave your email — we will help you work it out and find the right fit.
The verdict on choosing a CRM
Both systems are good at what they do. The question is what kind of business you run: selling in conversation, or a center where the real work starts after the sale.
Choose Umai CRM if
The main part starts after the enquiry: classes, memberships, attendance and payroll.
And you do not want to keep that in a separate system and reconcile two databases by hand.
- You need one loop: lead → booking → classes → payments → payroll
- You need a timetable, attendance, memberships, freezes and remaining classes
- You need Kaspi POS and QR payment by the parent
- A Kazakh interface and support in your own time zone matter
- The subscription should be in tenge and not grow with headcount
- You need portals and mobile apps for students, parents and teachers
- Student data has to be stored in Kazakhstan
Kommo
Choose Kommo if
It is a powerful tool for selling in messengers, with official WhatsApp, bots and AI agents. If your cycle ends with the deal, it does its job better than most.
- The whole cycle is conversation and a deal, with no timetable or memberships
- Your team works in English or Spanish and sells abroad
- You need TikTok as a sales channel and deep pipeline automation
- Class and money records are already covered by another system you are not replacing
- Your team is used to it and the system is configured for you
If you are unsure
We will show Umai on your own scenario: how an enquiry arrives from WhatsApp, how it becomes a trial booking, a membership and a payment — and what the teacher and the parent see along the way.
BOOK A CONSULTATION →This comparison was prepared by the Umai CRM team from public sources, user scenarios and internal analysis as of 08.10.2026. Third-party services' features, pricing and terms may change. If you represent Kommo and believe any of this needs correcting, get in touch and we will update it.
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