Community-built infrastructure for local economies.
Trust travels through people, not platforms.
Find and offer services through the people you actually know. Every search, recommendation and deal leaves your community more connected than it was.
MeritWork is invitation-only while communities get started.
How it works
- 1
Trust through your network, not strangers.
Network-weighted, self-policing.
Recommendations travel through people you actually know. No anonymous reviews. No paid placement. No advertising.
The act of recommending is private. Your reputation as a recommender is public. That asymmetry is the whole trust mechanism.
Bad recommendations cost the recommender's reputation; good ones build it. No central moderation — the accountability is built into the math.
- 2
Economic activity that builds community.
Every transaction strengthens the network.
When you hire someone through your network — or when someone hires you — both sides gain access to each other's connections.
The community that forms isn't bound by shared identity. It's bound by the connections people make, one at a time.
- 3
Value circulates back to participants.
Built into how it works, not just promised.
New providers get a boost in search until people start recommending them. No per-transaction fees, no commission, ever. Providers keep what they earn.
The platform shows you what you're contributing — real social value made visible. Value moves sideways through the network, not upward to investors.
- 4
Works within the alternative economy.
Pay however your community pays.
Cash, mutual credit, time credits, local currencies, in-kind exchange. Every way of paying works equally well: communities decide which they use, providers choose what they accept.
Plugs into Murmurations for federation, the Open Credit Network for mutual credit, Made Open and Timebanking UK for time credits.
- 5
Local first, federated for reach.
Independent communities, connected by choice.
Each community has its own members, its own rules and its own data. Communities can reach each other without giving up their independence.
Distance matters for physical services. Local results carry priority. Cross-community reach is available but never overrides community choice.
In practice
Sarah searches for a plumber and sees the ones her network has vouched for — weighted by whose judgement has held up. For the plumber, reputation grows through people whose word is trusted — no fees for ranking, just work that gets vouched for.
Hire Sarah's plumber and you're connected to them too, so the people they trust are now within reach. The network gets denser as it gets used. At the end of the year you see — concretely — how many connections you've made.
A roofing firm takes cash. A tutor takes time credits. A food co-op takes mutual credit. Three providers, three ways to pay, one search. Each provider sets their own terms; the platform follows them.
A different kind of platform.
Service discovery isn't enough.
Existing platforms are service-discovery tools. You use them, you get a tradesperson, the interaction ends. The network is no denser, no more connected, no more trustworthy than before.
MeritWork is structurally different. Every search, every recommendation, every transaction leaves the network more connected than it was. The economic activity and the community-building are the same act.
MeritWork takes its lead from older traditions — guilds, mutual aid societies, time banks all knew that economic activity could strengthen community. But those were inward-facing, binding people within a defined group.
MeritWork builds community across groups. Whether you're a household, a sole trader, a co-op, or a small business, the network grows around you.
How this stays community infrastructure.
Founder-built, self-funded.
No investors, no corporate interests.
Asset-locked, by law.
Community Interest Company moving to platform co-operative. No acquisition pathway.
Open source under copyleft.
The math is inspectable. The trust mechanism is auditable. Anyone can fork it.
Sliding-scale subscriptions, no commission.
£3 to £50 a month depending on size. Nothing taken from what providers earn. Six months free for everyone at launch.
Why this exists.
MeritWork is built by Adi Andrei — a former NASA scientist with 30 years in data science, building production systems for companies including British Gas, Unilever, Philips and Space NK.
The conviction behind it is simple: technology should enhance human connection — not the other way around. MeritWork is what that conviction looks like as software.
No AI
No blockchain
No digital ID
Just plain old personal responsibility.
Where local economies grow on trust.
Bring your community to MeritWork, or ask to join one.