Excel, a paper khata or POS software: which should keep your shop's accounts?

A khata costs almost nothing and needs no training. The owner knows every line in it. For a small shop with one person at the counter, a few dozen regular customers on baki and a stock you can count by eye, it does the job.

Where it breaks:

• Baki gets lost. A due written on the wrong page, a payment not crossed out, a page torn: the customer disputes, and you have no record to show.
• No stock picture. The khata records money, not goods. You find out a product is finished when a customer asks for it.
• Totals take time. Monthly sales, profit, or "how much does this customer owe from the last six months" means an evening with a calculator.
• One copy. If the khata is lost, wet or burned, the record is gone.

An Excel sheet adds sums, filters and a backup copy. Many owners keep a sales sheet, a stock sheet and a due sheet.

Where it breaks:

• Nothing connects. A sale typed in the sales sheet does not reduce stock in the stock sheet unless someone types it there too. Each step is a chance to miss one.
• Formulas break quietly. One overwritten cell or a row outside the range, and the totals are wrong without any warning.
• One person at a time. Two salesmen cannot bill on the same sheet, and a second branch means a second file you have to merge.
• No control. Anyone with the file can change last month's figures, and you cannot see who did.

In POS software the bill is the record. When the counter sells, the stock goes down, the payment goes to the right account (cash, card, bKash, Nagad), and any unpaid part goes onto the customer's due ledger. The day's reports are ready at closing time, not after an evening of adding up.

What you gain with a cloud POS such as Posify24:

• One entry, many results. Sale, stock, due and cash book update together from the point of sale.
• Dues you can prove. Each customer has an opening due, a running due, a credit limit and a ledger. A sale that would take a customer past the limit is refused.
• Stock you can trust. Low-stock lists, stock counts, wastage and transfers between godown and shop.
• Accounts without a separate book. Expenses, deposits, bank and mobile-banking accounts, a daily opening and closing report, a cash book, profit and loss and a balance sheet.
• Staff with limits. Each user sees only what their role allows, and an audit log records every action.
• Access from anywhere. It runs in a browser, so the owner can check the day's sales from home.

What it costs you: a monthly or yearly subscription, a few days to enter products and opening balances, and some time to train the counter staff. It needs the internet for most screens, though the POS counter keeps selling when the line drops and catches up later.

• You or your staff spend more than half an hour a day adding up sales, cash or dues.
• A customer has disputed a baki amount and you could not show the record.
• Stock runs out without warning, or you found expired goods on the shelf.
• You hired a second salesman or opened a second shop or godown.
• You cannot say what your profit was last month without guessing.

If two or more of these are true, a POS will likely pay for its time. Our guide on how to keep shop accounts covers the daily routine either way, and how to choose POS software in Bangladesh lists what to check before you pay.