Order Manager Complete Guide: Wholesale Billing, Payments and Profit Tracking

My Local Shops Order Manager is a wholesale billing app for creating invoices, recording payments, tracking retailer outstanding and understanding the owner's actual sales profit. It connects each confirmed sale to the selected shop's live inventory, so an invoice does more than produce a PDF: it also reduces the correct SKU quantities and records the business result.

The workflow is designed for wholesalers who may create only a few invoices per day but sell many pieces and several colour-size variants in each invoice. A single shirt design can therefore be selected once and several types can be added together instead of repeatedly searching for every SKU.

At a glance

Need	Order Manager behaviour
Regular retailer records	Seller-scoped Parties with contact, address and optional GSTIN
Find a party among hundreds	Server search by name, mobile number or GSTIN
Bill several colours and sizes	Open one grouped product and enter quantity and price for multiple SKUs
Use current shop stock	Product picker and final save validate the selected billing location
Sell an item not in inventory	Add a Custom invoice line without creating inventory stock
GST and non-GST sales	Create a GST invoice when eligible or deliberately issue a plain bill
Paid, partial or credit sale	Explicit choice on every new invoice
Mixed payment modes	Record multiple Cash, UPI, Card or Bank transfer rows
Collect money later	Record another payment from the open invoice
Know who owes money	Outstanding grouped by party or shown invoice by invoice
Know real profit	Sale before GST minus snapshotted landed cost, adjusted for an agreed settlement difference
Share the bill	Generate, print or share the invoice PDF
Handle customer returns	Create an invoice-linked credit note that reverses stock and applicable totals

Why wholesale billing is different from retail billing

A retailer may scan one item, receive payment and finish the bill in seconds. A wholesaler often sells fewer invoices but each one contains more quantity and more product types.

Consider a printed T-shirt available in four colours and four sizes. That design has 16 SKUs. A retailer orders three pieces of every type, making 48 pieces in total.

The invoice should not hide the stock identity inside one vague line such as “Printed T-shirt — 48 pieces.” The seller needs to know exactly which colour and size left the shop. At the same time, forcing the billing user to search the same product 16 times is slow and expensive.

Order Manager uses a grouped product picker:

1. Search or select the printed T-shirt once.
2. Open its list of colour-size types.
3. See the available quantity for every SKU at the billing shop.
4. Enter the quantity and selling price beside the required types.
5. Add all selected types to the invoice together.

Each selected SKU still becomes its own invoice line, preserving accurate stock, price, HSN, GST and profit information.

The four main areas of Order Manager

The owner app uses four simple tabs.

Tab	Purpose
Bill	New invoice, outstanding glance, recent invoices, all invoices and credit notes
Parties	Retailer records, contact details, invoice history and outstanding
Reports	Owner profit and finished-month files for the CA
Settings	Billing preferences, default location and app settings

The Bill tab opens first because creating or checking a bill is the daily operational task. It shows an outstanding summary, the primary Create invoice action, shortcuts to credit notes and all invoices, and the latest five invoices.

Choose the shop that is issuing the invoice

Order Manager remembers a default billing location on the device. A new invoice opens from that shop or godown, and the user can deliberately change the Bill / dispatch from location before saving.

The location affects more than the printed address:

• the stock available for selection;
• the quantity deducted when the invoice saves;
• the seller address printed on the invoice;
• the seller GSTIN used for tax eligibility;
• the seller state used for CGST/SGST or IGST; and
• the location's units and stock-value summary.

Seller-wide stock at another godown is not treated as stock at the current counter. The owner must bill from the correct location or transfer the goods first.

Build a useful party book

A Party is the retailer or other buyer receiving the invoice. It is also the identity against which payments and outstanding are tracked.

A party can hold:

• trade or customer name;
• mobile number;
• GSTIN, when registered;
• legal name obtained from GST verification;
• billing address, city, state and pincode; and
• additional delivery addresses.

An unregistered buyer is valid. Order Manager does not require every party to have a GSTIN merely because the seller sometimes creates GST invoices.

Finding a party without loading the whole database

The party list is cursor-paginated in pages of 20. Its default order is Name A–Z, with Recently added available when that better matches the owner's workflow.

Submitted search checks seller-owned active parties by prefixes of:

• party name;
• mobile number; and
• GSTIN.

The search is run when the user submits it, not after every typed character. This keeps Firestore reads and mobile data predictable when a business eventually has 1,000 or more parties.

Party records are scoped to the owner. The owner or authorised staff work only with that seller's parties; the search is not a global search across other subscribers.

Bill To and Ship To are separate when needed

The selected Party is the Bill To buyer. Delivery normally goes to the same billing address, so the user does not have to repeat it.

When goods are delivered elsewhere, Order Manager can record Ship To as:

• another saved address belonging to the Bill To party;
• a new one-off delivery address; or
• a genuinely different party or consignee.

Both Bill To and Ship To can appear on the invoice PDF. For tax calculation, the effective state follows the buyer's GST registration and delivery situation; the same resolved place of supply is stored with the invoice so the tax breakup and printed information do not drift apart later.

The dedicated GST invoice guide will explain these rules with examples. The important operational rule here is: select the real buyer and actual delivery address before reviewing the bill.

Add products from live inventory

The product picker reads grouped records from product_listings, not hundreds of repeated SKU rows.

Its default catalogue is:

• limited to the signed-in seller;
• limited to active products;
• limited to products with stock at the selected billing location;
• ordered by product name; and
• cursor-paginated in pages of 20.

Search works by product name, supplier item code or shared SKU base. Selecting one result opens only that product's member SKUs.

The product list remains open after variants are added. If the user searched item code 6120, they can open a matching design, add several types, return to the same results and continue without fetching and searching the complete catalogue again.

Enter quantity and price per SKU

Every type displays:

• its colour and size identity;
• SKU;
• individual thumbnail;
• quantity available at the billing location;
• quantity field; and
• price field, prefilled from Inventory Manager.

The price remains editable because wholesale negotiation is part of the sale. If staff convince a customer to pay more—or the owner agrees to a lower price—the invoice must record the actual selling rate instead of silently forcing the saved catalogue price.

Out-of-stock variants remain understandable but cannot be added. If a user enters more than the available quantity, the error appears under that SKU row with a visual nudge and haptic feedback, helping them correct the exact line.

The variant sheet cannot be accidentally dismissed by dragging it down. The user closes it intentionally or adds the selected types, protecting work already entered on a long wholesale selection.

HSN and GST for the product group

When a GST invoice is being created, HSN and GST rate appear above the type list because they normally apply to the complete product design. Existing values are locked against accidental editing and can be deliberately unlocked.

HSN and GST remain required for taxable lines. If the inventory record is incomplete, the user can fill them while preparing the invoice. Optional catalogue maintenance happens after the critical invoice transaction so a metadata backfill cannot abort an otherwise valid stock-safe save.

Scan one exact SKU when that is faster

Order Manager can scan the Code 128 SKU labels printed by Inventory Manager.

The scanner:

1. validates the expected SKU shape;
2. searches for an exact SKU belonging to the seller;
3. checks stock at the selected billing location; and
4. adds or opens the correct invoice line.

Scanning is useful when the physical packet is already at the counter. Grouped product selection is better when a retailer is ordering several colours and sizes from the same design.

Add a custom item without changing inventory

Sometimes the seller needs to bill packaging, a one-off item or goods that were not entered into Inventory Manager.

Item not in inventory creates a Custom invoice line with:

• name;
• optional item code;
• quantity;
• selling price; and
• HSN and GST when the invoice is taxable.

A custom line does not create a product and does not deduct stock. Because its landed cost is unknown, the owner can enter the cost later on Invoice Detail. Until then, Order Manager warns that profit for the invoice is incomplete rather than pretending the custom item's entire sale value is profit.

GST invoice or plain non-GST bill

Order Manager supports both business situations.

GST invoice

Tax is available only when the selected billing location has a seller GSTIN. Taxable lines require HSN and a GST rate. Depending on the applicable state comparison, the invoice uses either:

• CGST and SGST; or
• IGST.

The bill stores taxable value and tax amounts separately and rounds the final customer payable total to the nearest rupee.

Plain bill

The seller can turn off Generate GST bill for a sale. If the billing location has no GSTIN, Order Manager also cannot invent GST eligibility.

A plain bill contains no fabricated GST fields or GST wording. Product GST percentages stored in inventory are not charged merely because they exist.

Review before saving

Before committing the invoice, the review screen shows:

• dispatch location;
• Bill To party;
• Ship To information when different;
• every line with quantity, price and applicable tax;
• subtotal;
• CGST/SGST or IGST when applicable;
• round-off; and
• grand total.

The user then records how the sale was settled. This explicit step prevents an invoice from silently becoming paid or credit because of a default choice.

Paid in full, partial payment and full credit

Order Manager offers three settlement choices when creating an invoice.

Paid in full

The customer pays now and the invoice has no outstanding balance. The amount is prefilled to the invoice total, but the seller can record a deliberately agreed difference.

For example:

Description	Amount
Invoice total	₹51,000
Customer actually pays	₹50,000
Agreed reduction	₹1,000
Outstanding after confirmation	₹0

The app does not silently hide the mismatch. It asks the user to confirm that ₹50,000 is being accepted as full payment. It then retains all three facts:

• the legal/commercial invoice remains ₹51,000;
• actual money received remains ₹50,000; and
• the agreed ₹1,000 reduction is explicit and does not appear as outstanding.

If the customer pays more than the total and the seller keeps it, the extra amount also requires confirmation and is recorded separately.

Partial payment

Some money is received now and the rest remains due.

Invoice total     ₹50,000
Paid now          ₹20,000
Balance due       ₹30,000
Payment status    Partial

The open ₹30,000 appears in Outstanding until later payments or a confirmed settlement close it.

Full credit

Nothing is received now. The complete invoice total becomes outstanding for that party.

Credit is not a payment method. It describes the unpaid part of the sale. When money is actually received, its method is recorded separately.

Payment modes and mixed payments

For money received at sale or later, Order Manager supports:

• Cash;
• UPI;
• Card; and
• Bank transfer.

Several payment rows can belong to the same invoice. A ₹50,000 full payment can therefore be recorded as ₹10,000 Cash and ₹40,000 Bank transfer instead of losing the distinction.

These entries record what happened; My Local Shops does not move the customer's money, operate a payment gateway or automatically verify a bank transaction.

Record a payment later

An unpaid or partially paid invoice has a Record payment action on Invoice Detail.

The owner can:

1. see the current balance;
2. enter the amount received;
3. choose its payment mode;
4. keep the remainder pending or pay the remaining amount in full; and
5. confirm an agreed closing difference when necessary.

The payment record, invoice amount paid, balance and payment status update together. The Outstanding worklist is patched immediately rather than re-downloading every invoice after one receipt.

Outstanding: who owes money and which bill is old?

The Outstanding screen fetches only invoices whose payment status is Unpaid or Partial. Fully settled invoices are not downloaded and filtered out on the phone.

It offers two useful views:

Party view

This is the default collection view. It groups open invoices by party and orders parties by highest total due first. The owner can quickly answer: Which retailer owes me the most?

Opening a party shows its total due and open invoices, oldest first.

Invoice view

This shows every open bill, oldest first. It helps answer: Which exact invoice has remained pending the longest?

Pull to refresh reconciles the worklist with the server. Between refreshes, recorded payments and credit notes update the local outstanding state immediately.

Party Detail becomes the sales history

Opening a party shows contact information, outstanding total and two document lists:

• Invoices; and
• Credit notes.

Invoices can be filtered between All and Unpaid. Each row shows status such as Paid, Partial or Unpaid, plus any balance due. This gives the owner the relationship history without scanning a seller-wide invoice list.

How Order Manager calculates profit

Profit uses the inventory cost snapshotted when the product is sold.

For each inventory line:

Sale before GST = quantity × actual selling price
Cost of goods   = quantity × landed cost at sale
Invoice profit  = sale before GST − cost of goods

GST collected from the customer is not treated as sales profit.

Example:

Calculation	Amount
300 pieces × ₹272 sale price	₹81,600
Product cost	₹64,110
Invoice profit	₹17,490
Margin on sale before GST	21.4%

For a GST invoice, the owner summary separately shows sale before GST, CGST/SGST or IGST, customer payable, product cost and profit. Every line can show its image, item code, SKU, quantity, sale each, applicable GST, cost each, profit each and margin.

These private cost and profit details are not printed on the buyer's invoice PDF.

Invoice profit versus realised profit

If the ₹51,000 invoice in the earlier example is settled for ₹50,000, the agreed ₹1,000 reduction affects what the owner actually realised.

Invoice profit       Sale before GST − product cost
Realised profit      Invoice profit − agreed reduction + accepted extra

The invoice value stays intact for the document and tax records, while the owner report reflects the commercial settlement.

Print and share the invoice

Invoice Detail can generate an A4 PDF for printing or system sharing, including WhatsApp where available on the device.

The customer-facing document can include:

• invoice number and date;
• seller and billing-location details;
• Bill To and Ship To;
• item name, item code, SKU, HSN, quantity and rate;
• taxable value and tax breakup when applicable;
• round-off and grand total; and
• amount in words.

The invoice number is generated by the system. An existing invoice is not silently deleted and recreated merely to change its history.

Customer returns and credit notes

When goods are returned, the original invoice remains. The owner opens it and creates a linked credit note for eligible quantities.

The credit-note flow can:

• prevent returning more than the quantity sold minus earlier returns;
• copy the original line rate and tax treatment;
• return inventory to the invoice's dispatch location;
• reduce open outstanding first;
• record a refund when the invoice had already been paid;
• reverse the relevant sales, cost and profit statistics; and
• generate a printable and shareable credit-note PDF.

This is safer than editing an old invoice, because the original sale and later return remain separately understandable.

Owner report and CA report are intentionally different

The Reports tab separates two purposes.

Owner profit

The owner can inspect sales before GST, product cost, invoice profit, settlement adjustments, extra received, realised profit and margin for a selected month, day or party.

Month-end for CA

For a finished month, Order Manager can prepare separate CSV information for GST invoices, credit notes, non-GST bills and HSN summary. Before generation, it warns about pending invoices from that month so the owner can record a payment, keep a genuine balance pending or close an agreed difference.

My Local Shops prepares and shares the files; it does not file GST on behalf of the seller. A dedicated guide will cover the full month-end process.

What happens when two devices sell the same stock?

Availability displayed in the product sheet is useful guidance, but final save does not blindly trust an old screen value.

Suppose two devices both saw 100 pieces:

1. Device A saves an invoice for 70 pieces.
2. Firestore commits the new quantity of 30.
3. Device B tries to save 50 pieces using its older screen.
4. The transaction rereads the current product document.
5. Device B is rejected with the latest availability instead of saving negative stock.

The same transaction updates products, grouped listing availability, stock movements, cost totals and the invoice. This lets owners use multiple devices without adopting a one-device lock, while still preventing conflicting stock deductions.

Complete wholesale example

Metro Garments sells one shirt design to City Fashion.

Type	Quantity	Price each
Red / S	10	₹300
Red / M	15	₹300
Blue / S	8	₹310
Blue / M	12	₹310

The owner follows this path:

1. Select the dispatch shop.
2. Search City Fashion by mobile number and select it as Bill To.
3. Search the shirt item code once.
4. Enter all four quantities and their negotiated prices in the variant list.
5. Confirm HSN and GST rate for a taxable invoice.
6. Review the line totals and applicable CGST/SGST or IGST.
7. Choose Partial payment.
8. Record ₹5,000 Cash and ₹3,000 UPI.
9. Save the invoice.

On save:

• each selected SKU reduces at the dispatch shop;
• the invoice stores the actual price and tax per line;
• ₹8,000 is recorded as received in two modes;
• the remaining balance appears against City Fashion;
• landed cost is snapshotted for profit; and
• the PDF is ready to print or share.

When City Fashion pays later by bank transfer, the owner records it on the same invoice. If goods are returned, the owner creates a credit note rather than rewriting the sale.

Important current boundaries

Order Manager deliberately does not claim features it does not currently provide:

• it does not collect UPI, card or bank payments through My Local Shops;
• it does not automatically file GST returns;
• it does not yet generate IRN e-invoices or e-way bills through a GSP;
• it does not promise offline invoice saving; and
• a custom item does not become inventory automatically.

These boundaries keep the operational records clear. The app records the seller's confirmed business activity; it is not a bank, GST filing agent or generic ecommerce checkout.

Frequently asked questions

Can I create a bill for a buyer without GSTIN?

Yes. Parties may be registered or unregistered. The available tax treatment depends on the seller's billing location and the chosen GST-bill setting.

Can several colours and sizes be added together?

Yes. Select the grouped product once, then enter quantity and price for every required SKU before adding the selected types.

Can each SKU have a different selling price?

Yes. The saved inventory price is prefilled, but every selected type has its own editable price field.

Does creating an invoice reduce inventory?

Yes, for inventory-linked products. The final transaction checks and deducts stock at the selected billing location. Custom lines do not change inventory.

Can one invoice use Cash and UPI together?

Yes. Add multiple payment rows and assign a mode and amount to each.

If a customer pays less but the owner accepts it as complete, does it remain outstanding?

No—after explicit confirmation. The difference is recorded as an agreed settlement adjustment, the invoice becomes paid and realised profit reflects the reduction.

Does GST count as profit?

No. Profit uses the sale value before GST minus the product's snapshotted landed cost, with any confirmed settlement adjustment or extra handled separately.

Can I record payment after the invoice date?

Yes. Open Invoice Detail and use Record payment against the current balance.

Can I search parties by mobile number or GSTIN?

Yes. Submitted party search supports name, mobile and GSTIN prefixes within the seller's own party records.

Can I issue a return without deleting the original invoice?

Yes. Create a linked credit note from Invoice Detail. It preserves the original invoice and handles eligible stock and financial reversal.

Can staff use the owner's private profit screen?

Staff Bill is a separate authorised invoice app designed not to expose owner-only cost, profit and reports. The owner reviews those details in Order Manager.

Start using Order Manager

• View and download Order Manager
• Understand how inventory connects to the digital shop
• Read the colour-size SKU and multi-shop stock guide
• Compare current plans
• Set up your first shop and business apps

The next guide will explain how to create GST and non-GST wholesale invoices with multiple product variants, including HSN, GST rates, CGST/SGST, IGST and stock validation.