Billing for your dairy and milk booth in Chandigarh
The slab with no maker's name, the milk boy's list for four flats and the halwai's khoa in the Diwali week.
Why a slab of paneer arrives with no maker's name, and the milk boy climbs four floors on a list
A slab of paneer that arrives with no maker's name on it
Paneer comes from two makers in the same kind of plastic, and the slab is cut at the counter through the day. A customer says that Tuesday's paneer was sour. The owner cannot tell which maker brought that slab, and when the food safety people test samples from a shop, the shop has nothing in writing about where the lot came from.
The milk boy who climbs four floors on a list in his head
A boy takes pouches from the booth to the flats of a society: two for the first floor, one for the third, four for the top. He carries the list in his head, and the money is collected another day. When a flat says its pouch did not come, nobody can show who was owed what on that morning.
The halwai who takes khoa by the kilo in the week before Diwali
In the last days before the festival the sweet makers of the sector send for khoa and paneer by the kilo, every morning, and pay when their boxes are sold. The booth's cold room empties day by day. By the third morning the owner is not sure how many kilos went to which halwai, or how much is left for the family that wants a quarter kilo.
From a slab nobody can trace to a delivery with a name and a date
The maker's name on every delivery, so Tuesday's slab is found by the page
Give each paneer maker a page and note each delivery on it with its day. Put the maker's name in the item's name when you sell the slab. When a customer says Tuesday's paneer was sour, you open the page and the day's sales and read which maker's slab went that day.
The morning after the power went: paneer slabs first, then each kind of pouch
When the power goes in the night, paneer slabs and pouches do not spoil at the same pace. In the morning count the slabs first, then each kind of pouch, against what the phone says. The gap, kind by kind, is what you lost. Send the order to the maker before the first customer comes.
The cold room falling kilo by kilo in the Diwali week
In the festival week the halwai takes khoa and paneer every morning, and the cold room's count falls with each kilo that leaves. By afternoon you can see how much is left, so the family that wants a quarter kilo is not met with an empty tray.
Tools for a booth with a cold room, a milk boy and a halwai at the door
Orders to suppliers
Each paneer maker's deliveries noted on his own page with the day, so a complaint about Tuesday's slab is traced to the maker who brought it.
Bills on your phone
Pouches for four flats billed one flat at a time while the boy is on the stairs, each bill sent to that flat's phone.
Godown stock
The cold room's paneer and khoa counted apart from the shop fridge's pouches, so the halwai's morning order is taken from what the cold room holds.
Credit book (khata)
A page for each halwai who takes khoa for the Diwali week and pays when his boxes are sold, with each morning's kilos dated.
What a Chandigarh dairy booth owner asks before starting
A customer says Tuesday's paneer was sour. How do I find which maker supplied that slab?
Open the day's sales and the makers' pages. The deliveries are noted by day on each maker's page, and the item you sold carries the maker's name, so the two match.
The boy brings back the money for four floors a few days later. Where do I write which floor has paid?
Each flat has a page. Write the pouches the boy gave as a line a day, and the money he brings back as it comes in. The page says what is paid.
In the Diwali week the halwai's khoa leaves the cold room each morning. How much is left for the quarter-kilo families?
Read the cold room's khoa count each morning before you take the halwai's order. What is left after his kilos is what the quarter-kilo families can have.
When the power goes at night, which do I count first, the cold room or the shop fridge?
The cold room first: its slabs of paneer and khoa spoil fastest. Each is its own place on your account, so its count is read alone, and the pouches in the shop fridge are counted after.
A summer price rise for pouch milk, and a mobile lab that tests paneer
Verka says its pouch milk price rise in Punjab and adjoining areas is an annual summer exercise to compensate dairy farmers as milk production falls and input costs go up. A booth that sells those pouches has one rate to change a year, and a full month of daily buyers on either side of the day it changes.
Chandigarh's food safety department runs a mobile lab that tests milk, paneer and khoa for Rs 20 a test; in one year 2 milk and 5 of 13 paneer samples failed. A shop that cuts paneer to order buys it from a named maker, and a page for that maker shows what came from him and when.