Billing for your garment and cloth shop in Ladakh
A shawl, a muffler and two metres of pattu, each billed as what it is.
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What a Ladakh cloth counter needs on one phone
GST bills
A shawl bill with its GST worked out on the line, the same bill a buyer shows at the next shop to say what he bought in Leh.
Bills on your phone
A muffler and a pair of socks sold by the piece to a tourist, billed under the name he gives and sent to his phone before he walks out.
Godown stock
The winter woollens split between the rack at the counter and the back room, each counted by size, so a customer's size is looked for in the right place first.
Offers for regular customers
A discount kept for the families who come in every autumn for the winter woollens, given at the counter to them and not to the passing visitor.
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The shawls that look alike on the rack, and the roll of pattu cut for a goncha
Two shawls that look alike on the rack
A traveller feels two shawls, one pure and one blended, and asks what he is paying for. On the rack they hang side by side and in the notebook they are both written as shawl. When the bill carries one word for both, the buyer cannot show it to the next person who asks, and you cannot say later which of the two was sold.
Metres, pieces and garments over the same counter
A roll of rough pattu is sold by the metre. A muffler goes by the piece, and a finished goncha goes by the garment. A family that wants a goncha cut from two metres takes the cloth today and comes back for the leftover next week, and the second visit is written in the margin if it is written at all.
The box of summer goods at the back
By October the caps, light shirts and cotton scarves that the summer visitors bought are packed away in boxes, and the winter rack goes up in front. Nobody remembers what is in which box. The counter is full of woollens, and a customer asks for a size you are sure you have somewhere.
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From the first summer shawl to the last metre of pattu in November
Each shawl named on its bill as what it is
Keep pure pashmina, blended wool and the plain cotton scarf as three different items, each with its own rate and its own count. The bill then says exactly what was sold, and the buyer carries it on his phone. Anyone who later asks him what he bought in Leh gets the answer from the bill.
The pattu roll's metres, counted down to November
Keep pattu as an item counted in metres. Each cut takes its metres off the roll, so by November the roll's count is the metres you really have left for the families that come late for their gonchas, and you do not hunt for the margin.
The summer boxes, counted in October
Count the back room on its own, apart from the shelf in front. In October you can read what is left of each summer item, decide what to sell down and what to keep for next season, and see whether the winter size you cannot find is in the shop at all.
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The wool behind the Leh counter: Changthang's goats and the shawl on your shelf
A cloth shop in Leh sells the end of a long chain, and the beginning of it is high on the grazing land.
- Pashmina wool is produced in the Changthang region of Leh, sustaining over 10,000 nomadic herders.
Questions Ladakh cloth sellers ask about shawls, pattu and the winter rack
The leftover length of pattu is kept aside for a family. Should it stay on my shelf count?
No. Add the leftover as its own item with the family's name in it. The shelf's pattu count then does not include it, and no other customer is sold the length that is waiting for them.
A customer asks if a shawl is pure. Can my bill say 'pure pashmina' for the ones I sell under that name?
The bill carries the name you give the item, and nothing else. If you sell a shawl as pure pashmina, name the item that way and sell only that shawl under it. The app does not test the wool, so the name is your word.
A summer visitor wants a stole like her friend's and does not know the colour. How do I find it?
Ask when her friend bought it and open the sales of that day. The stole lines list the colours that went, and the visitor points to the name she knows. If the friend still has the bill on WhatsApp, the colour is on it already.
Pashmina's GST cut and the rough cloth called pattu
The GST cut on pashmina from 12 percent to 5 percent is expected to help authentic Ladakhi pashmina compete against imported or machine-made alternatives. For the shop owner that is a line on every bill: the rate is lower, and the buyer sees it written there. A shop that sells both real and machine-made shawls needs each on its own line.
Pattu, a warm and rough woollen fabric, is one of the signature crafts of Leh-Ladakh. It is bought in lengths and cut and stitched into winter wear at home or by a tailor, which is why it is sold by the metre at the counter and not by the piece, and why the leftover so often comes back to be sold again.