Billing for your medical store in Odisha
A strip, a bottle of ORS and a thermometer on one bill, each with its own GST, even when the rain queue is at the door.
From the three-item bill in the rain queue to the shelf that lasts till the van comes
The rain queue served three lines at a time
In the monsoon weeks families come in wet, with a slip of three medicines and no wish to stand. Each strip is picked on the phone as it is taken from the shelf, so the bill is made in the time it takes to hand the strips over, and the queue under the awning keeps moving.
The bill the husband reads at home
When she shows the WhatsApp bill to her husband, he reads what was bought and what each thing cost, line by line, and no argument starts at home about a strip. In the fever fortnight every customer takes home one such bill, and the shop keeps the same bill in its day's sales.
Tuesday's order written on Monday, from the counts
In the monsoon the van may not be back for weeks, and in the fever weeks the ORS packets and the fever strips go faster than it can bring them. Every bill takes its strips off the count. On the day before the van, the list shows how little is left of the two, and the order is written for all the weeks the road may keep the van away.
Prawn farms, steel plants and ore mines: the districts a medical shop in Odisha serves
A medical shop serves everyone nearby, whatever work they do. A few districts, and what the people there do.
- Balasore district has been declared Odisha's production and processing cluster for scampi, the freshwater prawn.
- Sundargarh is an industrial district of Odisha, with a steel plant, a fertilizer plant, a cement factory and spinning mills.
- At Kalinganagar in Jajpur district, industrial firms use chromite ore. A sharp price rise in 2021 pushed several plants towards closure.
- Keonjhar is one of Odisha's top mineral districts. Iron ore covers most of it, and manganese ore is found at Joda East and Barbil.
Why an Odisha medical shop loses count in the fever weeks, at the GST line and between the wholesaler's van days
The fever weeks: many small bills, three items each
When the rains come, the counter fills with fever, cold and upset stomachs. Each customer wants a strip, a bottle of ORS and something for the stomach, and each asks what it comes to. You add three rates in your head thirty times before noon, and the hundredth sum of the day is the one you get wrong. A customer who stands behind her sees the wrong total and says so.
A strip and a thermometer do not carry the same GST
A medical shop sells medicines and the things beside them: glucose powder, bandages, cotton, a thermometer, baby food. Different goods can carry different GST, so a basket of three things needs three rates applied. You do it from habit, and when a customer asks for a bill with the tax shown, you work it out on a scrap while the queue waits. A wrong line is a customer who thinks you overcharged her, and she does not forget it. The customer is rarely unhappy about the price, only about the surprise.
The wholesaler's van comes on fixed days, and the shelf has to last
Your wholesale point sends its van on set days, and what is on the shelf must last until the next one. In the fever fortnight the ORS and the fever strips go faster than anything else. You find out on the day before the van that a thing is nearly gone, and by then a customer is already standing at the counter asking for it. In the monsoon it can be weeks before the thing is back.
Tools for a counter of strips, bottles and the goods beside them
GST bills
GST worked out on each line, so the tax on the strip and the tax on the thermometer are on the paper the customer takes home.
Low stock warnings
The glucose powder, the mosquito coils and the ORS every house by the river buys when the water rises, shown running low while the van can still reach you.
Offers for regular customers
A better rate for the family that comes to your counter in every fever week, set once and applied on its bills.
Questions Odisha chemists ask about GST lines, strip sizes and van days
A farmer's family leaves the prescription and returns next day, when the van has come. When is the sale made?
On the day the medicine leaves the shop. Keep the prescription with the family's name on it, and make the bill when they collect, so the shelf count falls on the day the strips really went.
One maker's strip comes on the Tuesday van, the other's on Friday. Can I see which is in?
Yes. Put the maker in the item's name, so each strip has its own count. Note each van's arrival against its order, and you see which strip is in and which waits.
Cotton comes in a roll and customers want a small pad. Are those two items?
Make the roll and the pad two items. When you cut pads from a roll, take the roll off its count and put the pads in, so the shelf and the phone agree.
Dengue in Bhubaneswar and the one-day chemists' strike
With the southwest monsoon set in, Bhubaneswar recorded 164 dengue cases in July alone, and waterborne diseases were a threat across Odisha.
The Utkal Chemist and Druggist Association said around 4,000 medicine wholesale points and 22,000 retail shops in Odisha would shut for a one-day strike.