Kaarobar vs. the spreadsheet you already have
Most Pakistani COD stores run their numbers in Excel or Google Sheets. It works until it quietly doesn't — and it costs a Sunday every month. Here is what changes when the same numbers compute themselves.
Why stores start on a spreadsheet — and what Kaarobar keeps from it
- Visible arithmetic. You trust a sheet because you can see every formula. Kaarobar shows its working line by line too, instead of presenting a total.
- No cost. Kaarobar's free plan covers 500 orders a month with every module included.
- Export whenever you like. Profit, tax and order data export to Excel, so your sheet and your accountant still get their file.
The four places it goes wrong without telling you
1. It is updated from the courier portal by hand, monthly
Which means the numbers are a month old when the decisions are made, and the reconciliation is done by comparing totals rather than parcels. A total that balances hides the parcels that do not.
2. Returns arrive late and cost twice
A sheet usually records the sale on the order date and the return whenever someone gets to it. In between, a returned order is counted as revenue, and the return freight is often never entered at all — so RTO, the largest cost in Pakistani COD, is the cost most likely to be missing.
3. Withholding is invisible
The 2% income and 2% sales tax withheld on delivered COD never appear on any document you type into a sheet. They are simply an amount that did not arrive. Most sheets never model them, and the profit line is 4% of delivered COD too high.
4. It has no idea which customer this is
A spreadsheet cannot tell you that this buyer refused two parcels last month under a slightly different spelling of their name. That is a per-order decision, and it is only available if customers are matched across phone, email and address.
| The job | Spreadsheet | Kaarobar |
|---|---|---|
| Cost per order and gross margin | Fine | Same, computed |
| Freight both ways, packaging, GST | Possible, if entered every time | Automatic |
| 2% + 2% withholding on delivered COD | Almost never modelled | Deducted and broken out |
| Remittance matched to the parcel | By total, by eye | Keyed on shipment ID |
| Returns counted when they arrive | Whenever someone types them | On warehouse scan |
| Repeat-RTO customer flags | Not possible | Before you ship |
| Booking, CN, loadsheet | In the courier portal | From the order |
| Up to date without typing | Only after someone updates it | Syncs every few minutes |
| Cost | Free, plus your Sunday | Free up to 500 orders/month |
When to switch
Because the free plan covers 500 orders a month, there is no size at which the sheet is cheaper — only a size at which its errors start to cost real money.
The sheet stops being cheap when reconciliation takes a full day a month, when you cannot say which product loses money after returns, or when you have found a courier payout short and had no way to prove which parcel. All three are the same underlying problem: a sheet stores totals, and these questions need per-parcel records.
Run one month both ways — install freeQuestions merchants actually ask
- Can I export back to Excel?
- Yes. Profit, tax and order data export to CSV and Excel, which is also what your accountant will ask for.
- Do I have to abandon my spreadsheet immediately?
- No, and the sensible move is not to. Run both for a month and compare the two profit figures. The gap is the answer, and it is usually made of return freight and withholding.