Your business runs on
WhatsApp and a register.
That works until it doesn’t — until an order is missed, stock runs out without warning, or nobody can say what this month actually earned. This page is about the system that replaces it, and what it takes to build one properly.
Built by a senior .NET developer whose day job is a provincial government’s land-records platform and, before that, payment systems handling live transactions.
Sound familiar?
These are the four sentences that come up in almost every conversation with a distribution business.
“Orders aate hain WhatsApp par, aur kabhi kabhi gum ho jate hain.”
Three staff, three phones, one group. Nobody knows which order was confirmed and which one somebody scrolled past.
“Stock register mein hai — aur register ek banday ke paas.”
Stock is accurate only when that person is in. Reordering happens after something has already run out, not before.
“Dealer har roz call karta hai: mera order kahan hai?”
Half the day goes to answering questions a screen could answer, and the dealer still feels ignored.
“Mahine ke aakhir mein pata nahi chalta kitna kamaya.”
Sales are known. Margin after purchase price, expenses and returns is a guess — and guesses are where money quietly leaks.
The modules, in plain words
Nobody needs all of this on day one. A system is built in stages, starting with whatever is hurting most.
Order management
Every order in one list with a status you can see: new, confirmed, packed, dispatched, delivered. Nothing lives in a chat thread.
Inventory & stock
Live quantity per item, reorder levels that warn you before you run out, and purchase price beside selling price so margin is a fact, not a feeling.
Dealer portal
Your dealers log in, see their own orders and balances, and place new ones. The phone stops ringing for status updates.
Invoicing & ledger
Invoices generated from the order, payments recorded against them, and an outstanding figure per dealer that is always current.
Dispatch & delivery
Who packed it, which vehicle it left on, when it was delivered and who signed. Disputes end with a record instead of an argument.
Reporting
Margin by item, slow-moving stock, ageing receivables, best dealers. The numbers you would ask an accountant for, on a screen.
Roles & access
Owner, sales, warehouse and accounts each see what they need and nothing else. Every change is recorded against a name.
Multi-warehouse
Stock per location, transfers between them, and one combined view for the owner.
Export catalogue
For exporters: an English product catalogue foreign buyers can browse, with enquiry forms that reach you properly rather than a spam folder.
One flow, from order to payment
This is the shape of it. Every box is a screen someone in your business already works on — just on paper or in a chat instead.
A demonstration you can click through
A working order and inventory portal for a fictional pipe and fittings distributor. Change an order status and watch the dashboard update. Look at the low-stock alerts, the margin column, and the view a dealer gets when they log in. Nothing is a screenshot.
Before you hand anyone your business data
These are fair questions and you should ask them of anyone, not only of me.
Who owns the code?
You do. On final payment you receive the full source code and the repository. No licence fee, no lock-in, and no situation where you have to keep paying me to keep your own system running.
Where does our data live?
Wherever you want it: your own server, a cloud account in your name, or a hosting account I set up and then hand over. The database is yours and you can take a full copy at any time.
What about backups?
Automatic daily backups, kept off the main server, with a tested restore — a backup nobody has ever restored is not a backup. You can also download a copy yourself whenever you like.
Can staff see things they shouldn’t?
No. Roles decide what each person sees — a salesman does not see purchase prices or the owner’s reports. Every create, edit and delete is recorded against a user and a time.
What happens when something breaks at 9pm?
You message me. Support terms are written into the agreement rather than left to goodwill, and hotfixes go through the same tested deployment path as everything else.
What if you disappear?
You hold the code, the accounts and the documentation, so any competent developer can continue. That is the point of handing those over rather than keeping them.
Will it work on the warehouse phone?
Yes. It is built mobile-first, because the person packing an order is not sitting at a desk.
Bigger than a website, so run differently
A system touches how your staff work every day. It is scoped in writing before anyone writes code, and delivered in stages you can see.
- ConversationAn hour on a call or at your office. What actually goes wrong in a week, and who it goes wrong for. Free.
- DiscoveryI sit with your process properly — how an order arrives, who touches it, where it stalls — and write it down. Paid, and credited against the build if you go ahead.
- Written scopeModules, screens, what is in phase one and what waits. A fixed price against that document, so the number cannot drift.
- Build in milestonesYou see working software every two weeks, not a progress report. Payment follows the milestones.
- Testing with your staffThe people who will use it try it on real orders before it goes live. What they find gets fixed first.
- Go live and handoverData migrated, staff trained, documentation written, code and accounts transferred to you.
- SupportThree months included. After that, a monthly agreement if you want one — not compulsory.
What it costs
Systems are quoted per project, because a two-warehouse distributor and a single-shop wholesaler are not the same job. These are the ranges in practice.
Discovery
Before committing to anything bigger.
- Your process mapped properly
- Written scope with screens listed
- Fixed price for the build
- Yours to keep, even if you then use another developer
Phase one system
The part that stops the bleeding.
- Orders and inventory
- Invoicing and dealer ledger
- Roles, access and audit trail
- Reports the owner actually opens
- Data migrated from your existing files
Full platform
When the whole operation runs on it.
- Dealer portal with self-service
- Multi-warehouse and transfers
- Dispatch and delivery tracking
- Purchase orders and supplier side
- Integrations — accounting, SMS, payments
For exporters
A different job: an English-language site and product catalogue built for foreign buyers, with proper technical SEO so they find you, and enquiry handling that does not lose leads. From PKR 150,000, and usually live within two weeks.
Start with a conversation, not a quote
Tell me what goes wrong in a normal week — how orders arrive, who handles stock, what the month-end argument is about. If a system is not the answer, I will say so; that is a cheaper conversation for both of us than a proposal nobody needed.
Or send the details here
Goes straight to my inbox.
Zohaib Ahmad · Senior .NET Developer · Islamabad · currently building the land-records platform for the Punjab Land Records Authority, previously payment systems integrated with the i2c gateway.