Packshine POS
A point of sale system built for Zambian auto shops, supermarkets and bars, that grew with its first customer from one till to several shops.
The problem
Off-the-shelf POS software was either too expensive for a small Zambian business or built for a different kind of shop. An auto spares dealer needs part compatibility and supplier credit; a bar needs fast table service; a supermarket needs barcodes and quick checkout. The owner also wanted to see the business when he wasn't in it.
What we built
- Till and back office for Windows: sales with cash, card, mobile money and account payments, tap-to-add Kwacha notes, quotations, receipts and payment slips.
- Stock and purchasing: suppliers, purchases with buying-price history, stock adjustments with set reasons, and A4 barcode label sheets.
- Customer and supplier accounts, with balances paid off oldest invoice first.
- Several shops from one PC: the owner picks a shop at login, and every sale, purchase and stock movement is recorded against it. Reports can be run per shop or with subtotals by shop.
- Users and roles: cashiers get a full-screen till; admins get everything. Each sale shows who served it.
- Product pictures with a pop-out viewer the cashier can show to the customer.
- An Android owner app that reads the same API from anywhere: today's sales, reports, stock and balances.
How it's put together
One ASP.NET Core API in front of PostgreSQL serves both the Windows client and the Android app. It's a modular monolith: sales, inventory, purchasing, customers, shops and reports live in one deployable service but in separate modules, which keeps it cheap to host and simple to install on a single shop PC. Sign-in uses hashed passwords, expiring sessions and lockout after repeated failures, and every endpoint is admin-only unless it's needed at the till.
Results
The first customer runs his shops on it every day and asked for the multi-shop features that are now part of the product.