Built for Indian hardware shops running 1,000+ SKUs — pipes, fittings, tools, paints, wire. One app handles variant-wise GST billing, live stock across shop and godown, contractor credit ledgers and e-way bills. From ₹799/year. Free trial, no credit card. No accountant needed.
No credit card · Free migration in 48 hrs · No accountant needed
Accountune research · 2026
Based on Accountune hardware-store onboardings (Jan–Apr 2026). Market sizing: IMARC Group, India Building Materials Market 2025; 6Wresearch, Hardware Market Size in India 2025; GST Council 56th meeting / CBIC notifications, 17 Sep 2025.
A hardware store is not general retail. The same product lives in many forms — GI pipe in ten sizes, wire in five gauges, paint in thirty shades — and since 22 September 2025 each form carries its own GST rate under the new two-slab structure. Billing software has to treat every variant as its own SKU, track contractor credit, and generate e-way bills — things generic retail tools handle poorly.
Understanding the hardware counter
Every product is many variants. A “GI pipe” is ten products — half-inch to four-inch, each a different price, stock count and HSN-linked GST rate. Wire comes in five gauges; paint in dozens of shades and pack sizes. Software must treat each variant as its own SKU, not force “one product, one rate”.
Contractor credit is the business model, not an exception. Builders, plumbers and contractors buy across 15–20 visits and clear dues every 45–50 days. Per-contractor dated ledgers, credit limits and WhatsApp reminders are a core requirement — not an add-on. This is where hardware shops leak the most money.
GST 2.0 reshaped hardware rates. Since 22 September 2025 there are two main slabs — 5% and 18% — plus 40% for sin/luxury goods. Cement dropped from 28% to 18% (HSN 2523). Most hardware lines — pipes (PVC, CPVC, HDPE, GI, steel) and fittings, paints, tiles, wires, electricals, hand tools, sanitaryware — stay at 18%. Only a few items (unpolished granite/marble blocks, clay/fly-ash bricks) sit at 5%. A wrong slab means a wrong GSTR-1.
₹50,000+ orders make e-way bills a daily task. When a contractor lifts a full load, the order routinely crosses ₹50,000 — which needs an e-way bill. Logging into a separate portal for every consignment breaks the dispatch flow.
Multi-godown stock, owner-operated. Stock sits across a counter and a godown; fast-movers run out quietly and the regular walks to the shop next door. Most hardware shops are owner-run with no dedicated accountant — the software must work without accounting knowledge.
Built and proven at hardware scale. India's building-materials market is about $44.4B in 2025 and growing ~7.0% a year (2025–2031), almost all of it billed at counters like yours. More than 3,000 hardware stores — part of 12,000+ Indian businesses — already run on Accountune.
Entities covered on this page
6 counter failures Accountune fixes
These are not hypothetical. They happen in small businesses across India every month — and each one quietly costs money or hours.
1,000+ SKUs, every variant a guess. Finding the right item, price and GST rate by hand takes time and mistakes happen daily — wrong size, wrong rate, a missed line.
Multi-item bills slow & error-proneSearch “GI pipe” and every size/grade appears with price, GST rate and live stock. Select, set quantity, print or WhatsApp. A ten-SKU contractor bill goes out in around 20 seconds.
Bills out in ~20 sec, even multi-itemContractor dues pile up across 15 visits in a register where half the entries have no date. The “I already paid that ₹6,400” argument has no answer, and most owners write it off.
Disputed dues end in write-offsEvery contractor gets a dated account: each purchase, each payment, exact outstanding, and a credit limit you set. WhatsApp reminders go out without typing a number. The “already paid” argument ends with a timestamp.
~₹6,400 typically recovered in Q1Half-inch GI pipe finishes, nobody notices, the regular customer hears “nahi hai” and walks to the shop next door — and doesn't come back. Four or five times a month.
Sales and regulars lost quietlyEvery bill deducts stock; every purchase adds it. When a fast-mover drops below your minimum you get an alert — reorder the same day. Shop and godown counts stay separate.
No “out of stock” surprisesWrong slab on cement (still charging 28%?) or the deleted 12% slab means every invoice is wrong — and so is your GSTR-1, plus ITC mismatches for your contractor buyers.
Hours of guesswork + notice riskMap HSN and rate once per item on the 5%/18% structure. Every invoice applies the right CGST/SGST/IGST automatically, so GSTR-1 and GSTR-3B export in minutes.
Returns ready in minutes, not hoursAbove ₹50,000 you log into a separate portal and re-enter the whole invoice while the truck waits at the gate.
Dispatch held up, data re-enteredEnter vehicle, distance and transporter once; the e-way bill generates on the government portal without switching tabs. Bill and e-way bill stay linked.
Large orders dispatch fasterSupplier accounts scattered across registers; partial payments and shifting purchase prices mean no clear picture of dues.
Missed & double supplier paymentsPurchase orders, price history, partial payments and per-supplier outstanding in one screen. Stock updates on delivery.
No missed supplier duesSetup to first bill — in 15 minutes
No IT person, no training consultant. Most hardware owners raise their first live bill within 15 minutes of signing up.
Add each item with variants (size/grade/gauge), price, HSN code and GST rate on the 5%/18% structure. On Excel or Tally already? Bulk import / free migration loads everything — our team helps port within 48 hours.
Add contractors with a credit limit you set, and link items to suppliers. Each contractor gets a dated ledger; each supplier gets purchase history and outstanding. Walk-ins bill without a profile.
Search by name/code or scan a barcode, pick the variant, add quantity. Price, GST and HSN auto-fill. Print or WhatsApp the invoice. Stock deducts and the contractor ledger updates automatically.
For ₹50,000+ orders, raise the e-way bill from the same screen. GSTR-1 and GSTR-3B export ready with correct post-September-2025 slabs already applied. File yourself or share with your CA in one tap.
Variants, contractor ledgers, multi-godown stock, e-way bills and GST all run from one screen — no separate registers, no accounting knowledge.
What you get
From variant billing to e-way bills to GST returns — one connected system. Every bill updates stock, the contractor ledger and the right GST slab on its own.
Invoice in under 10 seconds
Search by product name or barcode scan. GST, HSN, price auto-filled. Print or WhatsApp in one tap.
Stock accurate without extra entry
Every sale deducts from stock; every purchase adds back. Live count at any moment.
Not one rupee missed or disputed
Per-customer digital account with timestamped history. One-tap WhatsApp reminders.
Zero manual tax calculation
CGST, SGST and IGST correct on every invoice. GSTR-1 and GSTR-3B ready at month end.
Reorder before the shelf goes empty
Custom minimum per product; alert via app, email or SMS.
Packaged goods billed in 3 seconds
USB, Bluetooth or phone camera; auto-fills name, price, GST, HSN.
Professional bills, no printing cost
PDF invoice to the customer's WhatsApp in one tap.
Never overpay a supplier again
Every purchase logged; supplier-wise outstanding always visible.
Full business picture in 2 minutes
Sales, top products, slow movers, daily profit, pending dues — one dashboard.
Counter staff see billing only
Role-based logins; profit and purchase data stay owner-only. Full activity log.
Cash flow protected without awkwardness
Set a max credit per customer; alert fires before the bill is created.
Data safe even if every device is lost
Automatic daily backup with 256-bit encryption; log in from any device.
The short version
Accountune vs Tally, Zoho and Vyapar across six capabilities that matter to a hardware shop (verified May 2026).
| Capability | Accountune | Tally | Zoho Books | Vyapar |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| E-invoicing built-in | ||||
| Mobile billing | view-only | |||
| Multi-user roles | ||||
| Live cloud sync | paid extra | sync only | ||
| WhatsApp + UPI in bill | limited | limited | ||
| Free migration support | via dealer | self | self |
Accountune is the only one here that ships variant billing, contractor credit, e-way bills and WhatsApp invoicing as defaults — not paid add-ons — at ₹799/year.
Is this right for your store?
Built and tested with real Indian hardware owners during development — from contractor-heavy plumbing stores to building-material counters.
Best fit · contractor-heavy
CPVC, GI, fittings and sanitaryware across many sizes, sold mostly on credit — variant billing + contractor ledgers handle it from one screen.
high-variant inventory
Paint in dozens of shades and pack sizes plus general hardware — unlimited variant SKUs stay findable past 1,000 items.
gauge / fast-mover heavy
Wire in multiple gauges, switches, fittings — per-variant reorder alerts fire before a high-turnover item runs out.
Growth plan · e-way bills
High-ticket orders that routinely cross ₹50,000 — inline e-way bills and IRN keep dispatch and ITC clean.
cement / steel, GST 2.0
Cement (now 18%), steel and aggregates with ₹50,000+ loads — correct post-Sep-2025 slabs and e-way bills from the billing screen.
credit + walk-in
Contractors on credit plus retail footfall — separate price lists, both updating the same stock and GST returns.
Recognise your shop? You're exactly who Accountune is built for.
Start freeAccountune Product Team
Product Research — India SME Billing
Based on
Most hardware shop owners in India discover their credit and stock problems only after the money is already gone — a disputed “I already paid that”, a fast-mover that ran out before anyone noticed, or a wrong GST slab that surfaces months later as a GSTR-1 mismatch. The common thread is not carelessness. It is a register that has no payment timestamp and no reorder alert. Once every contractor payment carries a date and stock updates itself, the “already paid” argument simply ends — and that usually pays for the software in the first quarter.
Buyer's guide · 2026
Evaluate any tool on these seven criteria. Failing even two usually causes friction within the first month.
Does it treat each size/grade/gauge as its own SKU — separate price, stock and HSN per variant, not one product, one rate?
Accountune
Accountune: a “GI pipe” search returns every size with live stock and rate.
Does it apply the 5%/18% slabs correctly? Cement is now 18%; most pipes, fittings, paints, tiles and tools stay 18%; only specific items are 5%.
Accountune
Accountune ships the two-slab structure; CGST/SGST/IGST applied automatically.
Per-customer ledgers, limits and WhatsApp reminders — not just a “credit sale” toggle. This is where hardware shops leak the most money.
Accountune
Accountune: dated per-contractor ledgers, limits, one-tap reminders with the outstanding pre-filled.
₹50,000+ orders are routine — you don't want a separate portal in your workflow.
Accountune
Accountune generates the e-way bill inline; bill and e-way bill stay linked.
Shop and godown counts must be separate and transferable.
Accountune
Accountune: location-wise stock on one screen, with transfers between locations.
“Sync” is not cloud. Check for hourly auto-backup and full mobile billing.
Accountune
Accountune: cloud-native with 256-bit AES on AWS India; full Android/iOS/desktop/web on one login.
A ₹799 first year that becomes ₹6,000 isn't ₹799. Check the renewal price and migration help.
Accountune
Accountune: flat ₹799–₹4,490/year with free migration in ~48 hours, no dealer markup.
Compiled from GST Council / CBIC guidance and 3,000+ hardware-store onboardings · Accountune Research.
Verified customer reviews
12,000+ Indian hardware stores trust Accountune · 4.9/5 rating. Quoted reviews are from real customers and reproduced verbatim; identities and businesses verified at the time of writing.
Stock 3× faster
“1200 items ka stock haath se track karna sach mein mushkil kaam tha. Accountune ne sab aasaan kar diya — reorder ke alerts bhi time pe mil jaate hain.”
Zero missed payments
“Pehle udhaar ka hisaab diary mein chalta tha, aadha yaad rehta tha aadha bhool jaata. Ab Accountune mein sab track ho jaata hai — ek bhi payment miss nahi hoti.”
Billing 2× faster
“Contractor ho ya walk-in customer, bill banane mein time lagta tha. Ab GST invoice seconds mein ready, kisi ko counter pe rukna nahi padta.”
Nuts-bolts tak ka hisaab
“Hardware mein chhoti-chhoti cheezein — nuts, bolts, fittings — inka count rakhna sabse tedha kaam hai. Ab har sale ke baad stock khud update ho jaata hai.”
Reorder alerts = no shortage
“Fast-moving maal khatam hone se pehle hi alert aa jaata hai. Pehle popular items aksar out of stock ho jaate the, ab aisa nahi hota.”
Reports ek click mein
“Sale, stock, GST — har report bas ek click pe saamne. Pehle ye sab nikalne mein poora din nikal jaata tha.”
Pricing
Every plan includes the day book, cash book, GST entries and reports. Growth adds e-invoicing, GSTR-2B reconciliation, bank reconciliation and CA remote access; Pro adds multi-location and unlimited users.
For Getting Started
+ taxes
Perfect for Mobile only Users
+ taxes · ≈ ₹67/month
Perfect for Getting Started
+ taxes · ≈ ₹154/month
Perfect for Growing Businesses
+ taxes · ≈ ₹375/month
Three yearly plans — Lite ₹799, Growth ₹1,849, Pro ₹4,490. Variant billing, contractor ledgers, live stock and GST 2.0 rates are in every plan; e-invoicing, e-way bills and GSTR-2B on Growth and Pro · Free trial, no card · Free migration from Tally, Vyapar or registers in ~48 hours.
Type a keyword or pick a category. Everything a hardware owner asks before signing up is one keystroke away.
The best hardware billing software treats every variant — each size, grade and gauge — as its own SKU with its own price, stock count and HSN-linked GST rate, then layers on contractor credit ledgers with limits, multi-godown stock, e-way bills for ₹50,000+ orders, and automatic GSTR-1 and GSTR-3B export on the post-22-September-2025 slabs. Accountune is built variant-first for Indian hardware shops, starts at ₹799/year, runs on mobile, desktop and web from one login, and is used by 12,000+ businesses. Free migration from Tally, Vyapar, Marg or registers takes about 48 hours, with a free trial and no card. Pick a tool that matches your SKU count and credit volume, not just the cheapest sticker price.
No. Accountune is built for shopkeepers who have run a register for twenty years, not for accountants. Billing takes two taps — search the item, set the quantity, print or WhatsApp the invoice. The screens are Hindi-friendly, the layout matches how a hardware counter actually works, and you do not need to know debit, credit, or any accounting term to raise a bill or track a contractor's dues. Our team helps with the initial setup free, and WhatsApp support answers in your language when you get stuck. Most owners raise their first live bill within fifteen minutes of signing up, without a single training class or a computer course.
Yes. Each size, grade and pack is its own SKU with its own price, stock count and HSN-linked GST rate. When you search one product name — say “GI pipe” — every variant surfaces with its live stock and rate, so even a multi-item contractor bill with ten SKUs goes out in around 20 seconds. You can group variants under a parent item, scan a barcode to bill, and set a separate reorder level per variant so a fast-moving half-inch size alerts you before it runs out, independent of the slow-moving sizes. Amit Gupta's shop in Nagpur runs 1,200+ items this way and reports stock handling roughly three times faster than the old register. There is no practical cap that affects a normal hardware counter.
Yes to both. You can scan a barcode at the counter to pull the exact item, size and rate instantly — useful when a single product like wire or screws comes in many gauges and packs. For items without printed barcodes, Accountune can generate and print your own labels. On the stock side, you set a minimum level per variant, so a fast-moving half-inch GI pipe alerts you the moment it drops below that line, independent of the slow-moving sizes sitting in the godown. The alert tells you to reorder before a regular customer asks and walks to the shop next door. Both barcode billing and per-variant reorder alerts work on mobile and desktop from the same login.
Yes, from the same counter. You can keep separate price lists for contractors and walk-ins, so a builder who buys in bulk sees his negotiated rate while a walk-in pays retail — without you re-typing anything. Contractors get a dated credit ledger with a credit limit you set and WhatsApp payment reminders that go out without you typing the amount; walk-ins are billed cash or UPI in seconds. Both transaction types update the same live stock and the same GST returns, so your GSTR-1 stays correct whether a sale was credit or cash. This matters in hardware because most shops are a mix — site-supply contractors on credit, plus retail footfall — and splitting them across two systems is exactly how dues get lost.
Yes. Each contractor or builder gets a dated ledger with a credit limit you decide — once their outstanding nears that limit, you see it before you hand over more material on credit. Every purchase and payment carries a date and amount, so the running balance is always current and disputes about an “already paid” entry end with a timestamp you can show. When a payment is due, you send a WhatsApp reminder from the ledger without typing the number or amount yourself — the message goes out with the correct outstanding filled in. For a hardware shop where contractors clear dues every forty-five to fifty days, this is usually where the most money stops leaking in the first quarter.
Since 22 September 2025, GST runs on two main slabs — 5% and 18% — plus a 40% rate reserved for sin and luxury goods. For hardware, the headline change is cement, which dropped from 28% to 18% (HSN 2523). Most other hardware lines stay at 18%: pipes (PVC, CPVC, HDPE, GI, steel) and pipe fittings, paints, tiles, wires, electricals, hand tools, sanitaryware and most fittings. Only a few building-material items sit at the 5% merit slab — notably unpolished granite and marble blocks, and clay and fly-ash building bricks under concessional notifications. Note that many online lists wrongly claim “PVC pipes at 5%”; per HSN-level guidance, plastic and metal pipes are 18%. Always confirm an item's current HSN-linked rate on the CBIC rate finder, since notifications are amended periodically.
Accountune prepares the GSTR-1 and GSTR-3B data for you; the actual filing is done on the GST portal by you or your CA. Because every invoice already carries the correct HSN code and the post-September-2025 GST rate, the monthly export is ready in minutes instead of hours of manual compiling. Sales are reported HSN-wise automatically, which reduces the classification errors that trigger notices, and keeps the input-tax-credit trail clean for your contractor buyers — a wrong slab on your invoice becomes their ITC-mismatch problem too. Growth and Pro plans also include GSTR-2B reconciliation so you can match purchases against what suppliers actually filed, and CA remote read-only access so your accountant pulls the data directly without you exporting and emailing files back and forth.
Yes. For orders above ₹50,000 — routine in hardware when a contractor lifts a full load — you enter the vehicle number, distance and transporter once on the billing screen, and the e-way bill generates from the government portal without you logging into a separate site or re-typing the invoice. The bill and the e-way bill stay linked, so dispatch records and GST returns line up. E-way bill generation is included from the Growth plan (5,000 e-way bills/year) and is unlimited on Pro. For shops that move several big orders a day, keeping this inside the billing flow — rather than switching tabs for every consignment — is usually the difference between dispatching on time and holding a truck at the gate.
Yes. E-invoicing with automatic IRN (Invoice Reference Number) generation is available from the Growth plan. It matters once your turnover crosses the government's e-invoicing threshold, or when corporate and contractor buyers insist on an IRN-backed invoice to claim input tax credit cleanly. Accountune generates the IRN at the time of billing and prints the QR code on the invoice, so you don't run a separate upload step. As thresholds tighten over time, having IRN already built into your billing means you won't have to switch systems or scramble — you simply turn it on when it applies to you. If you're below the threshold today, you can keep billing normally and enable e-invoicing the day it becomes relevant.
Yes. Accountune is cloud-native, with full Android, iOS, desktop and web apps that all use one login — so you can bill at the counter, check a contractor's outstanding from the godown, and pull a report from home without moving data between machines. “Sync-only” tools tie your real data to one computer and copy it up occasionally; cloud-native means the live data sits on the server and every device sees the same numbers in real time. Your data is backed up hourly with 256-bit AES encryption on AWS India servers in Mumbai and Bangalore, the setup is ISO 27001 aligned, and the platform has run GST-compliant since 2017. For a hardware shop with a counter, a godown and an owner often on site, one login everywhere removes a lot of daily friction.
The mobile app supports offline billing, so when the connection drops you keep raising bills as normal — nothing stops at the counter. Once the internet returns, those bills sync automatically to the cloud and update stock, ledgers and GST data without you re-entering anything. This is built for real Indian shop conditions, where power and connectivity aren't always steady, especially in older market areas. You don't have to switch to a paper pad and then type everything back in later; the app holds the transactions locally and reconciles them the moment it reconnects. For most hardware counters the practical effect is that a network outage becomes a non-event rather than a billing halt or a stack of slips to re-key at night.
Yes. The Growth and Pro plans include remote read-only access for your chartered accountant. Your CA logs in with their own credentials and pulls the ledgers, GST data and reports they need directly — no exporting spreadsheets, no WhatsApp-ing files back and forth, no month-end “please send me the data” loop. Read-only means they can see and download everything required for filing and review, but cannot alter your live entries, so your books stay intact. This usually cuts the back-and-forth that makes CA work slow and expensive: instead of waiting for you to assemble data, your accountant works from current numbers whenever they need to. GST filing and year-end accounts then get done from real-time books rather than a reconstruction at the deadline.
Accountune has three yearly plans: Lite at ₹799, Growth at ₹1,849 (the most popular choice) and Pro at ₹4,490. All three include cloud hosting, mobile access, GST billing and returns, and hourly backups, with no hidden add-on costs. The plans differ mainly by volume and depth: Lite suits a solo counter with low billing volume; Growth adds e-invoicing, e-way bills, GSTR-2B and bank reconciliation, plus up to 3 users and CA access; Pro adds multi-location/multi-GSTIN, unlimited users, advanced reports, bulk import and API. Pricing is yearly only — there's no monthly plan — but ₹799/year works out to roughly ₹67 a month. There's a free trial with no credit card and a 7-day money-back guarantee on paid plans, so you can test it on your real items before committing.
Tally Silver costs about ₹26,550 as a one-time license (plus GST), and to keep it updated you pay roughly ₹4,500 a year for TSS; cloud access is a paid third-party add-on on top of that. Accountune is ₹799/year with cloud, mobile and hourly backups built in — so in year one you're comparing roughly ₹799 against ₹26,550+, around 33× cheaper, and you get full mobile billing that Tally's desktop license doesn't offer out of the box. Over several years the gap narrows because Tally is a one-time purchase, but most hardware shops value the cloud, the mobile app, the contractor reminders and the WhatsApp invoicing that come standard here. Verify current Tally pricing on their site before deciding, since licensing changes periodically.
No. Accountune's team handles the migration for you — importing your item list, suppliers, opening balances and outstanding ledgers, with variants and HSN codes mapped to the new GST 2.0 slabs. It typically completes within about 48 hours, with a no-data-loss approach: nothing in your old system is deleted, and you can run both in parallel during the transition so you're never flying blind. You don't need to export and re-format files yourself or learn a new data structure; you hand over your existing data and confirm the result. For shops moving off paper registers rather than software, the team also helps with structured manual entry of your active items and live contractor balances, so day one in Accountune starts with your real numbers, not a blank slate.
Yes — there's a free trial and no credit card is required. You sign up with a phone number or email and start billing on your own items within minutes, so you can test variant billing, contractor ledgers and GST on real hardware stock before paying anything. There's no auto-charge at the end of a trial because you never enter card details to begin with. Paid plans also carry a 7-day money-back guarantee, so even after you upgrade you can step back if it doesn't fit your shop. The point is to let you prove it works on your counter — your fast-movers, your contractors, your slabs — rather than asking you to commit on the strength of a feature list. If you want hands-on help during the trial, the team can walk you through setup.
Practical reads on GST, billing and running a business in India — written for shop owners, not accountants.
Mobile accessories HSN codes 2026: charger 8504, earphones 8518, cable 8544, cover 3926, glass 7007 — almost all 18% GST. Why billing under 8517 is a mistake, explained.
Jewellery HSN code 7113: gold, silver & diamond are 3% GST, making charges 5%. Old gold exchange, imitation 18% & the two-line invoice rule for jewellers, explained.
Cement HSN code 2523 is 18% GST in 2026 (down from 28%). Full construction materials list — bricks, sand, steel, RMC, tiles — with HSN codes and rates for dealers.
Each industry comes with its own preset items, taxes and templates — so day-one feels like day-thirty.
Trust on every device sold
Counter-speed billing
Move volume, control credit
Stay compliant, cut wastage
Bill rods, sheets and packets right
Everyday neighbourhood billing
Size, colour, season — never out of stock
Every pair, every size, tracked
From raw inputs to finished value
Join thousands of Indian small businesses running their accounts, billing and inventory on Accountune.
