What a shopkeeper actually needs from a till
Speed at the counter, an honest stock number, and something that keeps working when the internet does not.
Most point-of-sale software is sold on the length of its feature list. Stand behind a counter for an afternoon and a much shorter list emerges.
The queue is the whole problem
Every second between "what's the total?" and the drawer opening is a second the next customer is waiting. That is why the till here takes a scanned barcode straight into the basket with no second tap, why you can say "do Coke aur aik bread" instead of hunting through a grid, and why a customer who has forgotten their wallet can be set aside rather than holding up the five people behind them.
Stock has to be one number
A shop that keeps its stock in three places will have three different answers by Friday. Casho keeps one: every movement is an entry in a ledger, and the number on the shelf is derived from it. You can always ask why a figure changed, and get an answer.
It has to work without the internet
Connections drop. Load-shedding happens. A till that stops taking money when the line goes down is not a till. Sales made offline are kept on the device with the key they were given at the counter, so when the connection comes back they land exactly once — and the catalog is mirrored on the device too, so you can still start a sale, not just finish one.
Nothing else is urgent
Reports matter at the end of the month. Loyalty schemes matter when there is a queue to reward. The counter matters every single day.
