How to collect udhaaro before Dashain: a four-week plan for shops

Why collecting udhaaro before Dashain matters for your own cash

A credit sale looks like income on the day you make it, but it only becomes cash when the customer pays. For most of the year you can live with that gap. In Asoj it meets three bills that all fall due at once:

• Festival stock. Suppliers selling to you before Dashain often want cash or shorter terms, because they are funding their own stock. Our Dashain and Tihar stock planning guide covers how much to buy.
• Staff allowances. Most shops and distributors pay a festival allowance before Dashain, and it has to be paid from cash in hand.
• Tax. The VAT on bills you raised on credit is still due with the return for the month you raised them. More on that below.

Money your customers owe you is the cheapest festival cash you have, because it costs no interest. You only have to ask for it.

Start with an ageing list, not a phone

An ageing list groups each customer’s unpaid bills by how long they have been outstanding. Use four bands and keep them fixed:

Count days from the due date if you give terms, or from the invoice date if you sell on open credit. Pick one rule and apply it to every customer, or the bands mean nothing.

Your accounts receivable record may be a khata, a spreadsheet or software. Either way it should show the customer, bill number, bill date, amount, what has been paid and what is left. With that, you can build the list in one evening.

Why the oldest balance is not always the first call

A customer who is 45 days late but still orders every week is usually just short of cash. When their own festival takings arrive, they pay whoever asks clearly and early. A customer at 120 days has usually stopped buying, has a complaint about a delivery, or is in real trouble. That call takes longer and brings in less.

So work in this order. First, large balances in the 31 to 90 day bands from customers who are still trading with you. Second, anything over 90 days where you suspect a dispute, because the statement in the next step will surface it. Third, the true dead accounts, which need a different conversation after the festival.

A worked example: a small FMCG distributor

The figures below are illustrative, not from any real business. A distributor in a district bazaar supplies about 40 kirana shops on credit. Their ageing list in mid-September looks like this:

Now set that against the festival needs. Say the distributor wants Rs 3,50,000 of extra stock for the Tihar orders and pays six staff a festival allowance totalling Rs 1,50,000. That is Rs 5,00,000. A modest share of the overdue balances covers it without a loan. And because you built the list first, you know which accounts to ring before you pick up the phone.

Send a statement of account the customer can check line by line

Before you ask for money, send each overdue customer a statement of account. It lists every bill, credit note and payment for the period in date order, with a running balance. The customer can lay it beside their own records and tick each line.

The call can then start from “here is what our records show” instead of “you owe me”. The statement also finds disputes early: the crate returned damaged in Shrawan, the cash handed to a salesman that never reached you, the bill raised twice. Disputes found in September get fixed. Disputes found on the phone on 9 October become arguments.

A good statement starts with the opening balance and has one line per document, with its number. It has separate debit and credit columns and a running balance. At the bottom it shows the ageing of the closing figure and how many days the customer has to raise a difference.

How to ask for payment politely: scripts and timing for Asoj

Asoj is when the ask works best, because festival allowances and early shopping put cash in your customers’ hands. Contact each customer a few times, gently, instead of making one hard call.

The cadence

1. Mid-September: send the statement by WhatsApp or print, with a short covering note. No request for money yet beyond “please check”.
2. About a week later: phone to confirm they received it and ask whether anything does not match.
3. Late September to early October: visit the larger accounts in person, statement in hand, and agree an amount and a date.
4. Two or three days before the agreed date: a short WhatsApp reminder.
5. The day payment arrives: send a receipt that names the bills it settles.

A covering message with the statement

In English:

Namaste [name] ji. This is [your name] from [business name]. I have attached your account statement from Shrawan to Bhadra. It shows a balance of Rs [amount]. Please check it against your records and tell me if any line does not match, so we can correct it before Dashain.

In Romanised Nepali:

Namaste [name] ji, [business name] bata [your name]. Tapaiko Shrawan dekhi Bhadra samma ko khata ko statement pathayeko chhu. Baki Rs [amount] dekhiyeko chha. Kunai bill namilne bhaye bhannu hola, Dashain aghi milaaula. Dhanyabad.

The phone call or visit

Name the bills that are past their terms instead of quoting the whole balance. Ask for a date and an amount, and accept a part payment if that is all the customer can manage:

“Of the balance, bills [numbers] are past 45 days, Rs [amount] in total. Could we settle that by [date]? The rest can follow after Tihar as normal.”

The reminder before the date

Namaste [name] ji. Just a reminder of the Rs [amount] we agreed for [date]. Thank you, and advance Dashain shubhakamana.

Namaste [name] ji, [date] ma milaune bhaneko Rs [amount] ko samjhana matra. Dhanyabad, Dashain ko agrim shubhakamana.

Avoid group messages, public reminders and anything sent late at night. You want to be paid and still be supplying that shop next year.

Record part payments against the invoices they settle

Before Dashain many customers pay part of what they owe. Apply each payment to specific bills, oldest first unless the customer says otherwise, and write the bill numbers on the payment receipt.

If you enter a payment as a loose credit against the customer’s name, the ageing list goes wrong. The old bill still looks unpaid, and next month you chase the wrong amount. When each payment is applied to its bills, the oldest bills close first.

Use a credit note for disputed items, not a silent write-off

When the statement turns up a genuine problem, such as short supply, damaged goods or a price agreed after the bill, issue a credit note against the original invoice with the reason written on it. Then ask for the corrected balance.

You might knock Rs 4,000 off in your head, or cross a line out in the khata. Your records will still say the customer owes it. Your sales register and VAT figures will also stay too high, because only the credit note reduces the tax on the original bill.

VAT on a credit sale is due with the invoice, not with the cash

Under the VAT Act 2052, the tax on a sale is tied to the supply, and for a normal credit sale that means the month the invoice is issued. If you raised a Rs 1,13,000 bill including VAT in Bhadra, the VAT on it belongs in the Bhadra return, which most registered businesses file by the 25th of the following Nepali month, whether or not the customer has paid.

So the longer the udhaaro runs, the longer you pay the tax out of your own pocket before the customer’s cash arrives. Confirm your own position with your accountant or the IRD, and see our note on clearing supplier bills and input VAT before the return deadline for the purchase side of the same month.

Set credit limits and terms for Tihar to Chhath and the next season

Once the money is in, stop the same balance building up again by Chhath. Before Tihar orders start, set these for each credit customer:

• A limit. The most you will carry for them at any time, based on what they reliably pay, not on what they ask for.
• Terms. How many days each bill has, written on the bill.
• A rule for the festival peak. For example, new Tihar stock on credit only once the Dashain balance is below an agreed figure.

Tell customers these terms when you collect. They have just paid, and the conversation is friendly.

When to stop extending credit

Move a customer to cash on delivery until their account is clear if they are over their limit, have bills past 90 days with no dispute raised, or have missed two agreed payment dates. Apply the same rule to every account, so no customer feels singled out.

Your checklist to Ghatasthapana

Festival dates as published in the 2083 calendar.

When a notebook or spreadsheet is enough

If you sell on credit to fifteen regular customers and settle monthly, a well-kept khata or a spreadsheet does this job. Write the bill number beside every payment and total each customer on the first of the Nepali month. Build the ageing list by hand once a quarter.

Software is worth it when the list is too long to keep in your head, when several people sell on credit, or when receivables must agree with the VAT registers. Distributors with dozens of retail accounts get there first. The wholesale and FMCG distribution page shows how that trade is handled.

Where Kuver Books helps with udhaaro

In Kuver Books, receivables come from the documents you approve. Each sales invoice shows its amount, payments received, due date, status and remaining balance. Before a call, you can filter the list to one customer. Record a part payment from the invoice it pays, and the invoice shows Partially Paid with the rest still open. A payment cannot exceed the invoice total. An approved credit note reduces the balance.

Each customer record has a credit limit and payment terms. When a customer crosses the limit, a banner appears with a link to settle the dues. The receivables view exports to XLSX, PDF or CSV, using the filters you set. Record payments across 10 Nepali methods: cash, Khalti, eSewa, bank transfer, ConnectIPS, Fonepay, IME Pay, PrabhuPay, card and mobile banking. See how this works on the receivables, payables and cash page.

Common questions before you switch

Price. Standard is NPR 9,999/year, and 13% VAT applies to all prices. Full details are on the pricing page.

Trying it first. There is a 14-day free trial, no card required, so you can enter this season’s customers and see the receivables list before paying.

Setup. Guided setup; workspace ready the same business day.

Your existing records. Customers and opening balances can come across from a spreadsheet or a bill book. See moving from Excel or moving from a bill book.