Questions
The things people ask before they buy.
Including the ones where the answer is no. You will find out either way in the first ten minutes of a demo, so there is nothing to gain by saving it until then.
01
What it costs
- Is Nool a monthly subscription?
- No. Nool is licensed once per shop and then it is yours. There is no monthly fee and no per-user seat. Yearly support and updates renew separately and are optional — the licence does not expire, and the software does not stop working if you choose not to renew.
- How much does Nool cost?
- Three one-time tiers by shop size: Counter at ₹24,000 for a single till, Shop at ₹54,000 for a shop with more than one counter, and Group at ₹1,10,000 for more than one branch. Prices are per shop and exclude GST. Optional yearly support and updates are ₹6,000, ₹11,000 and ₹24,000 respectively.
- Is anything held back from the cheapest tier?
- No module is. Counter has the same point of sale, purchases, inventory and accounting as Group. What the tiers change is how many devices and locations the licence covers, and how much of our time comes with it.
- What happens if I stop paying for support?
- Nothing happens to the software. The licence is perpetual: Nool keeps running, keeps selling and keeps posting. What stops is new versions and our support time. You can start renewing again later.
- Do I need to buy hardware from you?
- No, and we would rather you did not buy anything you do not need. You need a machine to act as the server, a thermal label printer, a receipt printer and a barcode scanner. If you already have any of these, we will tell you whether they will work.
- What about my existing data?
- Item, supplier and customer masters, and opening balances, can usually be brought across. Migration is quoted once we have seen what is in your current system, because that is the only honest way to price it.
- Is there a trial?
- There is a demo, on your own stock if you like. We would rather spend an hour showing you the software with your items and your supplier's docket in it than give you a download and hope.
02
Running it in the shop
- Does Nool work without an internet connection?
- The counter does. A till talks to the server over the shop's own network, so if the broadband drops, bills are still rung up, stock still moves and the ledger still posts. What does need a connection is anything coming from outside the shop — a branch over the VPN, or you looking at the day's takings from home. Those resume when the line comes back.
- Where is my data kept?
- On a machine in your shop. Nool is not rented from a data centre and no third party holds your trading data. The server runs as a Windows service that starts with the machine and comes back after a power cut without anyone logging in.
- Do I need to buy a separate server machine?
- Not necessarily. A busy store is better on a dedicated machine, but a small shop can run the server on the office computer. From the Shop tier upward we recommend a dedicated on-premise server, so the tills keep selling if any one machine fails.
- Can I see my shop when I am not in it?
- Yes, over a VPN — an encrypted private link, rather than opening the shop's server to the public internet. That is the setup we recommend once there is a second location, and it is what the Group tier covers: branches and your own phone reach the same server, with location-wise stock, sales and closing figures.
- Can more than one counter bill at the same time?
- Yes. Each till has its own session, its own counted cash close and its own variance report, and the back office works on the same data at the same moment. Phones and tablets on the shop's Wi-Fi can check stock on the floor.
- What are my backups?
- Automated database backups run on a schedule, and the restore is tested at handover rather than assumed. Scheduled health checks and log rotation run alongside them.
03
What it actually does
- How does Nool handle GST on MRP tag prices?
- Indian retail prices are MRP, so the customer pays what the ticket says. Nool carves CGST and SGST out of that figure line by line, at each item's own rate. Nobody at the counter does arithmetic.
- Does Nool file my GST returns?
- No. Nool records the tax on every sale and purchase and posts input and output GST to the ledger, but filing returns is not part of it. Your accountant works from the figures Nool produces.
- Does it print barcode price tags in the shop?
- Yes. Every garment gets its own serial and its own barcode, and the thermal tags print in your shop straight from a purchase entry — through a local agent, with no browser print dialog and no cloud print service.
- How is serialised stock different from ordinary stock?
- Ordinary stock software holds an item and a quantity. Nool holds each piece. Two shirts of the same design, size and colour can have arrived on different bills at different costs, and Nool knows which of the two left the shop, at what price, against which purchase.
- Does Nool replace my accounting software?
- It keeps real double-entry books rather than a sales log with a report bolted on. Sales, purchases, expenses and till closures post to a journal that balances, and you get a trial balance as of any date, a day book, party ledgers, outstanding bills and payment and receipt vouchers. Whether your CA wants it in another format is worth asking them before you decide.
- Can I bring in the balances I already have?
- Yes. Opening balances are entered once, properly, so you start from where your books already are rather than from zero on the day you install.
04
Whether it suits you
- Is Nool right for a shop selling cloth by the metre?
- No. Nool's whole model is that a garment is an individually barcoded piece, and yardage does not serialise. You would be fighting the software every day.
- Does Nool connect to Amazon, Flipkart or Shopify?
- Not today. There is no marketplace or e-commerce connector. If online is a real part of your trade, ask us before you buy rather than after.
- Does Nool do payroll or manufacturing?
- No. Nool covers retail — buying, selling, stock, and the books that come from them. It is not an HR system and it is not a production planner.
- How new is Nool?
- The product is new. The experience behind it is not: 10 years of retail ERP work, and a first shop that ran on it before it was offered to anyone else. We would rather you judged it by watching a piece go from a supplier's bill to a printed tag to a bill at the counter than by a customer count.
Where these are set out in full
Still deciding?
Ask the question that is not on this page. If the answer is that Nool is the wrong fit for your shop, we would rather say so on the phone than after you have paid.