Catering software for Pakistani caterers who price per head and per deg

Per head or per deg: the two ways Pakistani caterers price

A walima in a hall is usually priced per head: one figure covers the salan, the rice, the salad, the naan, the sweet and the drinks, and the hall or caterer adds service on top. A mehndi at home in Karachi is more often priced per deg. The family orders six degs of biryani, four of qorma and a few of kheer, and then adds naan by the hundred, waiters by the head and crockery by the set.

Catering software that only understands per-head pricing forces you to fake the deg order as a single line, and then the kitchen sheet is useless. Software that only understands items forgets that a per-head package includes naan and drinks. Test both in a demo: build one per-head walima and one per-deg mehndi, and check that each produces a sensible quotation and a sensible kitchen sheet.

Sample catering order: mehndi at a home in Karachi, priced per deg

Friday mehndi for about 300 guests at a family home in Gulshan-e-Iqbal, Karachi, food delivered by 8:00 pm, served by the caterer's waiters, quoted with Sindh sales tax.

• Home event in Sindh, so the Punjab one-dish rule does not apply; a marriage menu at a Punjab venue must stay within it.
• Sales tax shown at the Sindh general rate of 15% for a caterer registered with SRB; confirm your own rate.
• Breakages charged at replacement cost after the crockery is counted back.
• Balance due on delivery.

The one-dish rule binds the caterer too

Many caterers assume the Punjab Marriage Functions Act is the hall's problem. It is not. Section 5 says that a person running the venue or a caterer shall not serve, or allow anyone to serve, food at a marriage beyond the one dish allowed by section 4, and section 2 defines that dish as one salan, one rice dish, one salad, hot and cold drinks, roti, naan and one sweet dish. Section 10 allows food served in breach to be forfeited, and section 8 sets a fine of Rs 50,000 to Rs 2 million with up to one month of simple imprisonment.

Your catering software should therefore know where each event is. A marriage order for a hall in Lahore should only offer menus that fit the definition, while the same family's dholki at home or a corporate dinner is not caught by the marriage rule. Keep the signed menu on the order: if an inspector arrives, it is your evidence of what was agreed.

From the order to the deg: kitchen sheets, waiters and crockery

The order is only the start. Someone has to buy the meat, rice and oil, someone has to cook a set number of degs by a set hour, and someone has to send the right number of waiters with the right crockery to the right address. When those numbers live on three pieces of paper, one of them is always out of date.

Good catering software turns one confirmed order into a kitchen sheet with deg counts and cooking times, a dispatch list with the address and the time the van must leave, and a staff list showing how many waiters are needed. When the family adds fifty guests on the morning of the event, the change should reach all three at once.

Outdoor events add more lines. Shamiana, chairs, tables, cooling fans, a generator and transport are often hired from other suppliers and charged to the family. Put each on the order as its own line, with its own cost, so the profit on the event is visible before you agree the final price.

• Deg count per dish and the hour each must be ready
• Naan and roti counts tied to the guest number
• Waiters per guest and the time they must arrive
• Crockery sets out and back, so breakages are charged

What to test in a demo before choosing catering software in Pakistan

Sales tax on catering depends on the province

Catering is a service, and sales tax on services is set by the provinces. A caterer registered with the Sindh Revenue Board charges at the Sindh rate, 15% under its general rate, while a caterer registered with the Punjab Revenue Authority uses the rate on its PRA registration, which practitioners report at 16% for most services. KPRA has its own schedule. If you cook in one province and serve in another, ask your adviser which authority you should charge for, and set that rate on the order.

That is why tax per line matters. A catering invoice often mixes your own food and service with pass-through items such as hired shamianas, and you may treat them differently. One tax box for the whole invoice cannot show that, while a rate on each line can.

Bayana, balances and short-notice orders

Wedding orders come with a bayana weeks ahead and a balance on the day. Funeral and dua orders often come with a phone call and no deposit at all, and the payment arrives a few days later. Your software should record both patterns without fuss, issue a receipt for each payment, and show you at the end of the week who still owes what.

Keep the history. A family that orders a mehndi this year will call again for a walima or an aqeeqah, and being able to see what they ordered, how many guests came and what they paid makes the next quotation faster and more accurate.

Where Venura fits for a Pakistani caterer

Venura's catering app keeps orders, menus, quotations, invoices and receipts with the tax rate you set on each line, deposits and balances, kitchen sheets, staff roles, and sharing by WhatsApp or email. It runs on the web and in native Android and iOS apps, and if you also run a hall, the venue app shares the same bookings. You can try it free for 30 days, and plans for Pakistan are priced on request.

Venura does not connect to PRA, SRB, KPRA or FBR portals and does not file returns. It does keep every order's figures in one place for your accountant. If you price in an unusual way, bring a real order from last month to the demo and build it live.

Catering software questions from Pakistan