Money
Pricing, billing and refunds: what we charge, how the arithmetic works, and which way it rounds when it is not exact.
· 2 min read
Rutba Books on film: an invoice paid, the suppliers settled and the year so far
A four and a half minute film follows the books of Northbank Trading, an invented wholesaler: what is owed both ways, a payment recorded against an invoice, supplier bills settled, cash flow weeks ahead, and an income statement read from the ledger.
· 14 min read
A shop’s affiliate programme now pays the people who promote it
The Affiliate Program’s money half was built on 8 October. Codes and referral links work at the web checkout and at the till. A manager signs off each earning after the return window, and an administrator approves each payout. No shop has switched it on yet.
· 8 min read
The server prices the refund, not the till
A till that adds up its own refund can pay out more than the sale took. Returns and exchanges are now priced on the server from the original sale, and at the order desk the person who collected the cash no longer confirms it.
· 3 min read
Rutba Sign now comes in smaller sizes
A landlord who signs three leases a year and an office that sends forty agreements a month do not need the same plan. Rutba Sign now has four rungs, the first five envelopes each month are free, and every rung costs less an envelope than the one below it.
· 3 min read
A shop does not pay by the person any more
Per user was the wrong unit for a shop, not the wrong amount: a three-person counter paid three times for one till. Commerce, Inventory and Orders are now bought by the business on the orders it takes, with every member of staff and every register included.
· 3 min read
One price list, and no page carries a price
One product was advertised at three different prices depending on which Rutba site you opened, and nothing could tell. Every figure now comes from one record as the page renders, and a test fails the build if anybody types a price into the site.
· 5 min read
Asking the books who is behind on paying, and whether Friday is covered
A credit controller wants the worst debts first. A finance lead wants to know whether Friday’s supplier run leaves enough in the bank. What Rutba Assistant reads in Rutba Books to answer each, and where it stops.
· 2 min read
Stamps, seals and notaries: arranged at cost, and never faked
Some agreements need more than signatures before a court will look at them. The formality is declared on the agreement and has to be satisfied before it is sent or sealed. Arrange it yourself for free, or have a person at Rutba arrange it at cost.
· 3 min read
Why our partner pages publish no margin percentages
We publish every customer price, to the cent. The one number our partner site deliberately leaves out is the partner margin, because a margin that works in one market is unsellable in the next, and a published one would be wrong in ten of eleven territories.
· 3 min read
The till renders a total. It does not choose one
A point of sale that trusts the total its screen sends is fine until a discount means money owed to somebody else. Our till now asks for a sale to exist, and the server says what it costs, the rule the web checkout has always followed.
· 4 min read
Ask for your money back, any time, and we will not ask why
If you have paid for time you are not using, there is a button that gives it back. No window, no reason, no email to support. Here is exactly how the number is worked out, and where we round.
· 3 min read
Every rounding goes to the customer
Software is full of places where the arithmetic is not exact. Each one is a decision about who absorbs the fraction, and we made that decision once, in advance, for all of them.
· 3 min read
One unit, one rater: the rule that stops us billing you twice
When two systems can both price the same thing, eventually both of them do. Here is the single rule we hold to instead, and the one line of SQL that enforces it.
· 3 min read
Bookkeeping is mostly re-typing things the business already knows
A till sale, a pay run and a stock revaluation are all journal entries that somebody currently types twice. We made each of them post its own, and what is left is the work actually worth doing.
