Manufacturing & Retail
Toysam Distributors
From 5 days of tax paperwork to 2 — with POS, eTIMS, and CRM running on one ERPNext backbone
60%Faster tax reporting
The Challenge
- Monthly KRA tax reporting consumed 5 days of manual data entry, spreadsheet manipulation, and portal uploads.
- eTIMS compliance was handled through a third-party portal, creating data silos and frequent reconciliation errors.
- The POS required constant internet connectivity and went down during outages, forcing staff to record sales on paper for later manual entry.
- Customer data was scattered across notebooks and phones — no central record of purchase history or credit limits.
- Sales commissions were calculated by hand every month, leading to disputes and delayed payroll.
- Gift cards and store credit were tracked manually, with no real-time balance visibility for customers or staff.
- Pricing was inconsistent across outlets — the same item sold at different rates with no central control.
- There was no system for tracking leads, follow-ups, or customer inquiries from walk-ins and phone calls.
The Solution
- Deployed Coale-POS with a Vue.js frontend and full offline mode — transactions queue locally and sync automatically when connectivity returns, with biometric staff authentication and role-based permissions.
- Implemented Kenya eTIMS Compliance app with auto-submitting sales invoices to KRA on submission, generating QR codes, validating purchase invoices against KRA records, and blocking payments on unverified supplier invoices.
- Registered all 2,500+ items with eTIMS classification codes through the `etims_registered_items` master, ensuring every sale is tax-compliant from the moment it is scanned.
- Set up automated invoice queue retry for failed eTIMS submissions, with structured error logging and dual API mode for sandbox testing.
- Integrated Frappe CRM for lead tracking, deal pipeline management, and customer follow-ups — moving inquiry data from notebooks into a structured Kanban workflow.
- Deployed gift card and store credit modules with real-time balance tracking, unique codes, and automatic redemption at checkout.
- Implemented global_item_pricing with automated price enforcement across all outlets, preventing unauthorized discounting.
- Built automated commission calculation tied to POS sales invoices, with monthly payout reports eliminating manual disputes.
- Enabled contactless payment support (M-Pesa STK Push, QR codes) with automatic reconciliation to ERPNext Payment Entries.
Key Results
60%
Faster monthly tax reporting — from 5 days to 2 days
100%
eTIMS compliance with auto-submit and QR code generation
Zero
Sales lost to internet outages after offline POS deployment
2,500+
Items registered with eTIMS classification codes
Products & Services Used
ERPNextCoale-POSKenya eTIMS ComplianceFrappe CRMCoale-PaymentsCustom Frappe Development
“Coale-Tax eliminated the back-and-forth with our accountant every month. Invoices go straight to KRA, our POS works offline, and CRM tracks every customer inquiry. Three apps, one system.”
S
Samwel Gacheru
Managing Director, Toysam Distributors