What a pharmacy POS in the Philippines actually has to do.
Most point-of-sale software is built for retail in general. A drugstore is not retail in general: the stock expires, the discounts are set by statute, and some of what you sell has to be logged under a licensed person’s name.
This is the list we would use to judge any vendor here, including ourselves. Seven things — and the questions to ask before you pay for the first month.
- 01
Batch and expiry, not just a stock count
A hardware shop can count widgets. A drugstore cannot — two boxes of the same medicine with different expiry dates are different stock. A POS that stores one number per product cannot tell you what is about to expire, and expiry is where a botika loses money it never sees. Ask whether it tracks lot numbers, and whether the nearest-expiry stock is what gets sold first.
- 02
Senior and PWD discounts on a VAT-free base
Twenty percent comes off the price after the 12% VAT is removed, not off the shelf price. Many systems get this wrong, and so do many cashiers doing it by hand. Ask the vendor to compute ₱112 in front of you — the answer is ₱80, not ₱89.60.
Try the calculator - 03
VAT-exempt maintenance medicines
Medicines for diabetes, hypertension and cholesterol are VAT-exempt for every customer under RA 11467, not only for seniors. They have to ring up exempt and be totalled apart from vatable sales, or the two have to be untangled by hand later.
- 04
Selling by the piece
Stock arrives in boxes and leaves in tablets. If the system cannot convert between the two, someone is doing arithmetic in a notebook and the stock figure is wrong by the end of the week.
- 05
Prescription records that name a person
Under RA 10918 a prescription medicine is released under a pharmacist’s own PRC licence — not the owner’s. Ask whether the system records who actually dispensed, and whether it can produce the whole log as one file when an inspector arrives without warning.
- 06
Your data can leave with you
The most expensive thing about the wrong POS is not the monthly fee, it is the year of sales history you cannot get out of it. Ask, before you sign: can I export my products, stock, sales and suppliers, and in what format?
- 07
A published price
If a vendor will not tell you what it costs without a call, the price is whatever they think you will pay. That is not a feature question, but it is the one that predicts the relationship.
Where BotikaPOS stands on that list.
One through six: yes, and the screenshots on the home page are of the running product rather than mockups. Seven: ₱799 a month, every branch included — you did not have to book a call to find that out.
What it does not do yet is worth reading before you start: no offline mode, no bulk product import, and it is not BIR-accredited, so it does not print a registered Official Receipt.
Judge it against the list yourself.
Thirty days, no card. Ring up a real sale, give a senior discount, and look at what the receipt says. That tells you more than any demo call.
Walang card na hihingin. ₱799 kada buwan pagkatapos, lahat ng branch kasama.