Quick answer: A service business in Nepal — a consultancy, agency, IT firm, or repair/AMC provider — needs four things from its software that a shop does not: invoicing without inventory, handling the tax clients withhold from fees, recurring billing for retainers and maintenance contracts, and a way to bill time. Generic billing tools built for goods force workarounds on all four. Udyot ERP ships them natively in its Services module, on top of full double-entry accounting and IRD-verified VAT e-billing.
Why goods-first software fights you
Most billing software in Nepal grew up around shops: every sale wants a stock item, a quantity on hand, a godown. A consultancy has none of that — so you end up creating fake stock items with fake quantities, or typing “consulting” into a general ledger voucher and losing itemized invoices entirely. Worse, none of it understands the most service-specific fact of Nepali business life: clients deduct tax from your fee before paying you, and your books have to treat that as settled income with a tax claim, not a short payment.
The four capabilities that matter
| Need | How it works in Udyot ERP |
|---|---|
| Invoice services, no stock | Service items — named, priced, VAT-defaulted, usable on invoices, quotations and even the POS counter, with no stock checks and no cost-of-goods-sold. Free-text lines work too. |
| Client-withheld tax (TDS) | Tick a TDS section on the Receipt: the invoice settles in full, the withheld amount lands in a TDS Receivable report by section and party — your advance-tax working paper. |
| Retainers & AMC | Service Contracts: set customer, period and lines once; each period’s invoice generates from a Billing Due work-list with one click, or auto-posts daily if you opt in. |
| Billing time | Projects & Timesheets: log hours (Time & Materials or Fixed), then Bill All Unbilled turns them into an invoice — each hour marked billed so nothing bills twice. |
The TDS reality, with numbers
You invoice Rs 28,250. The client pays Rs 24,500 and deposits Rs 3,750 with the IRD against your PAN, as withholding rules for service fees require. In a generic tool your invoice looks under-paid forever, or you write the difference off. Recorded properly, the invoice shows fully settled, your bank shows what actually arrived, and Rs 3,750 sits in TDS Receivable — claimable at year end. That one flow is the difference between software that understands Nepali service business and software that merely prints bills. (Full walkthrough: TDS receivable on service income.)
Compliance is the same as for any business
Service invoices are VAT invoices like any other: 13% where applicable, sequential fiscal-year numbering, immutable once issued (corrections via credit note), flowing into the VAT return and IRD annexes automatically. Everything runs on the Bikram Sambat fiscal year. Nothing about being a service business exempts you — the module just removes the friction.
What it costs
The Services module is part of the standard plans — from Rs 1,500/month (Basic, annual Rs 15,000) or Rs 2,000/month (Standard), plus the one-time Rs 45,000 installation and licence charge. The full arithmetic, including your realistic first-year total, is on the pricing page.
Common questions
Do I need the Inventory module if I only sell services?
No — service items never touch stock. You can run accounting-only and even type free-text service lines straight onto invoices.
Can I bill some clients monthly and others by the hour?
Yes — contracts handle the recurring ones, projects and timesheets handle the hourly ones, and both produce ordinary invoices in the same books.
My client pays late and short — how do I chase the balance?
Part payments allocate bill-wise against invoices, so party statements and receivables ageing always show the true outstanding per client.
Explore the full Services documentation, or start a free 14-day trial and set up your first service item in minutes.