Cashflow OS for multi-branch businesses

How multi-branch businesses keep their books

There is no single right structure, and the choice affects how you will see the numbers later. The common patterns in Tally are:

A business with a branch in another state needs a separate GST registration there, and goods moving between them are usually treated as a supply. See GST on stock transfers between branches and confirm current rules on gst.gov.in. This is general information, not tax advice.

What goes wrong as branches grow

• Information lag: branch managers send figures at month-end, by which time a problem is a month old.
• Different habits: one branch books receipts daily, another weekly, so comparisons mislead.
• Too much access: a branch accountant given full access to the head office books.
• Owner fatigue: remote desktop into three PCs every night is not a management system.

Our guide on managing multiple branches covers the people side; the rest of this page covers the tools.

Several Tally companies, one account

Cashflow OS shows several Tally companies in one account, and you switch between them. Each company's data comes through the connector on the PC where that company is open in TallyPrime. If all branches' companies are on one central PC, one connector covers them; if each branch runs Tally on its own PC, the connector runs there.

For each company you see the same screens: Home with sales, purchases, receipts, payments, cash and bank against the period before; ledgers and bill-wise outstanding; reports including Profit & Loss, Balance Sheet, Day Book and stock summaries; and GSTR-1 and GSTR-3B views.

Teams and roles per company

Roles are set per company: owner, admin, accountant, staff and salesperson. That means the Jaipur branch accountant can have the accountant role in the Jaipur company and no access to the Udaipur company at all. A salesperson sees items and their own customers, not the company's accounts. The owner sees everything and can see each team's activity in the app.

Writing into Tally is switched on per company too. You might allow branch staff to post receipts and sales orders in one branch while another branch stays read-only until its Tally discipline improves.

Comparing branches fairly

To compare like for like:

1. Pick the same date range for every company; custom ranges can even span financial years.
2. Look at sales, gross margin and receivables together. A branch with high sales and 90-day receivables may be worse than a smaller, faster-paying one.
3. Export each branch's Profit & Loss and outstanding to Excel and put them side by side.
4. Check expenses by head; branch rent and salaries vary, but sudden jumps in small heads often point to leakage.

A quick example: Branch A sells ₹60,00,000 a month with ₹1,20,00,000 outstanding (about 60 days of sales). Branch B sells ₹40,00,000 with ₹40,00,000 outstanding (about 30 days). Branch B is turning sales into cash twice as fast.

Practical set-up tips

• Name companies in Tally clearly, with the branch name, so switching in the app is unambiguous.
• Keep ledger and item names consistent across branches; it makes exported reports far easier to combine.
• Invite each branch team only to its own company.
• Use the web app at head office: sign in by scanning a QR with your phone, no password to remember.
• Agree a daily habit with every branch: receipts and payments entered the same day. The owner's view is only as current as the slowest branch's Tally.
• Lock the app with fingerprint, face or PIN on phones that branch staff share.

Start with one branch for a couple of weeks, read the numbers every evening, and fix the naming and posting habits there before inviting the next branch. Rolling out to all branches on day one tends to expose every inconsistency at once, and the owner ends up debugging Tally habits instead of running the business.