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Trading and distribution — guides and articles
10 articles, all published in September 2026. Where to start is below; the rest follow, newest first.
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The Credit Limit Is Checked After the Truck Has Left
Almost every trading system has a credit limit field, and almost none of them has a credit control. The difference is not the rule — it is where in the order-to-cash chain the rule fires, and by the third of the three candidate positions there is nothing left to refuse.
Trading and distribution7 min read
The Credit Limit Is Checked After the Truck Has Left
Almost every trading system has a credit limit field, and almost none of them has a credit control. The difference is not the rule — it is where in the order-to-cash chain the rule fires, and by the third of the three candidate positions there is nothing left to refuse.
4 September 2026ReadTrading and distribution7 min read
The Import Box on Your VAT Return Is Filled In by Someone Else
Import VAT arrives in the return pre-populated from customs declarations against your TRN. Your purchase ledger is built from supplier invoices. The two are assembled from different documents on different dates by different people, and reconciling them is nobody's monthly job.
4 September 2026ReadTrading and distribution7 min read
Nobody Decides to Buy Dead Stock. It Is Decided One Reorder at a Time
There is no meeting at which a trading company resolves to tie up capital in stock it will never sell. There is a reorder point set three years ago, a report built from movement so an item with no movement cannot appear on it, and a phrase — we might sell it — that has never once been refused.
4 September 2026ReadTrading and distribution7 min read
A Free Zone Is a Customs Idea. A Designated Zone Is a Tax Idea. They Are Not the Same List
Companies holding stock inside a free zone routinely assume one status covers both duty and VAT. It does not. Customs status and VAT status are set by different authorities under different rules, and the same pallet can be outside one and inside the other.
4 September 2026ReadTrading and distribution7 min read
Three Letters on the Purchase Order Decide When the Stock Becomes Yours
FOB and CIF are not shipping jargon. They are the clause that sets the date your inventory rises, your payable is due, your insurance responsibility begins and your VAT is recoverable — and most trading systems record none of it until the container is physically at the door.
4 September 2026ReadTrading and distribution7 min read
The Margin Was Calculated on the Supplier's Price. The Cost Arrived Six Weeks Later
A purchase order carries one number. The cost of the goods it buys is assembled over the following two months out of freight, duty, clearing, handling and demurrage — and by the time the last invoice arrives, the stock has usually been sold at a price set from the first one.
4 September 2026ReadTrading and distribution7 min read
The Bank Is Holding Money Against a Shipment Your System Has Never Heard Of
Letters of credit, trust receipts and bank guarantees are the machinery a trading business actually runs on, and almost none of it exists inside the ERP. It lives in a facility letter, a bank portal and one person's head — and the limit is discovered when it is reached.
4 September 2026ReadTrading and distribution7 min read
You Bought in Dollars, Sold in Dirhams, and Booked a Profit That Included a Bet
The dirham is pegged to the dollar, so a lifetime of dollar buying teaches a trading company that currency is not a thing it has to think about. Then it buys in euros, and the habit stays — and the margin it reports on the sale is fixed at one of four rates, three of which have not happened yet.
4 September 2026ReadTrading and distribution7 min read
Everybody Has the Price List. Almost Nobody Sells at It
Between the price in the list and the money that stays in the business there are seven layers, each approved by a different person, none of them visible on the same document as any other. The result is the same customer buying the same item at four prices across three branches, and nobody able to say which one was right.
4 September 2026ReadTrading and distribution7 min read
The Margin You Earned in March and Claimed in November
A supplier rebate is earned one invoice at a time and collected once a year, and in between it exists nowhere. So the buyer negotiates without knowing how close he is to the next tier, and the credit note, when it finally comes, lands in an account that leaves every item's gross margin exactly as wrong as it was.
4 September 2026ReadAfter the reading
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