'Free' is the most-searched word in this category and the least examined one. It is not a trick — plenty of free software is genuinely free — but it describes at least four different arrangements, and which one you are being offered decides what happens to you in a year.
The four things 'free' usually means
| The arrangement | How you find out | What to ask now |
|---|---|---|
| Free for one user | The day you hire someone | What does the second login cost? |
| Free under a transaction limit | Your busiest month | What is the cap, in bills per month? |
| Free to enter, costly to leave | When you try to export | Show me the export file before I start |
| Free because it is unfinished | The first time it breaks | Who answers, and how fast? |
There is a fifth arrangement, which is that the free product is genuinely complete and the company earns from something else. That is the case here, and it is worth stating plainly rather than leaving you to guess: the mobile app is free because the web dashboard is not.
Where Khata's money actually comes from
The Android and iPhone apps are free, with every feature, no user limit, and no payment screen anywhere inside them. That is not a trial and there is nothing to cancel. The web dashboard at panel.lskhata.com is a separate commercial product for shops that have outgrown doing back-office work on a phone, and access to it is granted on request rather than bought from a checkout.
The cost that is not on anybody's pricing page
For almost every shop, the largest real cost of changing accounting software is not the licence. It is the evening spent moving customer balances across, and the risk of getting one of them wrong.
A wrong balance is expensive in a way a subscription is not. It is money you either do not collect or wrongly ask for, and it damages a relationship with a customer who has been buying from you for years. That is why every guide here about switching says the same thing: carry over the balances, not the history, and keep the old system for a month.
- Count how many customers actually carry a balance. In most shops it is far fewer than the number of customers.
- Enter those as opening balances on day one. Everything else can start from zero.
- Do not attempt to re-enter last year's bills. Nobody has ever finished that job.
- Keep the old book or app readable for a month, then stop looking at it.
Three questions worth more than a price comparison
- 1
What happens on the day I hire someone?
Ask before you need to know. If the answer is a per-user charge, that is not a free product — it is a free single-user product, which is a different thing and fine as long as you know.
- 2
Can I download my customers and balances right now?
Do it on day one when there is nothing to lose. If the file opens in a spreadsheet with the columns you would need, you can always leave, and that is worth more than any feature.
- 3
Who answers when it breaks on a Saturday?
A real answer names a channel and a rough time. 'Community forum' is a real answer too — it just tells you to plan differently.
Free is a good deal when you can also leave. Check the exit before you value the price.