Most billing software asks for a great deal before it lets you do anything, and most of it can wait. Here is the shortest honest path to a first correct GST invoice, and what each step is actually for.
One: the account
Email and a password. Nothing else is needed to look around, and you should look around before entering business details. Any product that demands your GSTIN before showing you a screen is asking you to commit before you have seen what you are committing to.
Two: your business
Name, GSTIN, state. The GSTIN is the important one and not for the reason most people assume — it is not just printed on the invoice, it determines the state you are supplying from, which is half of the calculation on every bill you will ever raise.
Three: one customer
Their GSTIN sets their state, and the pair of states — yours and theirs — is what decides whether a bill carries IGST or CGST plus SGST. Get the customer's GSTIN right once and every invoice to them is right afterwards. Get it wrong and every invoice is wrong in the same direction, which is the kind of error that surfaces at filing.
Four: one item
Name, HSN or SAC, price, and the GST rate you charge on it. The rate belongs to the item, not the invoice — set it once and stop deciding it per bill. If you are unsure of the rate for something you sell, that is a question for your CA or the GST portal, not for software.
Five: the invoice
Pick the customer, pick the item, set a quantity. The tax split follows from what you entered in steps two and three. If the software is asking you to choose between IGST and CGST+SGST at this point, it already had everything it needed to know.
What can wait
- Your logo and invoice design.
- Every other customer and item — add them as they come up.
- Inventory, if you can still see your stock by looking at it.
- Team logins, until there is a team.
Do it against real work
Set this up with a bill you actually need to send rather than a made-up one. A test invoice teaches you nothing about whether the thing fits your trade. BizGST Pro's free plan is ₹0 with no card, so the only cost of finding out is the ten minutes.