I was assigned a task to build a computerised database system for a petrol station that was planning to turn it’s records digital.

 

Introduction:

 

Zahid Petroleum Service, the authorised dealer of Shell Pakistan Ltd. used to purchase oil products in a bulk quantity such as Diesel (H.S.D), Super, and other lubricants. It also had its own transportation/delivery system to transport products from vendor’s oil depot to its site. Oil products were stored in the company’s underground tanks and later sold out to end consumers through oil dispensing units, which were connected through pipeline with underground tanks.

 

How Company’s Manual System Worked?

Like every other petrol station, a customer intending to refuel his/her vehicle had to arrive at the company site, where oil was filled into the vehicle’s tank through a Dispensing Unit and a meter attached to that dispensing unit showed quantity dispensed and the total price, according to the fixed selling rate (current oil rate). Cashier, who used to stand near the vehicle or the one filling the tank used to collect the cash and give back a cash memo to that consumer. After every 24 hours (defined business hour), all the records of sales were entered manually into a cash register. Next day, cashier along with the manager was responsible to check the entire quantity of oil sold during a 24-hour period by reading the “total quantity sold” meter attached on all the 4 dispensing units installed at the site. The record was then entered in a document called credit voucher. (credit voucher as a company’s document, where all the calculation of oil quantity sold per day and its respective amount was recorded).

 

Company had 2 Documents to record its data:

 

1)            Credit Voucher: For recording money received by selling its oil products along with proper calculations.

2)            Debit Voucher: For recording stock purchased, its price and quantity from its vendor i.e. Shell Pakistan Ltd.

3)            Stock Register: Where Quantity/Volume of stock is maintained on daily basis.

4)            Payroll Document: For recording monthly wages of employees.

 

Note: The last two documents were recorded and calculated on a piece of paper without having any particular format or layout.

 

The company was at that time, functioning on a manual system, that caused problems for the administration. The main requirement identified at that time was to develop a computerized system that would act as a record keeping of all the stock purchases and sales. This was required because there was a huge burden on a cashier and manager by maintaining paper work which was mostly time consuming. Also, if there was an error in recording any figure, cashier had no other way to correct it, but by cutting the figure with a pen that would often lead to a mess in work. Therefore, a computerized system was to achieve easy and fast recording the data. It was also to reduce burden on a cashier and space for record storage.

 

Other than that, there was no security measures made by the company in their record-keeping, which made it easy for any outsider or unauthorized person to gain access. Therefore, it was realised that there is a need of password-protecting system which can make it safe and avoid unauthorized use of data.

 

Management also told that by having a manual system rather than database or computerized system, they were facing problems in searching past records (monthly or yearly), which sometimes lead to wastage of several hours. They also experienced loss of record many times or found out worn out paper. Therefore, there should be a system that would make it easier to retrieve records and also have its own backup mechanism. It was also realised that, manual Calculation takes a lot of time with increased chance of human error. So there should be an automated calculation system having equations and formulas pre-defined, that would reduce human error and updated later when required. Finally, there was a problem in maintaining stock and payroll records because of having no proper documentation system which was therefore mostly done manually by hand on a piece of paper.

 

(Aims & Objectives)

 

General Objectives:

 

·         Faster system for record-keeping that is easy to handle.

·         Reducing amount of paper used and chance of human error.

·         To update records easily when needed.

·         To retrieve records faster.

·         Have backup mechanism to avoid loss of records.

·         Make it printable for further usage.

·         Making a proper system for stock registry and payroll.

 

Computer Objectives:

 

·         Making a database system.

·         Encrypting or creating a password-protected database.

·         Defining equations and formulas for recording data.

·         Creating a backup system.

·         Creating forms for stock register and payroll register.

 

Description of Solution:

 

For making a manual process faster with easy handling and less or no chance of human error, database was created which reduced human intervention. This was created in a program called ‘Microsoft Access’.

 

The setting of password through MS Access reduced risk of unauthorized access.

 

Design of tables and forms for records with equations and formulas helped in faster processing and less/no error.

 

Making backup copies on avoided loss of records and easy management without any fear of worn out paperwork.

 

 

Advantages:

 

The cost of implementation of this new system was really cheap and did not require any additional hardware or expensive software. It only required a basic computer hardware without any peripherals and a simple office suite program.

 

Software was really easy to operate and required no special training to staff/management. However, company management was not computer literate and because of this they experienced problems at start when using the software but with passage of time they got accustomed with it as it had relevance with manual system operations and contained simple options.

 

Disadvantages:

 

Maintenance of computerized system will be complicated than in a manual system.

 

If there’s no electricity, management will not be able to work or record which can affect the company’s performance and can increase burden on a cashier later to record delayed records because of its batch processing-nature.

 

There can be a threat of virus, if there’s a use of counterfeit software and if any damage to hardware of computer it can be a problem.