Vikram runs a pharma distribution business in Lucknow.
Every month Sharma Ji tells him which brand earns the best margin.
For six months, the same brand has been on top.
So Vikram decided to stock more of it and have his team push it harder.
Before he did, he exported a year of sales and returns from Tally, uploaded the file to Claude, and asked one question.
"Before you analyse anything, tell me what in this data looks wrong."
Claude pointed at something nobody had noticed.
Every other brand had returns from chemists every month.
His top brand had none since April.
Vikram showed it to Sharma Ji the next morning.
It took them two hours to find the reason.
Since April, returns for that brand had been coming in through a new stockist portal, and the portal had never been connected to Tally.
Once those returns were entered, his top brand was somewhere in the middle.
Vikram was one week away from putting more money behind a number that was never true.
Ask what is wrong before you ask how to grow
Most owners ask AI the big question first: how do I grow?
The better first question is smaller: what in my numbers looks wrong?
In my workshops, when owners bring their real sheets, the first useful thing AI says is often some version of "this number cannot be right."
Most of the time the cause is something ordinary, like a portal nobody connected to Tally.
Business owners come to the conclusion to stop looking at turnover and focus on profit.
But profit is only as true as the entries behind it.
So before you ask AI how to grow your profit, ask it whether your profit is real.
Try it this week
- Sit with your accountant and export one register from Tally for the last twelve months: sales, purchase or salary. Tally can export reports to Excel or use tally2ai.com.
- Upload the file to Claude, which can read and analyse spreadsheets, and paste this:
Before doing any analysis, read this data and list anything that looks impossible, duplicated, missing, or inconsistent.
For each one, show me the rows and tell me what to check in the original records.
- Check each flag together against the original bill or invoice, and fix the real ones in Tally.
Then ask how to grow.
For the record
- AI can be wrong too.
A flag is a reason to check, not a conclusion. - Check your privacy setting.
On Claude's Free, Pro and Max plans, you choose whether your chats can be used to improve Claude, and you can change it any time in Privacy Settings.
Team and Enterprise plans fall under separate commercial terms.
