Guide / free tracking, honestly
A free inventory tracking system for small business
Tracking means knowing where each item is and where it went — receiving, issuing, counting, all recorded. Free covers the smallest rung honestly; here is the ladder and its ceilings.
The key facts
- What tracking requires: every movement — receive, issue, adjust — recorded as a transaction with a user and time.
- Genuinely free: the spreadsheet, at one-person scale; free tiers add real databases with caps.
- The paid layer: live quantities, audit trails, reorder-driven purchasing, the accounting handoff.
- BSimple: tracking built into one record from $180/month (AUD), the full product free to trial.
- Context: the full inventory system holds the wider system, this page one stop in it.
- 01The key facts
- 02What "tracking" actually requires
- 03The free rungs, honestly
- 04Where BSimple fits
What "tracking" actually requires
Tracking is not a list — it is a history. The list says you have 12; tracking says you received 50 on the 3rd, issued 26 against three jobs, adjusted 2 damaged, and counted 12 on Friday. When the list and the shelf disagree, tracking is what tells you which movement to doubt. That is why tracking systems are built on transactions — every movement with a user, a time and a reason — and why editing a bare number is not tracking, whatever the software calls it.
For a small business, this is the feature to judge everything else against. A tool with a beautiful dashboard and no movement history is a list with a coat of paint.
The free rungs, honestly
The spreadsheet. Columns for item, quantity, and — if you are disciplined — movement notes. Free forever, honest at one-person scale, and it stops tracking the moment two people edit or the notes fall behind the shelf. How small businesses track stock today covers this stage.
Free tiers. A real database with movement records, phone counts and barcode scans — capped on users, volume and history. For a genuinely small operation, a free tier can track honestly for a long time; read the caps before the features. The app-based path and the free ladder cover the rungs.
The paid layer. Where tracking connects to everything: purchases raised from reorder levels, invoices pushed to accounting, payment status mirrored back. Free tiers almost never include the connections — which are, again, the tracking.
Where BSimple fits
We build BSimple, so weigh that. Tracking is native to the record: receipts, issues, transfers, adjustments and counts are transactions — from the dock, the shelf or a phone browser — with users and timestamps, feeding purchasing and the Xero/MYOB handoff on the same dataset. Plans start at $180/month (AUD), everything in the core plans, no tracking module to buy. The tracking-and-management view covers the wider category.
The honest test: trial one shelf — receive a delivery, issue an item, count the rest, then ask the record what happened. If the answer is a query and not an archaeology, tracking is real.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is there a free inventory tracking system for small business?
The spreadsheet, honestly, at one-person scale — with movement notes if you can keep the discipline. Free tiers add real movement records with caps. Tracking connected to purchasing and accounting is the paid layer everywhere.
Is BSimple free?
No — plans start at $180/month (AUD). The trial is the full product with your own data, no card to start: receive, issue, count, and read the history back before deciding.
What is the difference between a stock list and a tracking system?
A list holds a quantity; a tracking system holds the history that produced it — every movement with a user and time. Lists answer "how many"; tracking answers "why" and "who", which is what audits, disputes and shrinkage hunts need.
Do we need barcode scanning for tracking?
Not at small scale — typed movements still track. Scanning removes mis-identification, which becomes the dominant error once lines multiply; the scanning workflow covers when it pays.
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