How to calculate your real profit per order on Meesho, Flipkart and Amazon

The number most sellers get wrong

Ask a new seller what they make on a product and you will usually hear "I sell it for 499 and it costs me 180, so I make about 300." That number ignores almost everything that happens after the order is placed. Real profit has to account for the orders that never become sales.

The formula

For one product, over one full month:

Then divide by the number of delivered orders, not the number of orders placed. That is your real profit per order.

Why "units shipped" and not "units sold"

You pay for product and packaging on every unit that leaves your shelf, including the ones that come back as RTO or returns. If 20 out of 100 COD orders come back, you still packed 100 boxes. Some returned units can be resold, some cannot. Use your own experience to decide what share of returned stock you lose.

The settled amount already includes most fees

If you start from what the marketplace actually settled to you, commission, shipping, fixed fees and penalties are already taken out. That is why this formula starts from the settlement report and not from the selling price. It is also why it only works if the settlement itself is correct.

Where the formula breaks

The formula assumes every delivered order was paid and every deduction was right. When that is not true, your profit looks lower than it should, and you might cut a product that is actually fine. Before you decide a product is not worth selling, check:

• Are any delivered orders missing from the payments report?
• Are you being charged RTO on orders that were delivered?
• Is the weight slab right for the packed box?

Our guide on why a marketplace payout is less than expected walks through each one.

A quick example in words

Say a product had 100 orders in a month, 75 were delivered, 15 were RTO and 10 were customer returns. You shipped 100 units. You might recover most of the RTO units in sellable condition but lose a few of the customer returns. Your settled money covers the 75 delivered orders minus all marketplace charges, including the RTO and return fees. Subtract the cost of 100 units of product and packaging, the units you lost, and your ads. Divide by 75. That is the number to compare with other products.

Make it a monthly habit

Do this for your top five products every month. It takes about an hour with a spreadsheet once the reports are correct. Veritally handles the part that is hardest by hand: it checks that every delivered order was paid and every charge matches the order, so the settled number you start from is one you can trust.