Profit, Loss and Discount
About 6 min · Quantitative Ability · English
Time worked out from the lesson's 381 words at 150 words a minute, plus a minute for each question.
Profit, Loss and Discount forms a cornerstone of commercial mathematics in HSSC CET's Quantitative Ability section. These problems test your understanding of everyday business transactions—buying, selling, calculating margins, and offering discounts. The topic connects directly to real-life scenarios, making it both practical and exam-relevant.
Key ideas
- Cost Price (CP) is the price at which a trader buys goods. This is the base for calculating profit or loss percentage.
- Selling Price (SP) is the price at which a trader sells goods to a customer. Comparing SP with CP determines profit or loss.
- Marked Price (MP) is the price labelled on the product (also called List Price or Catalogue Price). Discounts are calculated on MP, not CP.
- Profit occurs when SP > CP; Loss occurs when SP < CP. The difference gives the absolute profit or loss.
- Discount is the reduction offered on Marked Price to arrive at the Selling Price. Discount = MP − SP.
Watch out for
- Calculating profit % on SP instead of CP → Always remember: Profit and Loss percentages are calculated on Cost Price, not Selling Price.
- Applying successive discounts on original MP → Each successive discount applies to the reduced price after the previous discount, not the original marked price.
- Confusing discount percentage with profit percentage → Discount is on MP while profit/loss is on CP. A 20% discount does not mean 20% loss.
Quick reference
- Profit/Loss % is always calculated on Cost Price.
- Discount % is always calculated on Marked Price.
- SP = CP × (100 ± Profit/Loss%) / 100
- Two successive discounts a% and b% = (a + b − ab/100)%
- Dishonest dealer gain = (Error / Actual quantity given) × 100
Check yourself: 3 questions
1. A shopkeeper bought a dozen pencils for Rs 60 and sold them at Rs 6 per pencil. What is his profit percentage?
2. A trader allows a discount of 15% on the marked price of an article and still makes a profit of 19%. If the cost price of the article is Rs 2000, what is the marked price?
3. A man sells two articles for Rs 1200 each. On one article he gains 20% and on the other he loses 20%. What is his overall profit or loss percentage?
This lesson is cut from the topic's note, not rewritten. Fact-checked on 18 Oct 2026: an AI-assisted check of this note against cited sources; the errors it found were corrected that day. Some errors may remain. The questions are from Shishya's validated question bank.
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