There are so many benefits to using QuickBooks for Ecommerce that I had trouble settling on just five. These are the most common areas my clients find helpful.
Add Accountant To QuickBooks for Ecommerce Bookkeeping
QuickBooks is the software used by many Certified Public Accountants, if not most. QuickBooks Company files can be accessed by your accountant to make adjusting entries as needed and to keep a watchful eye on your bookkeeping. They can run their own reports too, which saves them time and allows you to keep right on working. To do this, your accountant needs to have a QuickBooks Accountant account. If this is important to you, make sure your bookkeeper has the required software and is familiar with using QuickBooks for eCommerce. You’d send an invitation, and they’d need to accept. Done. You’re on your way to a great relationship but if you change your mind, you can always delete their access.
Input Double Entry Bookkeeping
No matter if you use a CPA, a paid tax preparer or DIY with a service like TurboTax, having a Profit and Loss report and a Balance Sheet is essential for filing accurate business income tax returns. Double-Entry accounting is necessary to provide these reports. While outside inventory management services may have a P&L report, without the ability to reconcile bank accounts in those systems, some income and expense entries may be missed resulting in inaccurate tax returns. Besides tax filing, accounting can be used for evaluating processes and procedures in business. QuickBooks offers tons of reports for doing just that. Have you changed shipping boxes or methods over a certain period? QuickBooks can help you weigh the costs and benefits of the change. Do you need a way to track your sales tax payable? QuickBooks has you covered. Are you looking to expand in the future? Using QuickBooks for eCommerce, you can upgrade or downgrade Online subscriptions, add services like payroll, and move from Online to Desktop or vice versa.
Attach Receipts in QuickBooks for Ecommerce Expenses
– There’s no more a need for that trusty shoebox when you attach digital receipt copies to QuickBooks transactions. Just scan and attach. Some versions allow you to snap a picture on your phone and send it to a special QuickBooks email for easy posting. Be sure to backup Desktop versions to a Cloud-based server to prevent loss of data. There’s no need to purchase a special scanner unless you just want one. The All-in-One printer/fax/scanner on the desk is just fine. For scanning when not directly attaching to transactions, you can create a folder for receipts on a Cloud server like OneDrive or Google Drive. I like to make a new folder each year. Then you can scan the receipt and name the file according to the vendor with the date and amount for easy access and identification. Example: Walmart 052021 1428. Adding the amount is helpful if you have many receipts from the same vendor on the same date, otherwise, you can leave off the amount.
Import Banking Transactions and Set Rules for Quick Posting of Recurring Items
In the Rules setup, you can choose to automatically input any matching transactions, which is a big time-saver. Importing transactions, rather than hand-typing each, is so important I would not use a bank that doesn’t offer the service. While importing transactions is quick and painless, depending on your bank cutoffs, occasionally transactions are missed. The simple solution is to manually input during the monthly reconciliation process. It is rare but I have had this happen a few times over my twenty years or so of using QuickBooks Bank Feed.
Use QuickBooks for Ecommerce Inventory Tracking
Desktop versions include inventory tracking, but not all the online versions do. Depending on the number of SKU you have, inventory tracking in QuickBooks may be helpful. There are limits, though. Somewhere around 10,000 SKU, which sounds like a lot, unless you are primarily using Retail or Online Arbitrage. In that case, some Amazon sellers will take advantage of an inventory management system like Inventory Lab making a monthly entry to Cost of Goods Sold more practical. There is a monthly fee for Inventory Lab. Private Label and Wholesale resellers with minimal SKU may find that QuickBooks is a better option over the monthly fee of an outside inventory management system. In my courses, I teach both options. Another option for inventory tracking is a spreadsheet like the one I created that works with any platform and can be used for multiple platforms at once. It works well for clients using QuickBooks for eCommerce since it is a dynamic spreadsheet. If you aren’t familiar with the benefit of a spreadsheet being dynamic, that just means it changes as you input information. So the spreadsheet starts with a database sheet for inventory. Then purchases and sales have their own pages for adding and subtracting inventory items. Finally, there is an on-hand sheet that calculates all the information and returns your available totals, along with replenishment alerts.
Ecommerce Accounting Coach – Vicki McCay
Are you still unsure which QuickBooks version is right for you? Clients often find that a coaching call can really clear up confusion on which version is right for them. A recent coaching client learned how to save over $1100 per year by choosing the QuickBooks version that better fits her business than the one recommended by the QuickBooks salesperson and by dropping some overlapping outside services she was using. I’m here to help and being an eCommerce business owner, I understand your needs. Whether you use QuickBooks for eCommerce bookkeeping alone or take advantage of the inventory tracking application, I can help you set up a system that works for you.
