square vs Quickbooks

[cpufixer]

Can I use Square to replace QuickBooks for all my accounting needs? If not what would be a good accounting program? I use TurboTax, will this integrate with the accounting program for Taxes?

[HC_Charlie]

Hello @cpufixer thanks for your post. No, I would certainly not use ONLY Square for your accounting. Square will only report and record things like inventory levels, items sold, credit card processing, invoices. Basically, it only keeps track of INCOME received. You MUST also record EXPENSES for your business; items like rent, electricity, supplies, shipping, etc. Square does not do that kind of accounting. And TurboTax really is only for your year-end State and Federal income tax filing. You'll need to have data that you collect from both your income and expense sources for you to input into TurboTax.

I personally use Quickbooks Desktop, but there are other online services like Quickbooks Online, Zero, etc that keep track of both income and expenses. If you search for Square app integrations, you can find some that will help sync with your Square account for bookkeeping purposes. If you want to search for apps check this post. I hope this helps answer your question.

[Candlestore]

I agree with what HC_Charlie said and also use QuickBooks Desktop.  Square is a POS system to track your sales and income, all the expenses mentioned plus others would be recorded in a Accounting package and some of the inventory is not always tracked by Square.  Depending on what type of inventory you have.  I have inventory for making my candles which Square does not track since it is not a completed item for sale, but rather a 'build assembly' as QuickBooks calls it.  Depending on your needs there are a lot of accounting software packages with integrations to Square.  Just do your research when looking at the integrations.  Some work well and others do not import as much detail as you may want.  Look for Accounting products and integrations that give a free trial so you can see what will and what does not import through Square.   I have heard that through Squares QuickBooks integration, the daily sales totals are imported but not each line item.  So if that is true, your accounting software's inventory levels will be off but Squares inventory could be correct.  Saying could be since I am seeing a lot of complaints on these forums about inventory showing out of stock when its in stock.... not sure if that is for online, in store, or just a computer programing error.  

So if you fix computers you may have, Memory chips, Hard Drives, CPU's etc as items to repair and keep track of as a 'build assembly' or repair assembly but Square would not keep track of those inventory items for you.  If you do a simple search and compare of different accounting packages you may find one that fits your business the best.