Square, PayPal Lapses in QuickBooks Tough for Small Businesses

JJ Hornblass for BankInnovation.net writes: To say Square and PayPal are important to American small business might be an understatement.

So when those two ventures’ integration into the accounting platform of choice for America’s small business — QuickBooks Online — falls short, the shortcoming deserves notice.

QBO, as QuickBooks Online is called, had about 624,000 subscribers, as of last May.

Both Square and PayPal are working to integrate with QBO. Square released an integration with QBO around a year ago, while PayPal has a beta running for its integration. PayPal’s beta testing group was quickly filled — the beta only began on October 22.

The thing is, both efforts appear to be hitting some bumps. Square’s integration app has gotten roundly booed by users. Several users say the application “just doesn’t work.” One reviewer wrote as such as recently as last month:

It always says to import my transactions. They show up clearly, but the import ALWAYS fails and says to contact support. I contacted support, but got no resolution. Would love it if it worked, but I’m so used to just putting in my receipts by hand from Square to QB Online that it is no big loss. I’d like it if it didn’t appear like everything was there waiting for me… mocking me…

An employee of Intuit, which owns QuickBooks Online, wrote in response that the company “is currently working on bringing in fees and deposits … We are also investigating batching and support for multiple accounts.” However, we could not find evidence that this work has been finalized.

Meanwhile, PayPal might have an integration beta running — but the company is no longer accepting new customers into its beta, “due to overwhelming inbound interest.” The app is designed to “sync PayPal sales, fees, tax, tips and discounts into QuickBooks Online … [and] automatically match products and services.” Without the app, small business owners must key every transaction into QBO by hand.

Both less-than-ideal situations amount to a pain in the you-know-where for the hundreds of thousands of small businesses that use QBO.