Import Square Transactions Into QuickBooks Online

Quick Answer: The direct route is Intuit's Square Connector by QuickBooks app, which imports Square sales, refunds and payouts into QuickBooks Online automatically once you connect the two accounts. The manual route is exporting transactions as CSV from Square Dashboard and uploading them to QuickBooks. Either way, record gross sales and Square's fees separately, then match each Square payout to the net deposit on your bank statement.

Square deposits money into your bank as payouts, and each payout is the net of many sales minus fees and refunds. Importing Square transactions into QuickBooks Online properly means recording those pieces separately, then letting the bank deposit match the payout. Square and Intuit both point to a connector app for this; a CSV upload works when you cannot or will not use it.

Why don't Square sales match my bank deposits?

A day's activity in Square might look like this (hypothetical figures):

Your bank statement shows only the $1,168.45. If you record that deposit as sales income, you understate revenue by the fees, never record the fee expense, and hide the refund. The aim of any import is to put $1,240 in sales, $35 in refunds and $36.55 in fees on the books, with the $1,168.45 deposit treated as money moving from Square to your bank account.

Timing adds another wrinkle. Square's transfer options article explains that with the standard schedule, payments taken before 5 PM PT are available in your bank account the next business day, and next-business-day transfers are not sent on Saturdays. So Friday and weekend sales tend to arrive together, and a payout dated Monday can cover several days of sales. Instant and same-day transfers carry a 1.95% fee per transfer, which is a separate cost to record.

Route 1: the Square Connector by QuickBooks

Intuit's Square partner page describes the Square Connector by QuickBooks as a way to "Auto import all your Square transactions," with transactions appearing "within a few hours after they occur," and payout details viewable in QuickBooks. It says existing QuickBooks users can connect a Square account for free. Square's own App Marketplace listing lists the same connector for the United States, with features including automatic import and an enhanced view of payouts.

The setup follows the usual app pattern: install the app from the QuickBooks side, sign in to Square when prompted, authorize the connection, then review the settings that decide which QuickBooks accounts receive sales, fees and deposits. The exact screens can change, so follow the prompts in the app rather than a screenshot from an old blog post.

Before you connect, decide three things:

1. Start date. Pick the first day you have not yet recorded Square activity, so the import does not duplicate sales you entered by hand.
2. Deposit account. The bank account in QuickBooks where Square payouts land.
3. Fee account. An expense account such as "Merchant fees" for Square's processing fees.

Once connected, the payout record in QuickBooks should equal the deposit that arrives through your bank feed, so you match the two instead of adding the deposit again.

Route 2: export a CSV from Square and upload it

The CSV route suits a catch-up of past months, an accountant who does not want an app connected to a client's books, or a business that only needs monthly summaries.

Export from Square Dashboard

Square's transaction search article gives the path: sign in to Square Dashboard and go to Orders & payments (or Invoices & payments or Payments) > Transactions, filter by date, then click Export to download transaction details as a CSV. Square notes that the CSV download is available in Square Dashboard, not the point of sale app.

For summaries instead of individual sales, Square's report export article describes going to Reports, choosing a report and its filters, clicking the export icon, choosing which columns to include from the gear icon, and selecting Start export.

Shape the file for QuickBooks

QuickBooks Online's bank upload does not create sales receipts; it brings lines into the Bank transactions screen for one account. A clean way to use it is a clearing account:

1. In QuickBooks, create a bank-type account called something like "Square Clearing."
2. In Excel, reduce the Square export to three columns: Date, Description, Amount. Sales are positive; refunds, fees and payouts are negative.
3. Per Intuit's manual upload instructions, go to Bank transactions, open the Link account dropdown and choose Upload from file, select the file, pick the Square Clearing account and map the columns.
4. Categorize: sales lines to your income account, fees to Merchant fees, refunds to a refunds or returns account, and payout lines as transfers to your checking account.

Intuit lists the accepted formats as .csv, .txt, .qbo or .ofx, and limits each file to 350 KB and 1,000 lines. A busy month of individual Square sales can exceed that, so either split by week or upload daily totals rather than every sale.

After the upload, the clearing account's balance should equal whatever Square is still holding for the next payout. If it drifts, something was missed.

How do you match Square payouts to bank deposits?

Matching is where the books prove themselves. The checklist:

• One deposit, one payout. Each Square deposit on the bank side should match one payout record (connector) or one transfer from Square Clearing (CSV route). In the QuickBooks bank feed, choose Match, not Add.
• Same amount, nearby date. The bank's posting date may be a business day after Square's transfer date, especially around weekends and holidays.
• Instant transfers. These arrive the same day, net of the 1.95% instant transfer fee, so record that fee as well.
• Gaps in the bank feed. If your bank feed only reaches back a few months or broke for a period, the deposits for those months are missing from QuickBooks. Your bank can supply the PDF statements, and QuickBankConvert's PDF to QBO conversion turns them into a .qbo file you upload through the same Upload from file screen (QBO output is on the Plus plan; see pricing). There is no direct link between QuickBankConvert and QuickBooks; you import the file yourself.

When the month is matched, reconcile the bank account against the statement as usual. The bank statement reconciliation guide covers that step, and the QuickBooks integration page summarizes which file formats QuickBooks accepts.

Common mistakes that double or hide income

1. Adding deposits as income while the connector also records sales. Sales get counted twice. Match deposits instead.
2. Recording only payouts. Revenue is understated by the fees and refunds, and the fee expense never appears.
3. Overlapping start dates. Connecting the app with a start date earlier than your last manual entry duplicates those days.
4. Ignoring sales tax and tips. Square's figures may include tax collected and tips; these belong in liability or payroll accounts, not sales income. Ask your accountant how to map them.
5. Mixing several Square locations into one clearing account without noting the location, which makes payouts hard to trace.

Related guides

• Import Stripe transactions into QuickBooks Online
• Import bank statements into QuickBooks
• Categorize bank transactions in QuickBooks Online