Does Quickbooks work for retail businesses?

[Lorien]

Hello,

I'd like to ask your opinions on the best software packages for retail businesses. We're new to bookkeeping and need something user-friendly. Our business is a partnership, we won't be registered for VAT or have employees, initially at least, and we'll get the professionals in to draw up our accounts.

We like the look of Quickbooks Simple Start, but it seems to have been designed mainly for service businesses. Is this a problem, or can it easily be got around? Do any other retailers here use it? Our accountant has suggested Sage, but it looks way too scary and advanced for our needs. We just need something which can keep track of our everyday sales, bills and cash flow, and can show us exactly where we stand at any time.

Would love to hear your thoughts - thanks!

[Indizine]

Is it accounting software I take it you need?

I can recommend Solar Accounts which I have started using recently. There is a link in my signature.

[James Smith]

If you have a stock business you will probably need to use Quickbooks pro rather than Simple Start but may need some help setting it up.

I would agree about SAGE - its hard to use if you don't have an accounts mindset. I have never quite understood why accountants push it onto non-accountants! I don't know how many transactions you have but a simple excel solution might also be OK to start with depending on your skills.

[AccountingBasics]

We have used Quickbooks Pro for a simple stock system. It may be worth your while getting someone with experience to set it up for you and give you a quick training session. There is a list of people on the Quickbooks website. If you get the accounts set up right to start with it will make it easier to use in the future.

I had to use Sage for a while in my previous employment and found it difficult to learn and make adjustments. I never really got to grip with the software after two years of use.

When we purchased Quickbooks we were up and running in about half an hour and found it very easy to use. Your accountants will be able to use the reports from Quickbooks to complete your year end.

[accounting solutions]

We have used Quickbooks for nearly 15years and find it very user friendly for any business. Alot easier to use than Sage for the non finance person

[coe114c]

I haven't found any software that works for my business so I still do it on a spreadsheet. The problem is that most things I sell are zero-rated for VAT but things like confectionery and delivery charges are VATable. I have not found a package that will let me enter in the amounts - they all want to calculate the VAT so to enter every single item is far too time consuming!

It doesn't sound like a big thing but the last company I tried was KashFlow, I made the suggestion to them because the rest of the software was great but it was too much trouble for them. I can't be the only one with that problem!

[James Smith]

The problem is that most things I sell are zero-rated for VAT but things like confectionery and delivery charges are VATable. I have not found a package that will let me enter in the amounts - they all want to calculate the VAT so to enter every single item is far too time consuming!

Quickbooks will do this, but it takes a bit of setting up. For the sales you would enter essentially a "daybook" total, which can be a day or a week as you see fit, but where you have already computed your total sales for zero rated and total sales for standard rated sales. This way you enter two numbers per day/week and not every single sale which would presumably take a huge amount of time.

On the purchases in Quickbooks you can set a supplier to be zero or standard rated by default, similarly you can do this for an expense code. So you could have one expense code called "Stock standard" and one "stock zero rated" and then QB would know if it was adding VAT or not by default without keying it in each time.

I should point out I am talking about "pro" here, the basic version might not let you do all this.

Regards,