Why aren't delivery fees included in the Transactions Sales Report?

[TheRealChipA]

The title of this thread has been edited from the original: Online Store Delivery Fee. 

Greetings,

On 5/29 I received a delivery order via the Online Store.  My standard $4.99 delivery fee was charged.  However, when I downloaded my Transactions CSV the next morning, my analysis did not balance.  It was off exactly $4.99.

During my investigation, I noticed that the $4.99 delivery fee is not posted anywhere in the CSV files that I download.  I use the “Transactions CSV” and the “Items Detail CSV” files.  I think that there should be a column added to the Transactions CSV with the Service Fee/Delivery Fee from the online store so that the transaction will actually balance.

FYI, my transaction on 5/29 was number 2095335499

Thanks,

Chip

[JustinC]

Hmm, I hear you on the separate column for delivery fees bit - definitely makes reconciling your Transactions CSV easier, but the delivery should be included in the whole transaction amount which would make your transactions report balance. 

I would surface this to our CS Team so they can comb through your reports to double check if there is a discrepancy. 

@TheRealChipA

[TheRealChipA]

@JustinC Thanks for the reply and for your efforts here.  Maybe I can clarify a little to help the CS Team.

1) The delivery fee IS included in the whole transaction amount.  This is actually how I found the issue to begin with because it IS included, but there is nothing to tell me exactly why it is included.  It is not an “item” in the Detail file, nor is it a column in the Transactions file.  It is just “there.”

2) My daily analytics spreadsheet (which I use to create a sales journal entry in my accounting system) looks at two files — the Transactions CSV and the Items Detail CSV.  I pull various numbers from various columns and rows to insure that I am accounting for all sales numbers.  The problem arises because there is nothing in either of these files that specifically accounts for the delivery fee.  It is in the transaction total, but there is nothing that says specifically what that $4.99 is.

These two files, otherwise, do a great job of giving me everything I need to get a total picture of my day in as much detail as I need.  But, as far as this new fee, which is a new sales component, it is missing completely from any detail. Right now, I’m let to “infer” that any remaining transaction total amounts I can’t account for are, indeed, delivery fees.  This is true in this case, but might be the result of some other error as well.

I can see two solutions here.  One I already suggested — add a new column to the Transactions CSV for “Service Fees” or “Delivery Fees” or something.

The other solution would be to add a new line item to the Transactions Detail CSV specifically for the service fee, since it is (technically) an item that I am selling to the customer, albeit a service item instead of a food/beverage item.  In other words, treat the delivery fee as an item I am selling, and give it its own line in the Detail CSV.

I realize this is an unusual request.  Most people use Square’s canned daily reports for their analysis.  However, I do not, because I find that those reports don’t quite fit my needs.  They are 95% there, but missing something critical to my analysis.  So I have decided to use the raw, unfiltered, transactions data and do my own reporting and analysis.  When pieces of data are not specifically called out in that raw data, that is where my problems start.

I can be more specific, including providing more detail (spreadsheets, formulae, etc)  about how I analyzed this transaction, in private Email.  Feel free to reach out to me.

Chip

[JustinC · Accepted solution]

@TheRealChipA - thanks for expanding your thoughts! I hear you and understand the need for delivery fees to appear on it's own separate line in reports. Unfortunatley, there is no such report avaiable.

There's no way around this, but I've already escalated your feature request to our Product Team for tracking. Since the delivery feature is relatively new, I imagine there are improvemtents in the works as it relates to Reporting and Analytics.

I don't have news t share right now, but keep tabs here for updates as they come! 

[TheRealChipA]

@JustinC Allow me to follow up with a question that might help.  

IF your reporting team were to try to create a report of delivery fees, using ONLY these two CSVs:

Transactions CSV

Transactions Detail CSV

Would they be able to do it with the information given in those two files?  I’m not seeing a way to do it, without doing a calculation or two first and then making an assumption or two.

I’m open to the fact that I might need a third CSV which contains the delivery fee details.  But for the life of me I can not find any CSV that contains this information.

Chip