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Reporting & Deposits 101 - A Guide for New Sellers

Fictional Seller, Susie QFictional Seller, Susie QWe took a look at questions we see from people just getting started with Square. One common thread has to do with those days following the first payment. Let’s walk through what the first few days are like to help answer some of those questions.

Meet our fictional seller, Susie Q.  Hi Susie! 👋

Susie sells handmade home goods at craft fairs around the country. She keeps hearing about Square from her fellow sellers at craft shows, and has decided to make the switch from her old POS. 👏

 

Setting Up

Downloading the app & linking her bank account
Susie Q is getting ready to start selling her handmade goods at a craft fair. She downloaded the Point of Sale app, did a test transaction for $1.00, and a day or so later didn’t see the credit to her bank account. 🤔

She remembers that she actually hasn’t linked her bank account to Square yet (️), so she logs in to her Square Dashboard, navigates to the bank account page, and enters her account routing and account number.

Bank linking page of the Square DashboardBank linking page of the Square DashboardSusie doesn’t have anything to worry about - Square will hold her deposit until she links that bank account, and when it’s ready, Square automatically makes the deposit. 😅  Once her bank account is linked (typically 2-5 business days), she’ll see that $1.00 test transaction in her bank account. 🎉

 

Susie’s Big Event

Sales summary & item sales analysis
Susie Q’s first craft fair using Square was a huge success! She sold a ton of products, and was able to quickly ring up customers, and accept all credit and debit cards.👌

As she gets home, she starts to get curious about what types of items were her best sellers, and how much money she made overall. 💰 Is there a place to find this information? Yes!

From the  Sales Summary report  in the online Square Dashboard, Susie selects the date of her craft fair. From that page she can see her Gross Sales number, Net Sales, and other details like what time of day was busiest. This is the basic Sales Summary report. Susie decides to export the report so that she can keep a CSV file on her computer for later.

 

Sales Summary reportSales Summary report
Read more about summary reports in our Support Center.


Susie is also interested in which items were her best sellers. 💪  She needs to know what types of items to bring to the next craft fair, and what she should start making more of. From the Item Sales report in the dashboard, she can click on Item Sales to get details for all items sold including gross sales, net sales, SKUs, discounts, and total sold. She can also click an item in the report to see specific sales info on that item and all its variations.

 

Item Sales reportItem Sales report

Susie Q notices that there are a ton of other reports available to her - including the ability to make custom reports that only include the info she’s looking for. There’s also a report showing sales trends where she can compare how she does from one event to the next by checking out daily, weekly, and yearly gross sales. Should be useful once she has data from a few more craft fairs in her dashboard! 📈

 

Getting Paid

Deposit schedule, viewing deposits online, & Instant Deposit
Ok, so now Susie knows what she sold at her event, how much money she made, and which items were most popular. Next up: making sure she gets paid for all her hard work. 🙌

Since Susie has already linked her bank account, her funds will be deposited automatically according to the Square deposit schedule - in most cases, the next business day. 📆

Susie can log in to the Deposits page of the Square Dashboard and see which deposits have been sent to her bank account, and which transactions are included in each deposit.

 

Deposits page of Square DashboardDeposits page of Square Dashboard
Susie remembers that she needs to pay her supplier ASAP, so actually needs her deposit sooner than the next business day. 🙆  From the Deposits page in Account & Settings, Susie can set up Instant Deposits - a way for her to instantly send up to $2,500 per deposit for a fee of 1% of the deposit amount. 

 

Getting set up for Instant DepositsGetting set up for Instant Deposits
What a relief! 😌  🙏  Susie quickly set up her instant deposit so that she can pay her bills, and now she can finally take a break  before starting prep work for her next craft fair.


What questions do you have about getting started with Square? If you’ve been around for awhile, what advice do you have for those just setting up? 

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So if my activity page under deposits on my app says my deposit is sending 6/5/17 does that mean tonight the deposit will be sent and the funds will be available tomorrow?

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Square Community Moderator

@Electronico3000 Correct. If funds are sent automatically via the normal deposit schedule, you should see the funds the following  business day. 

 

 

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I keep getting an email saying insufficient funds my deposit will be delivered in one or two days but my account is not insufficient. Please help

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Square Community Moderator

@MoosePC That sounds a bit strange. Were you receiving this error when linking your bank account? We might need to have our Support Team look at this for you directly since it sounds account specific. 

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I printed off my tax summary for 2018 and it has all of my state tax for each state I entered and then it has a row that says "Sales Tax" right in the middle of all of the states I collected sales tax in...I am so confused and so is my accountant. If I entered sales tax for various states myself, why does square have the added "Sales Tax". Can someone explain?
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Admin

Sorry for any confusion @meldpalmer! I'm not sure what you're seeing so I would go ahead and call the CS team - a member of the team will be able to look at your reports and help answer any questions that you and your accountant have. 

️ Helen
Seller Community Manager

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I am exploring and still deciding if I will switch from Elavon.  One thing I don't see and definitely need in my practice is a report of each transaction for a date range (usually one day) that shows customer name and amount of transaction. 

 

Is this possible?

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Beta Member

Yes, there is. On the Dashboard, under Transactions you can select your location and dates. There is a button for Export to select Transactions CSV. That will give you a spreadsheet with the data associated with each transaction that includes customer information. From that data, you can create any report you can possibly think up and can be used in any spreadsheet program that you have access to.

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Thank you.  At least there is a work around, although cumbersome.  This needs to be one of the available reports; configurable so columns meaningless to a given business can be eliminated.

 

This may be the deal killer.

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Beta Member

Someone please tell me how to link cash app to square.. I don't understand what is going on

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Alumni

Hey @chestercat9846 - To clarify, are you attempting to link your Cash App account for direct deposits? If so, you can find the steps in this thread.

Puka - She/They
Seller Community UX Designer
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