From effectively leading your team to providing expert customer service, owning a small business means taking on several different roles.
One of your toughest parts to play is your store’s accountant.
Accounting for retail is a challenging but critical aspect of running a profitable business. You need to keep accurate records of your inventory, sales, and expenses in order to make sure your store’s bottom line is healthy.
Fortunately, you don’t have to do it all alone. Your store’s point of sale (POS) system is your most valuable ally in accounting for retail, offering detailed reporting, efficient inventory tracking, and seamless integration with your accounting software.
Let’s explore four key ways a POS system can help on your journey to small business success.
1. Make Tax Time a Breeze
Taxes are a crucial aspect of accounting for retail. Tax compliance is paramount for small business success, but without the right tools, tax season can be a stressful time.
If you’re still relying on manual processes, preparing your taxes can be time-consuming and error-prone — leaving the door open for compliance issues that threaten your store’s growth.
Fortunately, your POS system acts as your business’ personal accountant, simplifying your tax calculations, ensuring accuracy, and saving you valuable time.
Your POS system should allow you to customize and automate your tax records, process tax-exempt transactions, and even sync your tax process across multiple locations. These features will make filing your small business’ taxes nearly effortless.
2. Access Insightful Reports
One of the biggest ways your POS system helps with accounting for retail is by providing easily accessible, in-depth reports.
Your POS system automatically records a wealth of information about your store’s financial performance, including your gross/net sales reports, transaction history, and sales trends.
These reports empower you to keep an eye on the health of your business and make informed decisions to boost your store’s bottom line.
A bonus of using your POS system to generate financial reports is that you can easily export them to CSV format, enabling you to sync them with your accounting software or analyze your data further in your preferred spreadsheet software.
3. Leverage Accounting Software
If you rely on accounting software to keep your store running smoothly, integration with your POS system is a must.
Tools like Quickbooks by Intuit are helpful for accurately tracking your expenses, revenue, and overall profit — but if your accounting and POS software don’t communicate, it can cost you time and energy to manually input the data.
That’s why your POS solution should integrate seamlessly with your chosen accounting for retail software, sharing data between the two systems in real time. This integration will ensure that your financials are always up to date with no extra effort required from you.
4. Master Inventory Management
Inventory management is a core piece of the accounting for retail puzzle.
Without understanding exactly what you have in stock, how quickly your inventory turns over, and how often you should reorder your most popular items, keeping your finances balanced is nearly impossible.
Your POS system is critical for successful inventory management and for a healthy bottom line, tracking each item in your inventory from the moment it arrives at your store to the minute a customer purchases it.
Not only does your POS system ensure that all of your stock is accounted for, but it also provides insights that can help you more strategically stock your store. For example, your POS system will reveal your bestselling items, as well as items that move slowly, empowering you to make informed decisions about what and when you should reorder.
Tackle Accounting for Retail With Comcash
Accounting for your retail store can seem like a daunting task, but the right tools can make it easy. One of the most important tools to put to work is your store’s point of sale system.
The right POS system can be a game-changer in your accounting for retail process, helping you with your taxes, providing you with detailed sales and inventory reports, and integrating with accounting software.
If you’re ready to take control over your store’s finances and see your profits grow, check out Comcash! Comcash is an all-in-one POS solution designed with small business owners like you in mind.
Schedule a personalized demo with one of our retail experts today to see Comcash in action.