How it runs for retail stores
A LedgerBPO accountant matches each batch and deposit to the POS Z-report, posts fees, chargebacks and over-and-short on their own lines, and reconciles every bank, card and merchant account in QuickBooks Online or Xero monthly, with exceptions logged in ReconBot.
What is a bank reconciliation service?
A bank reconciliation service compares the transactions in your accounting software with the transactions on your bank and credit-card statements and explains every difference. The goal is a ledger balance that agrees with the statement after timing items such as outstanding checks and deposits in transit. Done monthly, it catches missing entries, duplicates, bank errors and fraud early.
What we handle for retail stores
- Card batches matched to deposits by processor, including separate Amex settlements
- Cash deposits reconciled to drawer counts with over-and-short posted
- Buy-now-pay-later and gift-card processor payouts matched net of fees
- Refunds and chargebacks tied to the original sale and reversed correctly
- Business credit cards reconciled with receipts matched through Dext
The KPI that matters here
Every batch and cash deposit matched within 2 business days; no item open past 30 days.
Retail compliance notes
Sales tax collection and remittance
Sales tax collected at the register belongs to the state and, in many places, to a city or county too, each with its own rate and filing frequency. We reconcile the tax collected in your POS to the liability in the ledger every month and prepare the workings for each jurisdiction. Your registered preparer or your Avalara or TaxJar subscription files the return; we prepare, we do not file.
Economic nexus for online sales
Since the Wayfair decision in 2018, a store selling online can owe sales tax in states where it has no premises once it passes that state's threshold, commonly $100,000 in sales or 200 transactions. We track sales by ship-to state from Shopify or your marketplace reports and flag when a threshold is near so you and your advisor can register in time.
Inventory shrinkage and counts
Shrink from theft, damage, miscounts and vendor errors reduces gross margin and, if unrecorded, overstates both inventory on the balance sheet and profit. We book count adjustments when you supply cycle or full counts, separate known write-offs such as damaged goods from unexplained variance, and report shrink as a percentage of sales each period.
Gift cards and unclaimed property
Gift-card sales are recorded as a liability and released to revenue on redemption, with breakage recognized only under the method your CPA sets. Several states treat unredeemed balances as unclaimed property after a dormancy period. We keep a card-level liability schedule so the annual unclaimed-property review is a report, not a reconstruction.
Retail software we work in
- Shopify
- Square
- QuickBooks Online
- Xero
- Avalara
- TaxJar
- Dext
- Lightspeed
- Clover
- All 50 platforms
More for retail stores
Other services for retail
Bank reconciliation in other industries
Frequently asked questions
Why is my undeposited-funds account so large?
Because sales were recorded as received but never matched to the bank deposits that actually arrived, so both the sale and the deposit are in the books and the clearing account keeps growing. We match each batch to its deposit, post fees separately and clear the account. Once the daily match runs, it stays near zero.
How do you reconcile cash when the drawer never balances exactly?
We compare each day's cash count from the Z-report to the deposit that reaches the bank and post the difference to a cash over-and-short account, by register where the POS supports it. Small daily differences are normal; a pattern by register or shift is reported so you can look at operations, not just the books.
Do you reconcile Afterpay, Klarna and gift-card processors too?
Yes, each provider is set up as its own clearing account. Buy-now-pay-later payouts are matched to their statements with the merchant fee posted separately, and third-party gift-card programs are reconciled to activations and redemptions. The payment processor reconciliation service for retail stores explains the gross-to-net workflow for each provider.
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