POS and accounting: what your cashier app should hand your accountant

In short: Good POS and accounting software hands your accountant sales, tax, returns, payment methods, purchases, debts and stock, complete and clear, with JoFotara invoices that match the portal, whether that takes one program or two.

POS and accounting software records each sale at the counter and hands your accountant the figures they need, complete: sales, tax, returns, payment methods, purchases, debts and stock. Your accountant never stands at the counter, but relies on everything that happens there. If the till's figures are incomplete or scattered, they spend days sorting them out, and you pay for their time or their mistakes. 'Linked to accounting' does not have to mean one program does both jobs. It means the right figures get from the till to the accountant, clearly. Here is what they should receive.

What 'linked to accounting' means

In practice the till and the books relate in one of three ways. Accounting software with a sales screen, where entries post themselves but the screen is often too heavy for a busy counter. A cashier app that pushes its data into separate accounting software through an integration. Or a cashier app that produces clear reports your accountant takes and enters in the books.

Which fits depends on your shop's size and how your accountant works. A small shop with an outside accountant who reviews the books once a month is usually well served by the third, as long as the reports are complete. Ask your accountant what they need before you choose.

Sales and tax

The first thing an accountant asks for is sales, detailed enough to prepare your tax returns.

• Total sales for each day and each month.
• Amounts before tax and the tax itself, split by rate if you have more than one.
• Returns and their invoices, linked to the originals rather than quietly subtracted from sales.
• Discounts, so the real selling price of each item is known.
• A match between your invoice count and totals and what reached JoFotara, if your shop uses it.

JoFotara for accountants: how your accountant receives the shop's invoices

When the till sends every invoice to JoFotara, the shop's invoices live in two places: in the cashier app and in the business's account on the portal. Your accountant needs both: the till's report for the period with sales, tax and returns, and what shows on the portal for the same period, to confirm every invoice arrived before preparing the return.

Agree on a fixed routine from the start: how your accountant views the portal without the connection details travelling in messages, when you send the month's report, and who follows up any rejected invoices. That small agreement saves you both a week of searching at the end of every tax period.

Payment methods and cash

Your accountant needs to know how sales were paid: cash, card, CliQ or on credit. Card totals should match what the bank deposited from your terminal, and cash totals should match what you banked or kept. Cash differences at each shift close go over as they are, not covered up or hidden.

Anything the owner takes from the drawer for personal use is recorded as a withdrawal in their name, not a shop expense. Mixing the two changes the profit in the books.

Purchases and suppliers

• Purchase invoices from every supplier, with date, amount and tax.
• What you have paid each supplier and what you still owe.
• Each item's cost from its latest purchase invoice, because profit is calculated from it.
• Goods returned to suppliers, damaged, or past their expiry date.

Debts and stock

Customer debts are the shop's money in other people's pockets, and your accountant needs the month-end total and who is overdue. Stock too: its value at cost at the end of the period, plus any stocktake differences.

Without these figures the accountant cannot find your real profit. Profit is not sales minus expenses. It is sales minus the cost of goods sold, minus expenses. A shop with 10,000 JOD in sales, 7,800 JOD cost of goods sold and 1,500 JOD of expenses made 700 JOD, not 8,500.

Expenses

Rent, electricity and salaries usually go straight to the accountant. Small expenses paid from the drawer, such as water, bags or a delivery fee, belong in the cashier app the moment they leave the drawer, with a receipt if there is one. Miss them there and they vanish, the drawer looks short for no reason, and profit looks higher than it is.

A monthly routine with your accountant

• Early in the month: prepare last month's sales, tax, returns and payment method reports.
• Attach purchase invoices and a statement of what you owe each supplier.
• Attach the total of customer debts and the stock value.
• Go through any gap between your invoice count and what shows on the JoFotara portal.
• Ask one question every month: which figure do you wish were clearer? Then fix it in the app.

What Ghalleh gives your accountant

Ghalleh is built around the counter and records what the accountant needs right there: every invoice with its tax, sent to JoFotara, returns, payment methods including split payments, expenses paid from the drawer, and cash differences at every shift close.

On the stock side, you record purchase invoices, or photograph a supplier's invoice and Ghalleh reads its lines, so costs update and you see what you owe each supplier. You can share a report for any period as a PDF with sales, tax, purchase tax and an estimate of what is due, for your accountant to prepare the return from.

Your accountant still owns the books and the returns. Ghalleh hands them the figures from the source. Ghalleh is on Google Play now, the Windows version is on the download page, and the trial is 14 days free with every feature and no card.

Common questions