QuickBooks

If you keep your books in QuickBooks Online, AspirePro can mirror your invoicing there — so the invoices you raise in AspirePro appear in QuickBooks without double entry, and payments flow back.

The QuickBooks connection is set up under System → Integrations → QuickBooks (see the Integrations documentation). Once connected, the finance features below light up.

Putting an invoice in QuickBooks#

How invoices are sent is set once, in System → Finance settings → Invoices → Invoices are sent via:

• QuickBooks emails them — Send puts the invoice in QuickBooks with the recipients as its email, then QuickBooks emails it.
• AspirePro emails them, with Put each invoice in QuickBooks too on — Send makes or updates its QuickBooks copy as AspirePro emails it. An invoice already in QuickBooks is always brought up to date before AspirePro emails it, whichever is set (with payments recorded, only in who it goes to, its number, memo, due date and terms — see below).
• Put in QuickBooks in the invoice's ⋯ menu makes (or updates) a native QuickBooks invoice and emails no one — the invoice stays a draft in AspirePro, marked In QuickBooks, until it's sent. A draft's copy carries no client email until then, so QuickBooks can't email or remind the client about it; sending puts the recipients on it.

The invoice shows when it last synced, any sync error, and its QuickBooks pay link. Void or empty invoices can't go to QuickBooks, and neither can one with money already on it that isn't in QuickBooks yet (it would bill the full amount again).

Every line goes across for exactly its amount. Sales tax goes as its own line booked to the account you choose, or QuickBooks works it out itself — see Sales tax. If QuickBooks ends up with a different total, it's flagged on Finance → Sync.

Where each line posts#

Every line of a pushed invoice posts to a real QuickBooks product or service — and so to its income account — so your QuickBooks revenue reports split the way you sell:

1. A QuickBooks product or service chosen on the line — click Posts to … under the line's description, on the create page or in the editor, and pick from QuickBooks' own list. Choose Automatic to go back to the order below.
2. A line for a product in your catalog posts to that product's QuickBooks item (catalog items sync with QuickBooks on the Products and services tab).
3. An agreement's fee posts to the product the agreement is for — the one product its recurring lines share — or, if they're mixed, the product its type is billed as (System → Agreement settings → Types).
4. Anything else posts to the default product or service chosen on the QuickBooks page's Invoices tab.
5. Only when nothing is chosen does AspirePro use a generic "AspirePro Services" item on your first income account — the invoice page flags those lines so you can fix it.

The invoice page shows, under each line, where it will post. A line's service date goes to QuickBooks as its service date. (With Xero connected instead, Posts to chooses the line's Xero sales account; unchosen lines use the default sales account.) A product AspirePro creates in QuickBooks is filed under the income account for new items (Products and services tab); a product that already exists keeps its own — pushing it never moves it.

Terms#

An invoice's payment terms go to QuickBooks as its Terms as well as its due date. AspirePro uses QuickBooks' own term with the same number of days (the same name first); when QuickBooks has none, it makes one named as it is here ("Net 45", "Due on receipt"). On the invoice, choose a term from the list, or Custom… to type the number of days.

Linking a company to a QuickBooks customer#

On a company's Finance → Integrations tab you manage the QuickBooks relationship for that client:

• Enable QuickBooks for this company.
• Search your QuickBooks customers and pick one to pair the company with (a customer already linked to another company says so and can't be picked).
• Unlink to remove the pairing.
• Sync invoices to pull that customer's invoices from QuickBooks into AspirePro's view.

Linking is one-to-one — a company maps to a single QuickBooks customer — so there's never ambiguity about where an invoice belongs.

Auto-creating customers#

An auto-create customers option (in the QuickBooks integration settings) will create a QuickBooks customer automatically when you push an invoice for a company that isn't linked yet — saving you a manual step. (It creates customers, not invoices; when an invoice goes to QuickBooks is set out under What AspirePro writes to QuickBooks.)

Receiving payments#

Payments you receive on an invoice that's in QuickBooks are recorded in QuickBooks from AspirePro — no need to log in to QuickBooks to mark it paid. The invoice's Receive payment dialog asks for what QuickBooks' own Receive payment asks for: the deposit to account (Undeposited Funds or a bank account), QuickBooks' payment method, the reference number and a memo. Choose the account the dialog starts with on System → Integrations → QuickBooks → Payments.

• Invoices that came from QuickBooks always send their payment there, and read QuickBooks' new balance straight back.
• Invoices AspirePro pushed send it by default; switch it off in the dialog to record it only here — except while QuickBooks' copy carries a live pay link. Then it has to go to QuickBooks too (the switch is on and locked), or QuickBooks would keep asking the client for the full amount.
• A payment is never recorded twice: each one AspirePro makes carries a marker in its memo, so a retry after a lost answer adopts it, and the next payment sync sees it as the same money.
• Removing it in AspirePro deletes it from QuickBooks first — never a payment someone entered in QuickBooks themselves.

Recurring invoices#

QuickBooks' recurring invoices show in Finance → Recurring invoices, marked Runs in QuickBooks, and can be set up, changed, ended or moved to AspirePro from there. See Recurring invoices.

Keeping in sync#

AspirePro keeps the mirror fresh: it refreshes stale company mirrors when you view the Finance tab, and QuickBooks' notifications bring changes across as they happen, with a check every 15 minutes behind them (how soon payments show up). Payments recorded in QuickBooks are pulled back so your AspirePro view reflects reality — including every page of a large client's invoices, and payments edited, moved or deleted in QuickBooks (an edit becomes a dated correction, never an overwrite).

Your organization is linked to one QuickBooks company. Connecting a different one on top of linked records is refused; switch with the Linked company section on the page's Overview tab — see Finance sync.

When the connection needs reconnecting#

QuickBooks sometimes stops accepting AspirePro's login — most often after a long stretch with no activity, or when someone revokes access in QuickBooks. When that happens:

• System → Integrations → QuickBooks shows Needs reconnecting, with QuickBooks' reason, a Reconnect QuickBooks button and Disconnect. The settings tabs stay hidden until it's back, since they read their lists from QuickBooks.
• A banner across the top of every page tells the people who can change Finance settings, with a link to that page. It says what's paused: syncing with QuickBooks waits (nothing is lost — it catches up after the reconnect), invoices QuickBooks works out the tax for wait unsent, and your other Finance settings that use QuickBooks fall back to AspirePro meanwhile, each card saying how (see Finance settings).
• The same people get one notification.

Reconnect keeps everything. You sign in to the same QuickBooks company, so every invoice, customer and payment link stays, and so do the choices on this page — the default product, where payments are deposited, the income and sales tax accounts. Your Finance settings apply again by themselves and the banner goes. (Connecting a different company is refused, as above. Only Disconnect starts over: connecting afterwards begins with fresh choices on this page.)

The ledger sync#

The connection flows both ways. Beyond pushing invoices out, AspirePro pulls your expense ledger in — an hourly, read-only mirror of:

• Expenses — purchases, bills, and vendor credits, with split lines and exact category attribution.
• Vendors — everyone you pay.
• Expense categories — with their COGS/expense classification and parent/child hierarchy.

This powers Expenses & Vendors, feeds customer-tagged spend into Profitability, and lights up Statements — your P&L, Balance Sheet, Cash Flow, and aging reports rendered live from QuickBooks' own report engine. QuickBooks owns all edits on the ledger side; AspirePro just keeps it visible.

What AspirePro writes to QuickBooks#

Reading your books and writing to them are very different levels of trust, so what AspirePro writes is set in two places — how invoices are sent, on System → Finance settings → Invoices, and the QuickBooks page's Invoices and Reimbursements tabs on System → Integrations → QuickBooks — and each kind of thing is its own choice. Turning any of it on is a policy decision your organization makes deliberately; an organization that only wants its ledger read can have that, and stay there.

Two things can be written today:

• Invoices — AspirePro makes an invoice's QuickBooks copy, or updates what it says, at these moments and no others (voiding an invoice cancels its copy too — see Invoices; payments are under Receiving payments):
• When it's sent, according to Invoices are sent via: with QuickBooks emails them, every invoice is put in QuickBooks first; with AspirePro emails them, every invoice goes there as it's emailed while Put each invoice in QuickBooks too is on — and it starts out on once QuickBooks is connected. A recurring invoice sent automatically follows the same setting (with its own Put it in QuickBooks when it's sent switch when AspirePro emails them). An invoice already in QuickBooks is brought up to date before AspirePro or QuickBooks emails it, whichever is set.
• When QuickBooks works out its sales tax (Sales tax) — as it's sent, whichever way it goes (Stripe and Xero included), or put in QuickBooks: the tax comes from QuickBooks' copy.
• When Pay now is taken by QuickBooks Payments — as AspirePro or QuickBooks sends it, since the pay link lives on QuickBooks' copy. Add Pay now to them on Finance settings updates the copies of open invoices that were put there before Pay now was on, so each gets a pay link; it never makes a new one.
• When it's renumbered, if it's already there — its copy takes the new number.
• Put in QuickBooks in an invoice's ⋯ menu, on demand, emailing no one.

To send invoices without writing any to QuickBooks, choose AspirePro emails them, switch Put each invoice in QuickBooks too off (and each recurring invoice's Put it in QuickBooks when it's sent), keep sales tax with AspirePro and Pay now with Stripe or off; then only Put in QuickBooks writes one. A draft put in QuickBooks carries no client email there until it's sent, so QuickBooks can't email or remind the client about it (nor make it a pay link). An invoice with payments recorded is never put in QuickBooks, and its copy there is only ever updated in who it goes to, its number, memo, due date, terms and online-payment switches — after checking QuickBooks' total matches — never in its lines. Create missing QuickBooks customers and the sales tax account are on the Invoices tab. - Reimbursements → Bills — per claim, only when you press Push to QuickBooks, from the expense claim or in bulk from the queue's Not in QuickBooks view. Each push creates one Bill on that person's vendor record, one line per item, each posted to the account finance mapped for its category. Approving a claim never writes anything. Nothing here is written automatically.

Why bills against a vendor#

Reimbursements flow through accounts payable, not payroll — that's how they actually work in practice. Contractors are vendors by definition, and most organizations already keep a vendor record for employees who submit expenses, precisely so reimbursements don't get tangled up with wages, taxes, and withholding they have nothing to do with. So AspirePro writes what your accountant would write: a bill, on a vendor.

Payee mapping#

Because of that, write-back requires each person to be mapped to a QuickBooks vendor — from the Payees list on the Reimbursements tab. AspirePro suggests matches by name and email, and a human confirms each one. It never silently creates a vendor in your books: auto-created payees are how you end up with three spellings of the same person and no idea which one your history hangs off. A claim from an unmapped person fails with a message telling you exactly who to map.

Category mapping#

People log expenses against a short local category list ("Travel", "Software", "Meals") — never your chart of accounts. Each local category maps to one QuickBooks expense account, set once under Expense accounts on the Reimbursements tab, or on Finance → Reimbursements → Categories. A reviewer can override a single item's account on the claim.

A push refuses — with the category named — when any line has no account, instead of picking a plausible one for you. A guessed account produces a bill in your books that looks perfectly normal and is quietly wrong, the kind of error that surfaces months later during a reconciliation. A clear refusal costs you thirty seconds: map the category, or set the account on the item, and push again.

When a write fails#

A failed push never undoes the approval. The approval is a fact about your team's decision; whether QuickBooks accepted the bill is a separate question, and the two shouldn't be able to break each other. The sync status and any error are shown on the claim itself in Finance → Reimbursements — surfaced, never swallowed.

QuickBooks is a mirror, not a replacement — you continue to raise and manage invoices in AspirePro (where they're tied to your time and agreements), and QuickBooks stays in step for your accounting.