You could use the “Notes” field to add details to a QuickBooks invoice, but that’s another manual process that’s prone to error. QuickBooks can be difficult to integrate with a transportation management system (TMS). With Toro TMS, you get much deeper insights into your trucking operations and finances compared to QuickBooks. From here, syncing the data to QuickBooks (Online or Desktop) is easy, and you can close your books with a single click. Toro ensures that all charge types align with QuickBooks items quickbooks for trucking and are mapped to the correct general ledger, so no additional categorization is needed within QuickBooks.

Tax penalty protection

There’s no one-size-fits-all answer, as the “best” trucker software depends on your specific user needs, budget, and scale. If you have 1-5 trucks, don’t overcomplicate it; you likely can run off of Google Sheets. If you have a growing 5-50 truck asset-based fleet with multiple office employees, you’re likely best off with a modern cloud-based solution like Truckbase. Without such integrations, document management quickly becomes overwhelming. Saving rate confirmations and attaching the right one to the right invoice can become unwieldy.

PCS TMS for Carriers brings all of your technology under one roof, thanks to seamless integration capabilities. Manage your business — and your finances — in less time, and focus on growing your fleet. Contact us for personalized guidance and solutions, and discover how QuickBooks for trucking can revolutionize your financial management. Just like customer invoices, payroll and IFTA can be automatically synced to QuickBooks, so that your accounts stay up to date without any fuss.

Why choose Shoeboxed over QuickBooks?

QuickBooks can sync your finances and account information across all your devices, including the iPad, iPhone and Android. The app provides real-time payables, receivables, and cash flow, and prepares your data for tax time. The QuickBooks dashboard’s color-coded approach makes it easy to track open invoices, overdue bills and your overall cash balance. QuickBooks also allows you to personalize and send your invoices from anywhere at any time, and it deposits money into your bank account when you get paid.

‍4. Simplify driver pay and IFTA reporting

If you can’t integrate the two platforms, manual data entry becomes a larger part of accounts receivable operations. Errors and rebills increase, and accounting departments struggle to keep track of invoices. The chart of accounts is a list of all of your company’s accounts, including assets, liabilities, income, and expenses.

Smaller trucking companies that are still growing can use QuickBooks to meet the basic bookkeeping requirements, and use Excel for anything else. In this case, you already know what’s missing from QuickBooks, and you’re okay with it. In this article, we’ll explore using QuickBooks as your primary accounting software for a trucking company. Fuel is one of the biggest expenses in the trucking industry, and finding ways to cut costs can make a significant impact on profitability.

factors to consider regarding trucking software integration with QuickBooks

Many small trucking companies still use ledgers, spreadsheets and file drawers when managing their financials. If your company falls into that category, there are easy ways to do accounting without all the paperwork. Online accounting software allows you to update and track your financials in real-time for as little as $10 a month.

With Rigbooks, you’ll get an overview of the cost of each load and can access features from any device, anywhere. Expenses are automatically organized into neat reports with images of the receipts attached. When you approve the summary, Shoeboxed will generate a receipt with your trip information, including a photo of your route on the map, and auto-categorize it under the mileage category. At the end of a trip, Shoeboxed creates a summary that includes the date, editable mileage and trip name, and your tax deductible and rate information.

• Discover how freight tech is revolutionizing the trucking industry and increasing efficiency through AI and augmented intelligence.
• QuickBooks can sync your finances and account information across all your devices, including the iPad, iPhone and Android.
• Formerly known as KeepTruckin, this all-in-one platform provides Electronic Logging Devices (ELDs), GPS tracking, and safety monitoring for truck drivers and fleet managers.
• TruckingHQ is here to help transportation companies navigate regulation, compliance, and back office paperwork.

Using QuickBooks as your main accounting platform as a trucking company can be done, but it won’t be easy. Having your accounting in the same software as your dispatch, maintenance, and fuel taxes is preferred for most trucking companies. Keeping your fuel and mileage data under the same roof as your accounting software is far more efficient than managing everything in two or more places. Trucking software will be able to produce an IFTA report for you using your fuel and mileage data.

As mentioned in the article, we strongly recommend that you use QuickBooks Online for its flexibility and regular updates. An integrated solution allows for automatic invoice generation based on rate cons and dispatch information. You should be able to generate invoices either from within your TMS or QuickBooks. Additionally, you should have it sync automatically with the opposing system. The TMS lets you create and dispatch loads, create and send invoices, and manage payments. Shoeboxed is a receipt-scanning app and service that lets truckers manage expenses and digitize receipts right from their cabins.

• ✅ Streamlined Audits and Tax PrepBecause your financial records are accurate and up to date, audits and tax season become far less stressful.
• The most common reasons truckers use QuickBooks is that “everyone uses it” or that their accountant recommended it.
• Overall, Rigbooks is a good option if you’re looking for a way to reduce costs and increase profits by the mile.
• Inversely, QuickBooks doesn’t meet all the flexibility that a carrier TMS provides.
• PCS TMS for Carriers is the total package, with integrated trucking accounting features that speed up the invoicing process and ensure accuracy.

In Toro, invoices are automatically prepopulated with key details like PO numbers, BOL references, and pick-up/drop-off locations—all you need to do is click “Create invoices”. Integrating your TMS with QuickBooks ensures that such documents are seamlessly attached and registered in both systems. Inversely, QuickBooks doesn’t meet all the flexibility that a carrier TMS provides. It’s essential to choose a TMS that can integrate with QuickBooks without compromising on flexibility to meet your unique business needs.

You can manually enter each transaction, or you can connect your bank account and credit cards to automatically import your transactions. It’s important to categorize each transaction correctly, so it’s easy to track your income and expenses. The first step in using QuickBooks for your trucking company is to set up your account. You can choose between the desktop version or the online version, depending on your preference. Once you have your account, you’ll need to enter your company’s information, including your business name and address, tax ID number, and bank account information. Driver pay can be complex, as different drivers may be paid by the load, hour, or mile.

For the busy truck driver, manual data entry is a significant drain on time and accuracy. Manually tracking these intricate financial details in generic spreadsheets is highly prone to errors, leading to missed write-offs, inaccurate reporting, and significant audit risks. Sure all businesses share some basic needs like keeping track of revenue and expenses, and QB can handle that well, but your trucking company has specific needs to make you successful. The root of the problem with using QuickBooks for trucking is that it’s one-size-fits-all accounting software. They want to be able to sell it to everyone, so it has to work just as well for a plumber or florist as it does for your trucking company. ✅ Real-Time Cash Flow ManagementTrack revenue, fuel costs, and expenses as they happen.

We’ll walk through a lot of these in this article so you will have a better idea if it makes sense to use QuickBooks for your trucking business. Then you can decide if you want to use QuickBooks, or if something made specific for trucking makes more sense. Learn about deadhead trucking, which refers to the miles a trucker drives with an empty trailer between loads. ✅ Streamlined Audits and Tax PrepBecause your financial records are accurate and up to date, audits and tax season become far less stressful. All the data your accountant needs is already in QuickBooks—clean, organized, and ready to go.

Our Strategy Live system offers an entirely cloud-based solution that’s easy to install, learn and use and provides real-time access to critical operational data. New Zealand-based Xero is aiming to replace QuickBooks as the top accounting software for U.S. businesses. Xero offers real-time tracking of accounting transactions and customizable invoices that customers can pay digitally. The software’s account reconciling feature is easy to use and allows you to perform what was once a time-consuming task within minutes. That flexibility lets you consolidate your company’s accounting with project management and client relationship data. Trucking software is commonly referred to as transportation management system (TMS) or fleet management software.

You can stuff your receipts into one of our Magic Envelopes (prepaid postage within the US). Use our receipt tracker + receipt scanner app (iPhone, iPad and Android) to snap a picture while on the go. QuickBooks’ receipt scanner is finicky, so tracking expenses on the go may prove to be more of a headache than you anticipated. With the lack of industry-specific features, getting QuickBooks to meet all of your needs as a trucker or dispatcher will be a challenge, and in some cases, impossible. While QuickBooks has features that can benefit those in the trucking industry, it also has a lot of useless features—at least for truckers. Before we dive into QuickBooks’ drawbacks, let’s discuss how QuickBooks Online can benefit small businesses in the trucking industry.