iZettle

Hi Sean,

As MTD requires that financial transactions flow automatically into software, we already have that covered by our integration with Yodlee.

We currently have no plans to integrate with iZettle but thank you for your vote, I will add it to the request that we have logged for consideration.

Sean - that was the long answer - the short one is "No"

Aran, is there any indication why it isn't on the roadmap? It feels like Clearbooks isn't keeping up with competitors on plugins/integrations.

HMRC website states:

Further information required in addition to the VAT account Outputs value for the period split between standard rate, reduced rate, zero rate, exempt and outside the scope outputs.

Inputs value for the period split between standard rate, reduced rate, zero rate, exempt and outside the scope inputs.

Data for supplies made and received:

VAT accounting date for the transactions on the invoice: for traders on cash accounting scheme (or on the cash turnover method within the VAT flat rate scheme), the date of receipt or payment for other traders, the time of supply for VAT purposes (or, for input tax only, the date of receipt of the VAT invoice or alternative evidence if later), this will often, but not always be the date of invoice the invoice total broken down into sub-totals for each rate of VAT chargeable the VAT charged at each rate on the invoice Where an invoice covers several supplies, line by line input of each supply will not be mandatory, provided the VAT accounting date is the same for all of them.

Data for supplies made and received - for retailers The changes introduced under MTD will require businesses to keep a minimum data set electronically. Retailers will be permitted to record electronically sales transaction data based on daily gross takings, rather than recording details of each sale where they account for VAT using a retail scheme.*

Are you suggesting that the transfer from iZettle, net of transaction fees, covers this requirement? I don't think it does.

Paul, yeah disappointing. Can only keep banging the drum though - or turn to alternative software where client falls within VAT legislation.

Sean,

As we are already MTD ready, anything extra is unlikely to be prioritised unless it is deemed as completely necessary in the near future.

iZettle customers have informed me that you can download statements from iZettle via CSV that include both the transaction amounts and the iZettle fees.

If you download these statements, upload them into Clear Books, explain them and then explain the total amounts that appear on your imported bank statements (via your Yodlee feed) as transfers into your bank account, the requirement is covered.

Aran - I'm confused by this.

In answer to Sean's original query you said: "As MTD requires that financial transactions flow automatically into software, we already have that covered by our integration with Yodlee"

So what about my bank, that cannot be connected by Yodlee, or my clients that don't want to use Yodlee, or all the other financial apps, like IZettle, Woocommerce etc, where we have to manually configure spreadsheets to upload and leave the actual financial transaction, ie the sale itself, isolated outside CB?

Either you enable automatic flow into CB or you don't and have OKd with HMRC that it's OK to leave the originating transactions outside the bookkeeping? I'm not an expert in MTD (and don't want to be) but would appreciate knowing this sort of detail so that I can explain it to my clients.

Thanks Paul

PS: For the record, I agree with Sean's comment about CB falling behind its competitors with it's inability to integrate with other financial apps, it's one of the biggest benefits of cloud apps.

Apologies, I did some further research on HMRC and the flow of data actually refers to the software (Clear Books) sending information directly to HMRC.

If a customer cannot or does not want to use Yodlee, the CSV upload is sufficient; just as long as returns are frequently submitted to HMRC via Clear Books.

Paul, I think this is still clear as mud. Reading HMRC's website (https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/making-tax-digital-reforms-affecting-businesses/making-tax-digital-for-vat-legislation-overview#annex1) I think we need to at least have daily summarised invoices in Clearbooks. The underlying transactional data can be outside of Clearbooks. That's retailers only though. Non-retailers need transactional level data.

I'm taking anyone who operates a shop, even if that shop is high volume services, as a retailer.

Getting daily / transactional data into Clearbooks at the minute is a real pain in the backside. The CSV upload feature simply isn't flexible enough to make this simple. I'll need to do it myself for most clients because they'll simply forget or will get errors and ask me what went wrong.

Sean - the way I read it is that the books must have the detail of each invoice or a summary of daily takings if a retailer.

CSV imports can achieve this but, I agree they are sometimes cumbersome and make you feel like you’ve returned to the 20th century, which is why other providers have seen the benefit of enabling integrations with all the major commerce apps.

I’ve been told that CB’s core problem with achieving this is not because they are too intent on other things, like the MTD project, but because their API is useless and would need a major overhaul to enable anything sophisticated to integrate with it (eg the awful attempt with Autoentry).