Accounting 101: An Introduction for Etsy Sellers

Instant download items don’t accept returns, exchanges or cancellations. Articles on this website are for informational purposes only and do not constitute accounting, tax, or legal advice. Please consult your accountant, lawyer, or tax professional for guidance directly related to your unique situation. Running an Etsy shop is a meaningful business venture for many creatives. But for most Etsy shop owners, the most dreaded part of the job is bookkeeping.

This will help you stay organized and reduce the amount of time needed to manage your finances. By using bookkeeping to manage your Etsy business, you’ll be able to keep track of your profits and losses, organize your records, and communicate with clients. In addition, bookkeeping can help you address any tax issues that may arise. So if you’re looking to improve your Etsy business management skills, bookkeeping is a great starting point. Your system may be as simple as paper and pen if you are just starting out. The most common option though, is to use a spreadsheet, as this does your maths for you.

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This will speed up your admin as everything will be at your fingertips. It is also good practise as you’ll have the back-up to your numbers which will be needed if you ever get audited or have to provide support for your figures. To find the figures for bookkeeping, you’ll need all four of the forms for different data points.

In this blog post, we’ll go over the basics of bookkeeping for etsy sellers and walk you through a step-by-step guide on how to set up your own Etsy bookkeeping system. To exclude this from your reported Sales income you need to find the amount of that tax and deduct it from the total sales number calculated above. The simplest way to get the correct sales number for all lines is to add a new column and add together your net column and your fees & taxes to get to a “true” sales number. Bizarrely, this is not always the net of the above 2 columns but is the amount of the sale less the processing fee. Any tax that is collected by Etsy and retained by them to be paid over to the tax authorities  is excluded for this.

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Being able to easily add and subtract materials from my master inventory based on daily sales is invaluable in keeping organized & proactive. Managing inventory was a painful, manual, and inaccurate process before I discovered Craftybase. Being able to categorize expenses and see where each project is costing me has helped me to understand my business and pinpoint areas of high value or expense. Craftybase features a completely no-strings-attached 14 day trial that you can use to see how much time you will save with your Etsy bookkeeping.

QuickBooks is fully loaded with helpful tools that make running Canadian Etsy shops a simple and enjoyable affair. The software is highly intuitive, so you can get up and running fast, even if you’re not the most tech-savvy Etsy shop owner. Rather than emailing, calling, or texting you, they simply send a request through the QuickBooks platform with a due date. This way, you can simply sort your requests by urgency and respond in a timely manner.

How EcomBalance can help with your Etsy Bookkeeping?

Otherwise, you could end up underpricing your products, overvaluing your success, or missing tax deductions and overpaying on your taxes. Once you’ve tracked your sales and expenses, it’s time to understand your financial statements. This will show you whether you’re making money or losing money, as well as provide insight into how your business is performing overall. The first and most important step to good bookkeeping is having a system in place. Whether you use a software program or create your own Excel spreadsheet, make sure that you have a consistent way of recording and tracking your transactions.

• If tax has been charged to customers and Etsy pays that tax to you for you to pay to the authorities then that tax is included in the Net column on your Payment account.
• Any tax that is collected by Etsy and retained by them to be paid over to the tax authorities  is excluded for this.
• If it’s wildly off, you might want to get your accountant involved to figure it out.
• The best way to stop bookkeeping from overwhelming you is to make it a part of your daily routine.

Read on for Part 2 when I cover all the other numbers and tasks that you should be recording. Etsy bookkeeping can be really complicated as there are so many different reports that show different figures and rarely match or are comprehensive in what they include. If you are a VAT registered business, then unfortunately there is no easy way to find out the amount of VAT charged each month. You will need to use your OrderItem report and perform a manual calculation of the VAT included in your Order total. This also needs adjusting out of the Net figure in your Payment Account. Your sales income should include Product Sales, Shipping charged to customers and any refunds paid back to customers.