We have grown to the point that Quickbooks Online (QBO) no longer fits our business. Our new accounting firm would like to integrate Quickbooks Desktop into Copper, or would like our company to switch CRM vendors, which sounds awful. Does Copper support Quickbooks Desktop integration including generating QB quotes and price book from the Copper platform (so our team does not have to have access to a server based QB account).
Thanks Brian
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Oh gosh... For an accounting firm to recommend you switch from QBO to QB Desktop, I'd genuinely run away from them.
QuickBooks has been public about them trying to kill off the desktop version and to move everyone over to Online. Online has a proper API, which means integration is able to be had. QuickBooks Desktop does not have an API in the same way.
I've worked with companies doing $30m/yr in rev and use QBO just fine. If the accounting firm was suggesting Netsuite, while that's also a huge bummer, that's a more understandable move than QuickBooks Desktop. Genuinely sounds more like the comfort zone of your new accounting firm and less about the capabilities.
I know this isn't enjoyable to hear, but I'd look for a new CPA. I've switched accountants 5 times now, going from the largest firms to the small firms, and the larger the firm, the more stuck in their ways they are.
If you stayed in QBO, I'm willing to bet that you'd be able to integrate more than you think you can, but switching to QuickBooks Desktop, I'd be willing to bet everything that you won't be able to integrate anything, even if you switched CRMs. The level of "integration" for QuickBooks Desktop, is that of essentially exporting a CSV from one platform and importing it into QB Desktop.
Copper doesn't, and will never integrate with QB Desktop. Heck, no modern CRM on the market will either. There's no proper API.
Sorry, decision is made. And I don’t want to lose Copper. QBO has many limitations. You do not have access to revenue and cost at the same time and so cannot generate margin reports per transaction or per quote. Desktop solves these limitations. The reason QBO does not solve them is to force customers that grow to use Desktop, which has higher license fees. I do not know any CPAs who are willing to work with QBO and I have checked with many. Copper needs to find ways to integrate with more advanced accounting systems.
+3
Hey Brian, totally understand.
I'm not a Copper employee, just an integration specialist, and all I'm saying is that Copper won't be able to integrate with QuickBooks Desktop because QuickBooks Desktop doesn't have a proper REST API.
Totally understand the frustration here, but it's more on QuickBooks than it is on these CRM's. We for one are using a CPA that happily works with QuickBooks Online, so maybe give them a shot?
The engineering resources that'd be required for Copper to "integrate" QuickBooks Desktop, would be massive + the integration would be limited and sub-par.
Your best bet would be to find another CRM that is more enterprise-focused (like Salesforce) if you'd like QuickBooks Desktop to be "integrated". But with that, you're also likely to pay 5-figures or more getting something like Salesforce "integrated" with QuickBooks Desktop, through the use of their outdated and limited SDK.
If you use older software that doesn't have a modern API, you're not going to ever be able to integrate it to the degree of the expectations it sounds like your CPA has.
Your CRM also doesn't have to connect to your accounting software, that's okay too. We have a customer that uses copper + QuickBooks Desktop (Contractor edition), they just don't have the expectations of it integrating, so it works for them.
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