QuickBooks Premier Retail Edition Review: Features & Pricing

QuickBooks Premier Retail Edition, an industry-specific version of QuickBooks Premier desktop accounting software, is designed to support the needs of retailers. It helps retail businesses manage accounting functions, such as sales, inventory, and invoicing. It includes all the features of QuickBooks Premier, plus additional inventory tools and industry-specific reports. Pricing starts at $799 per year for one user.

I haven’t found a single QuickBooks Premier Retail Edition review, but the general business edition of Premier earns mostly positive feedback due to its strong automation features and extensive reports. A possible downside to using the QuickBooks retail accounting software is that it has limited integrations with point-of-sale (POS) and ecommerce accounting solutions.

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QuickBooks Retail Edition Alternatives & Comparison

Comparison Use Cases

	Pricing	Number of Users Included	Sales Tax Tracking	Inventory Management	Retail-specific Reporting
QuickBooks Desktop Retail Edition	$799 to $1,999 per year	1 to 5	★★★★	★★★★	★★★★★
QuickBooks Online	$99 or $275 a month	5 or 25	★★★★★	★★★★	★★★★
	Visit QuickBooks Online
Xero	$20 to $80 monthly	Unlimited	★★★★	★★★★	★★★★
	Visit Xero
QuickBooks Desktop Enterprise	From $1,410 a year	1 to 40	★★★★	★★★★★	★★★★★
	Visit QuickBooks Desktop Enterprise
Rating Explanation: ★★★★★: Excellent ★★★★: Very good ★★★: Good ★★: Fair ★: Poor

Still can’t find what you need?

If your retail business is focused on online selling, see out our list of the top ecommerce accounting software. If you primarily need general accounting features, then our guide to the best small business accounting solutions might help.

QuickBooks Retail Edition Reviews From Users

4.50 / 5

As mentioned earlier, I haven’t found a specific QuickBooks Premier Retail Edition review. However, to give you insights into QuickBooks Premier user experiences, I explored feedback on the general business edition, which has the same user interface.

I found that QuickBooks Premier is generally commended for its robust general accounting features and extensive reports. I agree that the general accounting features are great, but I am more impressed that it has a wide range of retail-specific tools, like pricing management, sales tax tracking, and inventory management. You can also run customized retail reports, like inventory valuation summary and inventory stock status by item reports.

On the downside, some users complained that it is a tad expensive and that its customer support is rather unresponsive. It is likely that the reviewer who commented about pricing purchased multiuser access as Premier is affordable for one or two users. Also, I understand their frustration with Premier’s customer support, but I believe the quality of customer service depends on the specific agent assigned to you. Some provide excellent support while others may not be that helpful.

Here’s how QuickBooks Premier is rated by top review sites:

• Capterra^[1]: 4.5 out of 5 based on around 100 reviews
• TrustRadius^[2]: 8.2 out of 10 based on more than 400 reviews

QuickBooks Retail Edition vs Competitors

We compared QuickBooks Retail with QuickBooks Online and Xero, and here’s the result:

QuickBooks Premier Retail Edition vs QuickBooks Online and Xero FSB Case Study

Touch the graph above to interact Click on the graphs above to interact

• QuickBooks Premier Retail From $799 per year
• QuickBooks Online From $30 per month
• Xero From $15 per month

QuickBooks Retail Edition is equally as great as QuickBooks Online and Xero in terms of general accounting features. However, it trails behind QuickBooks Online in retail features because it doesn’t automatically track sales tax rates based on the customer’s location. QuickBooks Retail Edition’s biggest weakness is ease of use, which isn’t surprising since it’s a locally installed software.

QuickBooks Premier Retail Pricing

3.50 / 5

We aren’t that impressed with the QuickBooks Premier Retail pricing scheme because it doesn’t offer monthly plans, and you have to pay a fee for each additional user. Below is a quick breakdown of QuickBooks Retail Edition pricing:

As a point of comparison, QuickBooks Online Plus costs $90 per month for one to five users. So, if you need five users, QuickBooks Online will be much less expensive, but for a single user, QuickBooks Premier Retail Edition is a great value.

QuickBooks Retail Edition New Features

• Inventory categorization: You can now group item lists by categories so that you can manage your stock better and access them easily.
• Contactless payments: If you’re using QuickBooks Payments (payment gateway), you can now accept contactless payments, with the data being recorded in QuickBooks Premier automatically. Read our QuickBooks Payments review to learn more.
• Cash Flow Hub: Just like the standard business edition, QuickBooks Premier Retail now has a Cash Flow Hub that you can use to track incoming and paid invoices, payments, sales receipts, and credit memos.

QuickBooks Retail Edition General Accounting Features

5.00 / 5

QuickBooks Retail Edition deserves a perfect score because it offers a wide range of general accounting features, including A/P, A/R, and bank reconciliation. The retail edition includes all the core features of the QuickBooks Desktop Premier general business edition, which we tackle in detail in our QuickBooks Desktop Premier review.

Here are some of the most notable QuickBooks Premier Retail features.

A/P Management

QuickBooks Retail Edition, just like the general edition, lets you enter and pay vendor bills directly from the platform. The system provides reports that show your outstanding bills so that you can stay on top of your payables. Additionally, QuickBooks Retail enables you to monitor payment deadlines, set up recurring expenses, create purchase orders (POs) and convert them to bills, and more.

A/R Management

With the QuickBooks Desktop retail accounting software, you can create and send invoices and track outstanding customer balances and payments received. You can create an invoice from scratch, a sales order, or an estimate. When creating an invoice, you need to enter important information, such as the customer name, date, item descriptions, and amount.

QuickBooks Retail Edition lets you choose from different invoice templates, with the ability to change colors and add a logo of your brand. However, invoices in QuickBooks Retail Edition aren’t as good-looking as those in QuickBooks Online. Below is a sample invoice created in QuickBooks Retail.

Banking and Cash Management

You can connect your bank and credit card accounts to QuickBooks Premier so that your transactions automatically flow into the platform instead of having to manually record them. The program automatically categorizes your transactions based on default rules, but you can customize those rules to better suit your accounting needs.

One feature I like is the Undeposited Funds account, which helps you manage and organize received payments before they are deposited into your bank account. This is particularly useful for businesses that receive multiple payments daily and make a single deposit at their banks.

Mobile App

QuickBooks Premier has a mobile accounting app, but it’s limited to capturing expense receipts. If mobile accounting is important to you, then you might stick with QuickBooks but switch to QuickBooks Online. You might also want to consider Zoho Books, our overall best mobile accounting app.

QuickBooks Retail Edition Retail-specific Features

4.70 / 5

QuickBooks Retail Edition offers many specialized features for retail businesses, including sales tax tracking and inventory management. The only reason it didn’t get a perfect score is that it has limited integrations with POS and ecommerce accounting systems. For instance, the Shopify Connector by QuickBooks, Intuit’s official Shopify connector, isn’t compatible with QuickBooks Retail Edition.

Nonetheless, QuickBooks Retail Edition offers useful retail-specific features, including:

Sales Recording and Tracking

QuickBooks Premier Retail Edition uses sales forms, such as invoices and sales receipts, to record sales transactions. When a sales payment is expected to be processed at a later date, you can use invoices to record the transaction.

If you have an immediate sale, you can create a sales receipt quickly by using the Enter Daily Sales feature under the Retail menu on your QuickBooks Desktop homepage. The information is recorded in QuickBooks, which is useful when creating financial reports.

If your retail business is subject to sales tax, QuickBooks Retail allows you to set up and track sales taxes. A downside to using QuickBooks Premier is that it doesn’t calculate sales tax rates automatically based on your customer’s location, which is possible in QuickBooks Online.

Inventory Management

QuickBooks Retail Edition has strong inventory management features, such as the ability to:

• Set up inventory by item: You can set up each of your products as a separate inventory item. You can indicate a standard cost and sales price per item that will populate POs and invoices automatically, but you can still make changes on those forms if the price varies.

• Specify price levels: You can set special price levels for individual inventory items or set a special price level rule that will be applied to all inventory items. For instance, you might enter a special Family and Friends price level that reduces the sales price of all inventory items by 10%. After you create a custom price level, you can choose to apply the standard price or custom price level when creating invoices and sales receipts:

• Create POs when ordering inventory: The units on POs will show in the inventory item screen so you know there are more units on the way. To create a PO, go to the Vendors menu and click on Create Purchase Orders. Complete the Create Purchase Orders form and click the Save & Close or Save & New button.

• Adjust inventory shrinkage: Shrinkage is an inevitable part of retail sales. You can record shrinkage by entering either the amount of the adjustment―for instance when you know an item was broken―or actual units of inventory on hand. QuickBooks will make an adjustment to record the shrinkage expense based on the average cost per unit.
• Create sales orders: Creating sales orders will help QuickBooks ensure you have sufficient inventory. Inventory needed to fulfill open sales orders is subtracted from units on hand in determining the units available. When available units drop below the minimum you specify, QuickBooks will notify you that it’s time to reorder.

Retail-specific Reports

In addition to all the usual accounting reports and financial statements like the balance sheet and statement of profit and loss (P&L), retailers will find these QuickBooks Retail reports useful:

• Gross Margin by Inventory Item: This breaks down the sales of inventory by inventory item and reports the quantity sold, average sales price, COGS, gross margin (or profit), and gross profit percentage. It’s very helpful in determining which of your products are the most profitable and deserving of prime floor space (or website placement for online stores):

• Inventory Valuation Summary: This not only shows you the quantity of inventory you have on hand but also the total cost and total retail value:

• Inventory Stock Status by Item: This is very helpful for determining when to reorder inventory. It provides, by inventory item, not only the units on hand, on sales orders, and on POs, but also the average weekly units sold.

QuickBooks Retail Edition Ease of Use

3.00 / 5

QuickBooks Retail isn’t that easy to use, especially if you are used to a cloud-based interface like that in QuickBooks Online. It uses a workflow-based desktop navigation interface, which can be overwhelming for new users and those without accounting experience. Additionally, sharing files with your accountant involves creating and sending an “Accountant’s Copy,” which can be a bit of an extra step. A more straightforward approach is to send an email invitation to your accountant—which is the case in QuickBooks Online.

However, if you have used QuickBooks Premier, then you’ll have no problems transitioning to the retail edition. QuickBooks Premier Retail’s dashboard is similar to the standard business edition except that you’ll see a Retail menu on the top of the homepage. This is where you access features useful for retailers, such as Enter Daily Sales, Pay Bills, and Vendor Returns.

QuickBooks Retail Edition Customer Support

3.50 / 5

QuickBooks Retail didn’t do well in customer service primarily due to the lack of direct phone support. You have to submit a support request first and wait in a queue for a call back. In other similar providers like Zoho Books, you can make a direct phone call to a support representative for immediate assistance. Another concern is that QuickBooks Premier doesn’t offer email support, which could have been useful for non-urgent inquiries.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Bottom Line

QuickBooks Retail Edition is a powerful, industry-specific version of QuickBooks Premier. It can help you manage your inventory better and adjust product prices and price levels easily, allowing you to leverage promotional pricing for your business.

Although it’s a powerful desktop application, it’s best if it’s used by an experienced in-house bookkeeper. Once you purchase QuickBooks Premier, be sure to download the QuickBooks Retail Edition at no additional cost and start using its industry-specific features.

User review references:

^[1]Capterra
^[2]TrustRadius