Global Taxes in Synder: A Guide for QuickBooks Online Users

• Who This Guide Is For
• How Synder Handles Taxes
• Per-Transaction Mode
• Summary Sync
• Handling Multiple Tax Rates From Different Regions
• When Your Payment Platform Sends No Tax Data
• Removing or Excluding Incoming Tax

Who This Guide Is For

This guide is for businesses that use QuickBooks Online with Synder and need to record taxes correctly across their accounting.

Use this guide if you:

• Use QuickBooks Online (US, Canada, UK, Australia, New Zealand, or any other region)
• Sell internationally or across multiple tax jurisdictions
• Have noticed that tax is not appearing — or is appearing incorrectly — in QuickBooks after syncing

How Synder Handles Taxes

Synder does not calculate taxes. It reads the tax information your payment platform sends, and then records it in your accounting software. If your platform doesn’t carry tax on a transaction, Synder has nothing to pass through.

However, if your payment platform sends no tax data — for example, Stripe without Stripe Tax — there are custom solutions Synder can implement to handle this. These are covered in the sections below.

Per-Transaction Mode

The Apply Taxes Setting

The core tax setting in Per-Transaction mode is Apply Taxes, found under Settings → [Your Integration] → Taxes.

This toggle controls how tax amounts are recorded in QuickBooks:

• Apply Taxes ON — Tax posts to the dedicated tax field in the transaction. QuickBooks recognises it as tax and includes it in tax reporting.
• Apply Taxes OFF — Tax posts as a plain line item on the transaction. The amount is still recorded, but it will not appear in tax reports.

Note: Synder automatically detects whether the transaction is Tax Inclusive or Tax Exclusive based on the original transaction data — this is not something you configure in Synder settings, but can be adjusted with Smart Rules.

QuickBooks Online US: What You Will See

If your QuickBooks Online company is set up for the United States, the Taxes page in Synder will show only the Apply Taxes toggle. No additional tax settings appear.

This is by design: QuickBooks Online (US) uses its built-in Automated Sales Tax (AST) engine, which calculates the correct tax rate based on customer location, shipping address, and item taxability. Synder’s job is simply to mark line items as taxable or non-taxable — QuickBooks Online does the rest. You do not need to configure tax codes or rates in Synder.

QuickBooks Online Non-US: Additional Settings

If your QuickBooks company is outside the US (Canada, UK, Australia, New Zealand, EU, etc.), enabling Apply Taxes reveals additional settings:

Default Tax Code

Acts as a fallback when Synder cannot find a matching tax rate in your QuickBooks. For example, if your payment platform sends 8.25% tax but no 8.25% code exists in QuickBooks Online, the transaction would normally fail. With a Default Tax Code set, Synder applies this fallback code and the transaction syncs successfully.

Zero-Rated Tax Code

Applied automatically when the tax amount on a transaction equals $0. This lets Synder record the transaction with the correct tax classification (e.g. Exempt or Zero-Rated) rather than leaving the tax field blank.

Generic Tax Code

Lets you apply a specific tax code based on conditions rather than relying on matching the rate from your payment platform. There are three uses:

1. Apply if a transaction contains taxes — Synder ignores the tax rate from your payment platform and applies your chosen code instead. Useful when your platform’s tax calculation is incorrect or you want to standardise to a single code.
2. Apply if a transaction does NOT contain taxes — Synder applies a tax code only to transactions that arrive with no tax. This is the key setting when your payment platform sends no tax data at all (see the section below).
3. Apply to shipping amount if the transaction contains shipping — Applies a specific tax code to the shipping line when shipping is present on the transaction.

Taxes on Expenses

Some jurisdictions require businesses to account for tax on payment processor fees. This setting lets you apply a tax code to fees recorded as expenses in QuickBooks. The Default, Zero-Rated, and Generic Tax Code options are all available here.

Summary Sync

QuickBooks Online US: Setting Up Tax Mapping

QuickBooks Online (US) does not allow tax codes in journal entries. Synder posts tax amounts directly to the liability accounts you specify in your mappings.

Once you have transactions with tax syncing through, a Taxes Payable line will appear in your Mapping → Mappings list. Map this line to the appropriate Sales Tax Payable liability account in QuickBooks.

Important: Do not map to system-generated tax liability accounts (e.g. accounts created by QuickBooks Online’s own tax centre). Use a plain Sales Tax Payable liability account instead — mapping to system accounts will cause sync failures.

Changes only apply to newly generated summaries. After updating your mapping, rebuild existing summaries. See How to Rebuild Summaries.

QuickBooks Online Non-US: Setting Up TaxMapping

For non-US QuickBooks companies, tax codes can be applied to journal entries. To set this up:

1. Go to Settings → Mapping and scroll down to Tax codes.
2. Enable tax codes and assign a default zero-rated tax code — this is required for all non-tax lines (shipping, discounts, fees, etc.)
3. Open Mapping → Mappings list. You will now see an extra field on your summary lines where you can select a tax code for them.

3. Assign the zero-rated tax code to all other (non-tax) mapping lines, or rely on the default zero-rated code set in Settings.

5. Assign a dedicated tax code to your tax payable lines.
6. Save and rebuild existing summaries.

Once set up, for each tax amount in your transactions Synder creates:

1. A taxable sales amount line with the mapped tax code applied
2. An offsetting zero-rated line to balance the entry

This ensures taxable revenue is reported correctly and tax appears in QuickBooks Online’s tax reports without overstating income.

Key Limitations

• Tax codes must exist first. Synder pulls tax codes directly from QuickBooks. If the code you need doesn’t exist there, create it in QuickBooks Online before trying to use it in Synder.
• Matching is by percentage only (Per Transaction). Synder matches tax codes by rate — not by name or jurisdiction. If two codes share the same rate, Synder applies the one that sorts first alphabetically. Use Smart Rules to override this if needed.
• Do not use system-generated tax accounts for the Taxes Payable mapping. Accounts like “GST/HST Payable” are created by QuickBooks Online’s own tax centre and do not accept tax codes from journal entries. Use a plain liability account instead.
• Synder cannot increase the transaction total (Per Transaction). When tax is applied, it is extracted from the existing amount, not added on top. A transaction of $100 with 20% tax becomes $80 net + $20 tax = $100 total. The income portion decreases; the total stays the same.
• Tax codes on expenses are not supported in Summary Sync. To account for tax on fees, either do it manually or switch to Per-Transaction mode for that integration. See How Synder Handles Taxes on Fees.
• If you collect Taxes outside of the US while using QuickBooks Online US, all the collected taxes outside of the country will fall into an Out of Scope tax liability account.

Please Note: If a limitation you are facing is not included here, please reach out to our support team to discuss options for Custom Development that are available for any custom solutions starting from the Pro plan.

Handling Multiple Tax Rates From Different Regions

If you sell to customers in different states, countries, or regions with different tax rates, you need a way to route each transaction to the correct tax code and account.

Summary Sync: Group by Region

Group by Region automatically splits your summary entries by the customer’s country or region, giving you a separate Taxes Payable mapping line for each, so you can assign the correct tax code and liability account to each region independently.

Note: Enabling Group by Region splits all mapping lines by region — not just taxes. Sales, refunds, and shipping income lines will also be split.

To set it up:

1. Go to Mapping → Mappings list and click Add group.
2. Select “Break down by product, SKU, or region”. This will take you directly to mapping settings.

3. Enable Group by region.

4. Return to Mapping → Mappings list — you will now see a separate Taxes Payable line for each region. Assign the correct tax code and account to each.
5. Save and rebuild existing summaries.

Unknown and N/A entries:

• Unknown — the transaction arrived without usable location data. Use Manual Groups (see below) to handle these.
• N/A — no shipping or billing address was present (common for subscription renewals). Assign to your default tax account.

Need more granular control? Use Manual Groups alongside Group by Region — for example, to split by city, customer, or ZIP code. Go to Mapping → Groups → Add group, set Type to Manual, define your conditions, and select Taxes Payable as the accounting category. Manual groups take priority; Group by Region handles everything that doesn’t match.

Per-Transaction: Smart Rules

Smart Rules (Recipes) let you route tax by shipping location automatically — no custom development required.

1. Enable Apply Taxes in your integration settings.
2. Go to Smart Rules → Recipes and find “Set NON US Tax in Sales Receipt” or “Set Non US Tax in Invoice” — enable both if you use both transaction types.

3. Click Try it out to open the recipe builder.

4. In the IF block: set Shipping Address → Region → Contains → [region name or abbreviation].

5. In the THEN block: select Set QuickBooks Online entity data → Tax → [your tax code].

6. Add additional IF/THEN blocks for each region you sell to.
7. Click Save & Close Rule.

Rule order matters — Synder applies the first matching condition. Arrange rules from most specific to least specific. See How to Apply Non-US Sales Tax Based on Shipping Location Using Recipes for a full walkthrough.

When Your Payment Platform Sends No Tax Data

If your payment platform doesn’t include tax in transaction data — for example, Stripe without Stripe Tax, or certain PayPal setups — Synder has nothing to record. This is the most common reason tax is missing from your books after syncing.

Summary Sync: Group by Region can only route tax that already exists in transactions. If no tax data is coming through, a Pro plan where custom modifications are available is required. Contact Synder support to arrange this. Any future changes to your setup will require the modification to be updated.

Per-Transaction: Tax inclusive transactions without taxes cannot sync to your books. It will cause the sync to fail.

Use the Default Tax setting to apply a blanket tax code to all transactions without a tax. This will make sure that all transactions sync through without failures. If you also need to route different tax codes based on region, follow the same Smart Rules (Recipes) setup described in the Per-Transaction: Smart Rules section above.

To apply actual tax rates to transactions, you can utilise Smart Rules. If you are planning to apply tax to every sales transaction according to locations, utilize a region/address based condition on the rule and select a desired tax code for each of the locations. You can also utilize recipes inside the Smart Rules menu. There is a dedicated Tax template for region-based tax applying to Canadian users.

Removing or Excluding Incoming Tax

If your payment platform sends tax data but you do not want it recorded in QuickBooks — for example, because you handle tax filing separately or the incoming data is incorrect — this can be handled with a custom modification.

Contact Synder support with:

• Which payment platform the tax is coming from
• Whether you want tax excluded entirely or recorded to a separate account
• Whether this applies to all transactions or specific types

Reach out to the Synder team via live chat or email — we’re happy to help you find the right setup.