Two different shapes of bookkeeping
Link My Books posts one summary per payout. Every Stripe, PayPal or WooCommerce Payments deposit becomes a single summarised invoice or journal in Xero, and because that summary total equals the amount that hits your bank, the bank feed matches one line per settlement. If reconciliation is the job you care about most, that is a genuinely good answer, and it is the same answer whether you sell on Amazon, on Shopify or on your own WooCommerce store.
Syncible posts every order as its own Xero invoice, with the customer on it. You get customer-level detail in Xero, VAT worked out per order and per line, and refunds as individual credit notes allocated against the invoice they belong to. If you want to open Xero and see who bought what, or hand your accountant a set of books where every sale is a discrete traceable transaction, that is the shape you want.
Neither approach is wrong. They are for different books. A seller reconciling high-volume marketplace payouts and a store owner who wants customer-level records in Xero are asking their accounting system for two different things, and each tool answers one of them well.
Worth knowing before you choose: a summary is hard to unwind once posted, so finding a single order means going back to your store. A per-order ledger is more rows in Xero, which some accountants love and some would rather not scroll through. Pick the one that matches how you actually work.
Feature comparison: Syncible vs Link My Books
| Feature | Syncible | Link My Books |
|---|---|---|
| Primary design | WooCommerce/Shopify → Xero | Payout-based, multi-channel incl. WooCommerce |
| Invoice type | ✓ One per order | Summary journals |
| Sync speed | ✓ Real-time webhooks | Per payout |
| Line-item detail in Xero | ✓ Full SKU, qty, price | Summarised, not per line |
| Refund → credit note | ✓ Per-refund, allocated (all plans) | Included in the payout summary |
| Cancellation → void | ✓ | Not documented |
| UK VAT tax class routing | ✓ Per class to Xero tax type | Not documented |
| Per-contact account mapping | ✓ Pro plan | Not documented |
| COGS tracking | ✓ Growth plan | ✓ Per settlement period |
| Stock sync | ✓ Both ways | Not documented |
| Payment gateway routing | ✓ Per gateway → bank account | ✓ Per payment processor |
| Audit trail | ✓ Every action logged | Not documented |
| Failure alerts | ✓ Email + dashboard | Not documented |
| WooCommerce plugin | ✓ Dedicated WP plugin | Web-based connection |
| Free plan | ✓ 100 orders/month, real-time, held not dropped above the limit | 14-day free trial, no free plan |
Three reasons WooCommerce merchants choose Syncible over Link My Books
1. Per-order invoices your accountant can actually work with
Your accountant wants to open Xero, search for order #1234, and see exactly what the customer bought, how much tax was charged, and which payment method was used. Syncible gives them that. Link My Books gives them a journal entry that says “WooCommerce sales £847.30” and expects them to trust it. For any business doing more than hobby-level volume, per-order visibility isn't a luxury — it's how proper bookkeeping works.
2. Built for WooCommerce, not bolted on
Syncible ships as a WordPress plugin that lives inside your WooCommerce admin. The dashboard shows sync status, failed orders, and connection health without leaving wp-admin. Link My Books is a separate web app designed around marketplace data feeds. WooCommerce support exists but it isn't the primary use case, and the integration reflects that — no WordPress plugin, no admin-level visibility, no webhook-driven real-time sync.
3. UK VAT routing that handles mixed rates
UK stores selling standard-rated and zero-rated products need different Xero tax types per line item. Syncible maps each WooCommerce tax class to a specific Xero tax type: standard to OUTPUT2, zero-rated to ZERORATEDOUTPUT, exempt to EXEMPTOUTPUT. Link My Books groups tax into summary lines, which means your Xero data doesn't reflect the actual VAT split your store collected. That gap becomes a problem at VAT return time.
Frequently asked questions
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