Consignment software for Square
Square is a great register, but it was never built to split a sale between fifty booths. If you run an antique mall, flea market or craft mall on Square, consignment software is the layer that turns your sales into a clear payout and a statement for every vendor — without replacing the POS your staff already know.
The problem with Square alone
Square is excellent at the thing it is for: taking the money. What it does not do is tell you whose money it is. Out of the box, Square will not attribute each sale line to the vendor or booth that owns it, it will not subtract a commission or the monthly booth rent, and it will not produce a per-vendor statement you can hand over or email.
So the work lands on you. Most mall owners export a sales report, open a spreadsheet, and spend a day or two every month sorting lines by vendor, applying each vendor's split, subtracting rent, chasing refunds that cross a month boundary, and copying totals into separate statements. It is slow, it is easy to get wrong, and at year end you still have to work out who crossed the 1099 threshold.
What consignment software for Square actually needs to do
Before you compare tools, it helps to be clear about the job. A consignment or booth-rental layer for a vendor mall has to cover all of this:
| Job | What it means |
|---|---|
| Attribute every sale line | Map each item sold to the vendor or booth that owns it, including custom-amount sales. |
| Compute the payout | Net sales minus commission minus booth rent withheld, per vendor, for the period. |
| Per-vendor statement | A monthly document each vendor can read: what sold, what was kept, what they are owed. |
| Handle the messy cases | Refunds, partial refunds, discounts and tips have to land in the right vendor total. |
| Pay people | A payout file you can hand to your bank or PayPal instead of writing checks by hand. |
| Year-end tax | A 1099-NEC report for vendors you paid above the threshold during the year. |
| Let vendors self-serve | A way for a vendor to see their own numbers without calling the office every week. |
The core equation is simple — net sales − commission − rent withheld = payout — but doing it accurately for every vendor, every month, across refunds and discounts, is exactly where a spreadsheet starts to crack.
Two ways to solve it
There are really only two honest approaches, and the right one depends on how attached you are to Square.
A) Replace Square with a dedicated consignment POS. Some systems are purpose-built for antique and consignment malls, with vendor splits and statements baked into the register. If you are starting from scratch, or you are unhappy with Square anyway, this can be a clean fit. The cost is real, though: you re-enter your catalog, you retrain every cashier, you may need new hardware, and you are betting your whole checkout on a system you have not run before.
B) Keep Square and add a reporting layer. If Square already works for your register, you can leave it in place and bolt the consignment math on top. Nothing changes at the point of sale; a tool reads your sales afterwards and does the vendor split, statements and payouts. There is no migration and no retraining — but it is a reporting layer, so it only reports on what Square captured.
| A) Replace the POS | B) Reporting layer on Square | |
|---|---|---|
| Migration | Re-enter catalog, retrain cashiers, move hardware | None — Square stays exactly as it is |
| Up-front cost | New software, often new hardware and setup fees | Low; a free tier covers the basics |
| Payments & checkout | Handled by the new POS | Stays on Square, which you already trust |
| Consignment math | Built in | Added as a reporting layer on top |
| Risk if it does not fit | High — you have switched your whole register | Low — you can stop and keep selling on Square |
Neither is wrong. If you have no POS yet, approach A is worth a look. If Square is already ringing up your sales, approach B gets you statements this month with none of the switching cost.
How BoothSettle does approach B
BoothSettle is the reporting layer. It reads your Square sales and turns them into per-vendor statements and payouts, while your register stays untouched. Here is exactly what it does — nothing more, nothing less.
Reads your Square sales two ways
Connect your Square account through the official OAuth connection and sales sync automatically, or upload a Square Item Detail CSV export if you prefer not to connect. Either way the raw data comes straight from Square.
Attributes every line to a vendor
Each sale line is matched to its vendor through a cascade, taking the first rule that resolves: a catalog custom attribute, then the category, then a SKU prefix, then an item-per-booth name, and finally the checkout note (the only option for custom-amount sales). You pick one convention and it is automatic — see how to encode a vendor on Square.
Computes the payout
For each vendor and period it works out net sales, subtracts your commission and any booth rent withheld, and shows the payout. Refunds, discounts and tips are handled so totals stay honest.
Produces statements, portal and payouts
It generates a monthly PDF statement per vendor and can email it automatically, gives each vendor a read-only portal link to their own numbers, exports a payout file for your bank (NACHA) or PayPal, and produces a year-end 1099-NEC report.
Pricing
There is a free tool: upload a Square CSV and generate per-vendor statements for the current month, no card required. When you want the month handled for you, paid plans are Starter at $49/mo (up to 60 vendors) and Plus at $89/mo (unlimited vendors), both with a 30-day free trial. Full details are on the pricing page.
Is it right for you?
BoothSettle is a good fit if you already run your register on Square, you have roughly 10 to 150 vendors or booths, and the monthly settlement is eating your time or causing disputes. It is not a new point of sale and it will not take payments for you — if you want consignment logic inside the register, a dedicated POS (approach A) is the better match. If you just want the vendor split, statements and payouts done accurately on top of the Square you already use, that is exactly what this is. Try the free consignment tool on last month's export and see your statements before you pay anything.
FAQ
Does this replace Square?
No. BoothSettle sits on top of Square. You keep selling, taking payments and running your register exactly as you do now. We only read the sales data afterwards to split it by vendor and produce statements and payouts.
Do I need Square Retail Plus?
No. A catalog custom attribute (a Retail Plus feature) is the most robust way to tag a vendor, but it is not required. A reporting category named with the vendor code works on standard Square, and we also read SKU prefixes, item-per-booth names and the checkout note.
Can vendors see their own sales?
Yes. On paid plans each vendor gets a read-only portal link showing their own sales, commission, rent and payout — no login to your Square account, and they only ever see their own numbers.
Is there a free version?
Yes. The free tool lets you upload a Square "Item Detail" CSV export and generate per-vendor statements for the current month, with no credit card. Paid plans add automatic Square sync, emailed PDFs, payout files and the 1099 report.
How are refunds, discounts and tips handled?
Refunds and partial refunds reduce the matching vendor total, line-item discounts are applied before commission, and tips are kept separate from the sale so they never inflate a vendor payout.
Related: track vendor & booth sales in Square · free consignment software · encode a vendor on Square · features · pricing.