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The Google Drive two-way sync keeps your files in Financial Cents and Google Drive in sync automatically. When you add, edit, or delete a file in one system, the change appears in the other.

With this integration, you can:

Access Google Drive files from within Financial Cents
Print or save files from any application (tax software, document tools, etc.) to a Google Drive folder and have them appear in Financial Cents automatically
Preview files in Financial Cents and open them in Google Drive to edit
Auto-create a Google Drive folder when you add a new client in Financial Cents

How to Set Up the Integration

Step 1: Enable Google Drive

Navigate to Settings > Integrations
Find the Google Drive card and click Enable
Click Sign in with Google and select your Google account

Step 2: Grant full permissions

During sign-in, look for the step that says Select what Financial Cents can do. You must check the box to allow Financial Cents to Edit, Create, and Delete files.

⚠️Please note. If you do not check this box, the two-way sync will not work. Only the one-way connection will be active.

Step 3: Choose your root folder

Select the parent folder in Google Drive where your client folders live (for example, "Active Clients"). This tells Financial Cents where to look when matching clients to folders and where to create new folders when you add clients.

Step 4: Match your clients to Google Drive folders

Financial Cents will automatically match clients to folders based on an exact name match. The name in Financial Cents and the folder name in Google Drive must be 100% identical for automatic matching to work.

For clients that do not match automatically, you have 2 options:

Manual match: Click the dropdown next to the client and select the correct Google Drive folder
Create folder: Click the create button to make a new folder in Google Drive with the same name as the client

You can also leave clients unlinked and come back to match them later.

ℹ️Heads up! Each client can only be linked to 1 Google Drive folder, and each folder can only be linked to 1 client. It is a one-to-one mapping.

Step 5: Sync your files

Click Sync All Clients on the bottom right to start the initial sync. This pushes all existing files between Financial Cents and Google Drive so both systems match.

💡Pro Tip! If you only want to sync new files going forward, skip the Sync All Clients button. Just complete the client matching step. From that point on, any new files added to either system will sync automatically, but existing files will stay where they are.

Accessing Files After Setup

Once the integration is active:

Preview a file: Click the file name in Financial Cents to see a preview
Open in Google Drive: Click the Google Drive icon next to a file to open it directly in Google Drive in a new tab
Edit a file: Open the file in Google Drive to make your edits. Changes sync back to Financial Cents automatically. The file must be in a format Google Drive can edit (Google Docs, Sheets, etc.). Files like PDFs require conversion or a Google Drive plugin to edit.

Sync status indicators

Files in Financial Cents show their sync status:

Spinner: The file is currently syncing. Wait for it to finish.
Google Drive icon: The file synced successfully.
Red warning icon: The sync failed. Click the retry button to try again.

Using the Google Drive Desktop App

If you install the Google Drive desktop app on your computer, your Google Drive folders appear as local folders on your desktop.

This means you can print or save files from any application directly to a client's Google Drive folder on your computer. The file syncs from your desktop to Google Drive to Financial Cents automatically.

💡Pro Tip! This is a great way to print tax returns from programs like Drake Tax, UltraTax, Lacerte, and others directly into Financial Cents.

Auto-Create Client Folders

You can turn on automatic folder creation so that when you add a new client in Financial Cents, a matching folder is automatically created in Google Drive under your root folder.

To enable this, check the auto-create option in your Google Drive integration settings.

ℹ️Heads up! This only works in 1 direction. Creating a new folder in Google Drive will not create a new client in Financial Cents.

Managing Clients with Multiple Folder Locations

If your client folders are spread across multiple parent folders in Google Drive (for example, "Active Clients" and "Tax Clients"), you can still link them:

Choose your first root folder and complete the client matching
Navigate back to the integration settings
Choose your second root folder and match the remaining clients

The root folder selection controls where automatic matching looks and where new folders are created. It does not disconnect clients that were already linked from a different folder.

Disconnecting and Reconnecting

Disconnecting the integration stops all syncing, but:

All files remain in both Financial Cents and Google Drive
Nothing is deleted
Financial Cents remembers your client-to-folder links, so if you reconnect later, you do not have to redo the matching

Reconnecting restores the previous links and resumes syncing automatically.