Connecting QuickBooks, Google and payroll
/app/integrationsSetting up a connection step by step, what each one does, and which payroll systems genuinely can't be reached.
Fairway can hand information to the other programs your club runs — accounting, Google Workspace, payroll and staff scheduling — so nobody types the same thing twice.
How it actually works
We don't hold an account with QuickBooks or Google on your behalf. Instead, a service called Zapier sits in the middle and does the translating. You'll need a Zapier account — it's free to start — and the connection itself lives there, in your name, not ours.
Setting one up
- 1Open Integrations and find the one you want — say, tee times on your Google Calendar.
- 2In Zapier, make a new zap. For most of these you choose 'Webhooks by Zapier' as the trigger, pick 'Catch Hook', and Zapier gives you a web address.
- 3Copy that address, come back to Fairway, paste it into the connection and press Connect.
- 4Fairway shows you a signing secret once. Copy it — you'll want it if you ever check that a message really came from us.
- 5Finish the zap in Zapier by choosing what should happen: create a calendar event, add a spreadsheet row, whatever you picked.
- 6Do the thing once for real — book a test tee time — and check it arrived.
The ones that work the other way
A few connections have Zapier asking us rather than us telling Zapier — payroll hours, today's jobs, the board deck. Those give you a read-only key instead of asking for an address. Paste the key into the zap where it asks for authorisation, as 'Bearer' followed by the key.
What's available
| Area | What connects |
|---|---|
| Payroll and hours | Google Sheets, BambooHR, Clockify, Toggl Track, Workday |
| Google Workspace | Calendar, Gmail, Sheets, Drive, Docs, Tasks, Chat, Contacts, Slides |
| Staff scheduling | Deputy, 7shifts, When I Work |
| Accounting | QuickBooks Online, Xero |
ADP, Gusto, Paychex, Rippling, Paylocity, Paycor, Justworks, Square Payroll, OnPay, Homebase and Wagepoint don't offer this kind of connection at all — not to us and not to anyone. If you use one of them, pull the payroll file from Reports and import it. We'd rather say so plainly than let you find out on a Friday.
The ones that touch money
Connections marked as writing to your books create real records in QuickBooks, Xero or a payroll system. Send one test through before you leave it running, and keep Zapier's own error emails switched on.
Turning one off
Disconnect it here and it stops immediately — the webhook is removed and any key is revoked in the same second. You should also delete or pause the zap on the Zapier side so it isn't sitting there erroring.
Questions
Do I need to pay for Zapier?
Their free tier covers a small number of connections and a limited volume, which is enough for one or two of these. Heavy use means paying them — that's between you and Zapier, and none of it comes to us.
Something stopped arriving. Where do I look?
The Integrations screen shows the last time each connection sent something and how many attempts failed. If failures are climbing, the address on the Zapier side has usually changed or the zap is switched off.
Is this secure?
Every message we send is signed, so your zap can verify it really came from us. Read keys are read-only and scoped to your course alone — a key can't reach another club's data, and there's no endpoint that would let it.
Can I build something myself instead?
Yes. See API keys, webhooks and calendar feeds — these connections are the same machinery with the wiring already done.
Tell us what's missing and we'll write it. Help that doesn't cover the thing you came for isn't help.