Wave is a Canadian company that provides

financial services Financial services are service (economics), economic services tied to finance provided by financial institutions. Financial services encompass a broad range of tertiary sector of the economy, service sector activities, especially as concerns finan ...

and

software Software consists of computer programs that instruct the Execution (computing), execution of a computer. Software also includes design documents and specifications. The history of software is closely tied to the development of digital comput ...

for small businesses. Wave is headquartered in the

East Bayfront East Bayfront, or the East Bayfront Precinct, is an emerging neighbourhood in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is currently undergoing a transformation from industrial use to mixed-use as part of Waterfront Toronto's plans to create a residential an ...

neighborhood in

Toronto, Canada Toronto ( , locally pronounced or ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, most populous city in Canada. It is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario. With a p ...

. The company's first product was free online

accounting software Accounting software is a computer program that maintains accounting, account books on computers, including recording Financial transaction, transactions and Balance (accounting), account balances. It may depend on virtual thinking. Depending on ...

designed for businesses with 19 employees, followed by

invoicing An invoice, bill, tab, or bill of costs is a commercial document that includes an itemized list of goods or services furnished by a seller to a buyer relating to a sale transaction, that usually specifies the price and terms of sale, quantiti ...

, personal finance and receipt-scanning software (OCR). In 2012, Wave began branching into financial services, initially with Payments by Wave ( credit card processing) and Payroll by Wave, followed in February 2017 by Lending by Wave, which has since been discontinued.

History

CEO Kirk Simpson and CPO James Lochrie launched Wave Accounting Inc. in July 2009, Wave Accounting launched to the public on November 16, 2010. In June 2011, Series A funding led by OMERS Ventures was closed. In September 2011, FedDev Ontario invested one million dollars in funding. In October 2011, a $5-million investment led by U.S. venture capital firm

Charles River Ventures CRV is a venture capital firm focused on early-stage investments in technology. The firm was founded in 1970 to commercialize research that came out of MIT. Its name comes from the Boston area Charles River. History The firm has raised over $4.3 ...

was announced. In May 2012, Wave Accounting closed its series B financing round led by

The Social+Capital Partnership ''The'' is a grammatical article in English, denoting nouns that are already or about to be mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The ...

, with follow-on participation from

and OMERS Ventures. Wave acquired a company called Small Payroll in November 2011, which was later launched as a payroll product called Wave Payroll. In February 2012, Wave officially launched Wave Payroll to the public in Canada, followed by the American release in November of the same year. In August, 2012, the company announced the acquisition of Vuru.co, an online stock-tracking service. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. In December 2012, the company rebranded itself as Wave to emphasize its broadened spectrum of services. On March 14, 2019, the company acquired Every, a Toronto-based fintech company that provides business accounts and debit cards to small businesses. On June 11, 2019, the company announced it was being acquired by tax preparation company,

H&R Block H&R Block, Inc., or H&R Block, is an American tax preparation company operating in Canada, the United States, and Australia. The company was founded in 1955 in Kansas City, Missouri, by brothers Henry W. Bloch and Richard Bloch. As of 2018, H&R ...

, for $537 million. On June 15, 2022, Wave announced that Kirk Simpson would be leaving and being replaced as CEO by Zahir Khoja. In May 2025, US customers of Wave were transitioned to a new Payroll processing system supported by CheckHQ. The new integration improved support for US employers by handling employer tax withholding and payments in all 50 US States. Plagued with technical problems and broken services, Payroll for US customers remained non-functional as of July 2025, as well as new system bugs that did not exist prior to the transition. Lawrence Levinson, VP Customer Experience at Wave, sent an email to customers July 5 acknowledging the problem but offering no specifics on a resolution. As the company provides support only via email, with response times exceeding two weeks, no further information was available on the situation.

Products

The company's initial product, Accounting by Wave, is a

double entry accounting Double-entry bookkeeping, also known as double-entry accounting, is a method of bookkeeping that relies on a two-sided accounting entry to maintain financial information. Every entry to an account requires a corresponding and opposite entry to a ...

tool. Services include direct bank data imports, invoicing and expense tracking, customizable chart of accounts, and journal transactions. Accounting by Wave integrates with expense tracking software Shoeboxed and

e-commerce E-commerce (electronic commerce) refers to commercial activities including the electronic buying or selling products and services which are conducted on online platforms or over the Internet. E-commerce draws on technologies such as mobile co ...

website

Etsy Etsy, Inc. is an American e-commerce company with an emphasis on the selling of handmade or vintage items and craft supplies. These items fall under a wide range of categories, including jewelry, bags, clothing, home decor, religious items, furni ...

. The next product launched was Payroll by Wave, which was launched in 2012 after the acquisition of SmallPayroll.ca. Payroll by Wave is only available in the US and Canada. Invoicing by Wave is an offshoot of the company's earlier accounting tools. Additional products launched on or shortly after the company's rebrand in December 2012 include: * a credit card processing tool, Payments by Wave, built initially on integration with

Stripe Stripe, striped, or stripes may refer to: Decorations *Stripe (pattern), a line or band that differs in colour or tone from an adjacent surface *Racing stripe, a vehicle decoration * Service stripe, a decoration of the U.S. military Entertainment ...

credit card processing. However, Wave does not report merchant fees correctly for countries where Stripe charges a tax such as GST. In these cases, the merchant fees are reported without tax and do not match your Stripe account. * a receipt scanning tool, Receipts by Wave. In 2017, Wave signed an agreement to provide its platform on RBC's online business banking site. The RBC-Wave service will be co-branded.

Taxes supported

The company's software supports tax-exclusive pricing, such as U.S. sales tax, where taxes are added on top of prices quoted. This has two effects: * When scanning receipts users must manually add the tax, and input the amount. * When making an invoice, users must put in a price before tax, and the system will add the tax on top. This makes Wave unable to handle taxes in countries like Australia where prices must be quoted inclusive of all taxes, such as GST. There is no way to set an invoice total and have Wave calculate the tax portion as a percentage.

Pricing and business model

Wave provides its software for free. Revenue from the company comes from the paid financial services the company offers: * Payments by Wave: Card processing which includes debit, credit and prepaid cards as well as ACH (bank payments) in the United States. Fees are a percentage of the transaction. * Payroll by Wave: Monthly subscription fee plus usage fees. Wave previously included advertising on its pages as a source of revenue. Advertising was removed in January 2017. Wave's software is free, as opposed to

freemium Freemium, a portmanteau of the words "free" and "premium", is a pricing strategy by which a basic product or service is provided free of charge, but money (a premium) is charged for additional features, services, or virtual (online) or physical ( ...

, in that the tools can be used without tiers or limits indefinitely. Wave does not currently disclose its revenue or financial statements publicly. However, media reports in 2016 indicated annual revenues of $20 million at that time. In 2017, Wave raised $24m (USD) in funding led by NAB Ventures.

External links

official website

References