QuickBooks Tips
Shortcuts
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To close all open QuickBooks Windows quickly, click on Window on the menu bar, and then Close All.
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- The History button shows you all the transactions related to the one you are currently viewing.
- For example, view any invoice that you know is paid, then click on the History button.
- Then you’ll see the payment details on your screen instantly.
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T = today’s date
M = First day of the month you are working in
H = Last day of the month you are working in
Y = First day of the year
R = Last day of the year
+ = Move the date forward by one day
– = Move the date backward by one day
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CTRL+A brings up the Chart of Accounts right away
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ALT+F4 closes QuickBooks software
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When working in a register, you can use the = to bring up the calculator when adding or subtracting from an account
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CTRL+T will bring up your Memorized Transaction list immediately
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If you are accustomed to using your mouse to navigate your way through QuickBooks, you may not realize that there are faster ways to get your work done in QuickBooks. Typically your hands are already on the keyboard, so take advantage of the shortcuts built into the application to save you time. Using this technique might also help minimize wear-and-tear on your wrists. In this article we’ll explore a variety of ways that you can quickly carry out tasks in QuickBooks.
Shortcut #1: Edit fields in a flash
Typically you use the Tab key to move between fields, but it might be more efficient to change the setting and use the Enter key instead. To do so, choose Edit, Preferences, and then General. Select Pressing Enter Moves Between Fields, as shown in Figure 1. Keep in mind that if you change this setting, you’ll have to either press Ctrl-Enter to save a record, or navigate to the Save & New button and then press Enter. While setting that option, make sure to also choose Automatically open drop-down lists when typing. This will allow you to type the first couple letters of a list item, and then use the arrow keys and Enter key to choose the desired item.

Figure 1: You can set QuickBooks to use the Enter key to move between fields.
Sometimes you may need to make revisions within a field, such as a description. You can navigate from word to word within a field by using Ctrl-Left Arrow or Ctrl-Right Arrow. You can also press the End key to jump to the end of a field, or the Home key to jump to the beginning.
Most other shortcut keys that you’ll use with fields are contained on the Edit menu, as shown in Figure 2.

Figure 2: The Edit menu contains a veritable treasure trove of keyboard shortcuts.
Shortcut #2: Speed up everyday tasks
Press Ctrl-W to display the Write Checks window, or Ctrl-I to display the Invoice window. Within a transaction window, press Ctrl-N to create a new transaction, or Ctrl-P to print. Ctrl-Q allows you to create a QuickReport on a selected transaction or list item. Ctrl-J will display the Customer Center, although for some reason the Vendor and Employee centers don’t currently warrant their own keyboard shortcuts. As you work in QuickBooks, you may encounter a stack of open transaction, list, and report windows, as shown in Figure 3-simply press Esc repeatedly to clear the decks.

Figure 3: Overrun with QuickBooks windows? Press the Esc key as needed to close extraneous windows.
Shortcut #3: Try these Register tricks
Press Ctrl-R to display the Use Register window, and then press Alt-Down Arrow to display the full list. If you simply press the Down Arrow, then your cursor will jump to the OK button. Within a register, press Ctrl-PgUp to move to the first previous month in the register, or Ctrl-PgDn to move to the next month in the register. Press Ctrl-Oto copy an entire transaction within a register, and then press Ctrl-V to paste a duplicate of the copy. Or, press Ctrl-Eto edit a transaction in the register. Conversely, Ctrl-D allows you to delete transactions.
You can also press Ctrl-G for certain transfer transactions to view the register of the corresponding account. QuickBooks doesn’t maintain a register for income and expense accounts, but you can use this to follow transfers between bank accounts, for instance. Similarly, you can press Ctrl-H on certain transactions to view their transaction history, as shown in Figure 4, or press Ctrl-Y to display a transaction journal. This is a report that shows you the debits and credits that comprise the transaction, as shown in Figure 5.

Figure 4: Press Ctrl-H within a register to view transaction history.

Figure 5: The Transaction Journal displays the debits and credits that make up a transaction.
Shortcut #5: Level your lists
Only two lists have their own shortcuts: Ctrl-A for the Chart of Accounts, and Ctrl-T for the Memorized Transaction List. You can use Ctrl-PgUp and Ctrl-PgDn to navigate to the top or bottom of a list. Press Ctrl-E to edit a record within a list, or Ctrl-P to print the entire list. As with transactions, Ctrl-D will delete a list item-you’ll receive the warning shown in Figure 6 if you attempt to delete an account that has a balance, though.

Figure 6: Accounts with open balances cannot be deleted.
Shortcut #5: Make a date
Incremental dates (and check or invoice numbers, too) can be moved up or down by pressing the + and – keys. Even better, laptop users can press the = key, instead of Shift-Equal to access the + sign. Navigate forward and backward in time by keeping these three words in mind: week, month, and year. Press W to move back one week, or K to move forward one week. Do the same with M or H and Y or R to move forward or back one month or year at a time. Within a date field, press Alt-Down Arrow to display the calendar without having to click with your mouse. Other date tricks you may find helpful are pressing [ or ] (the square bracket keys) to move to the same date in the previous or next week, or ; and ‘ (the semicolon and apostrophe keys) to move to the same date in the previous or next month. If all of these date tricks are making your head spin, just press T in a date field to return to today’s date.
Shortcut #6: Customize your start-up
Usually QuickBooks automatically opens the last company that you accessed, but it won’t do so if you hold down the Ctrl key while you open QuickBooks. Also, if you share a computer with a coworker that frequently leaves many windows open, hold down the Alt key while you open QuickBooks to start with a clean desktop. You can also press the F2 key to display a dizzying array of data about your QuickBooks company, as shown in Figure 7.

Figure 7: Press F2 to display a wide array of technical details regarding your QuickBooks company.
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Data entry and modifications in QuickBooks can be tedious. Beginning with QuickBooks 2010 Pro Edition and above, that job got a lot easier. The Add/Edit Multiple List Entries tool does just what its name implies: It lets you add entries to your lists of customers, vendors, services, inventory parts, and non-inventory parts. It also makes changing one or several of them quick and easy.
Using this feature, you can:
- See customized views of your list data
- Enter missing information
- Create new entries from duplicates of existing ones
- Do a mass change of a whole column
- Copy and paste records from Excel
There are myriad applications for this tool. You could use it, for example, when you’re changing Preferred Vendors for a group of items and you don’t want to have to edit each individual item record. Or, when the area code for select customers or vendors has changed. You could use it if you’re adding an inventory item that’s just slightly different from another, or when your accountant tells you to change the name of an account.
Building the perfect view
To get started, click Lists | Add/Edit Multiple List Entries. In the screen that opens, click the arrow next to the Listbox and select the type of data you want to see, like Customers. Then select the group that you want displayed by dropping the View list down. Click the Customize Columns button. This window opens:

Figure 1: Make sure your columns are correct and in the right order. The list on the left represents all possible column labels. To make the list on the right reflect what you want to see in your table, highlight the correct item and use the Add or Remove buttons and the Move Up or Move Down buttons. When you’re satisfied, click OK. The table will change to display those columns in that order.
TIP: You may have a lot of empty space between columns. To close those gaps, put your cursor on the faint vertical line that separates two column names. A cross-like symbol will appear. Drag it left or right until the columns are positioned well.
Let’s say that a customer commissions a new job. Since so much information will remain the same as in previous jobs, you can duplicate her record. Highlight the last entry in her list of jobs and right-click. Select Duplicate Row. The new entry will contain her default information, except the name will change to DUP [NAME OF PREVIOUS JOB]. Change that phrase to the name of the new job and click Save Changes if you’re done.

Figure 2: It’s easy to duplicate an entry’s information. Mass changes
You may occasionally want to make the same change to a subset of records. Say a city’s zip code changed and you want to find the customers affected. You’d open the Customers list, click on the View arrow and select CustomFilter. Then:
- In the Search list, choose from All, Active, etc.
- In the For box, enter the common attribute, like the zip code.
- Click on the arrow next to the in box, and tell QuickBooks where you want to search (address fields, all common fields, etc.).
Figure 3: You can search for a group of entries that share a common characteristic. - Click Go. QuickBooks will display a list of all of the matching entries.
- Make your change to the entry at the top of the list, then right-click on it. You’ll see this menu:
Figure 4: The Copy Down command changes all entries in a column to match the top one. When you select Copy Down, all of the entries duplicate the first one in the list.
Some housekeeping
Anything you change in these views, as long as you click Save Changes, will be reflected throughout QuickBooks, wherever that record appears. If you’ve made an error, like using a dollar sign, you’ll get a message telling you to fix it.
You can use Add/Edit Multiple List Entries in other ways. For example, it’s a good way to see how thorough your recordkeeping is. Take a look at your lists occasionally to spot missing data. Or say you were at a trade show and signed up new customers, but you didn’t have QuickBooks on your laptop so you entered them in Excel. Once you’ve made sure that your column names and order in Excel match those displayed in Add/Edit Multiple List Entries, you can just copy and paste the new customers in.
This feature is easy to use, but be cautious. We can help with complex modifications. Add/Edit Multiple List Entries is one of the ten best features QuickBooks has incorporated in recent years. It’s an easy way to get a birds’ eye view of your lists, and a great time-saver.
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Payday. You look forward to it when you’re young and working at your first part-time job.
But as a grown-up who needs to start processing payroll for your employees, you probably anticipate it in a different way, perhaps even with a sense of dread. QuickBooks handles the real grunt work once you’ve done the initial setup, but those early hours you spend preparing to print your first paycheck can be challenging.
Fortunately, QuickBooks’ payroll setup tool can guide you through the process. Once you’ve signed up for payroll, open the Employees menu and select Payroll Setup.
Figure 1: The QuickBooks Payroll Setup tool tells you’ll what information you need to supply in order to start paying employees.
Easy Operations
The first screen you’ll see in this step-by-step, wizard-like setup guide contains a link to QuickBooks’ payroll setup checklist. You don’t have to assemble all of the information you’ll need about your company, your employees, and your payroll taxes, but we recommend that you gather as much as you can before you start.
You’ll advance through setup by completing the information requested and then clicking the Continue button in the lower right (or, sometimes, Next; there’s also a Previous button available often). If you don’t have a particular detail immediately at hand, you can continue on and come back later. You’ll be able to edit your work then.
To back out of the whole process and return at another time, click the Finish Later button in the lower left.
Building a Framework
QuickBooks first wants to know about the various types of compensation and employee benefits your company offers. To start adding your Compensation options, click Add New. Click in the box in front of any pay types you support (Salary, Hourly wage and overtime, Commission, etc.) to create a check mark. When you click Next, this window opens:
Figure 2: It’s easy to indicate the types of compensation your company offers.
Keep clicking Next after you’ve completed each screen until you come to a page that lists all of the compensation types you’ve defined. To make any changes, first, highlight the type and click Edit to modify or Delete to remove, and then click Continue when you’re finished.
The next section is probably the most difficult: Employee Benefits. Here, using similar interface conventions to enter information and navigate, you’ll provide information about your company’s:
- Insurance benefits
- Retirement benefits
- Paid time off, and
- Miscellaneous items (cash advance, wage garnishment, mileage reimbursement, etc.).
It’s absolutely critical that you set these up accurately, or you’ll have unhappy benefits providers–and employees. If you’re not absolutely confident of an answer, it’s better to leave an item unfinished and come back later. You may want to ask us to work with you as you complete this section.
People and Taxes
QuickBooks will then ask you about your employees. Have your W-4 forms handy for this section, as you’ll need to know Social Security numbers, birth dates, etc.
Figure 3: On this screen, you’ll tell QuickBooks what type(s) of compensation and their dollar amounts apply to the employee.
All of those details you entered earlier about company benefits comes into play here. Once you’ve defined an employee’s compensation types and amounts, the next screen will display the additions and deductions that your company supports. You will have set up defaults for some of these, but you can modify them for individual employees.
There are numerous other details that you’ll have to supply for your staff, like how vacation and sick hours accrue, what state will want to collect taxes from them, and what their filing status is.
Unless you’ve worked with payroll before, you’re going to want our help in completing the payroll tax section. Once it’s done correctly, QuickBooks will calculate taxes due and help you pay them.
Finally, QuickBooks helps you determine whether you’ll need to enter any previous payroll data from the current year before you start to process your payroll in the software.
Whether you’re switching from manual payroll or a payroll service, or simply getting ready to pay your first employee, QuickBooks payroll-processing tools can help you save time and foster accuracy–as long as you get the details from the start.
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QuickBooks was designed to serve the needs of millions of small businesses. To do that, it had to include the tools and processes suitable for a wide variety of companies. But Intuit recognized that every organization is unique, so your copy of QuickBooks can be customized in ways that make it work best for you.
You could just dive in and start adding records and transactions but doing some setup first is highly recommended. If you don’t, you may run into some issues later, such as finding that some features you need haven’t been turned on, for example, or that QuickBooks is simply not doing some things the way you do. The good news is that you can change many of these.
Getting There
QuickBooks refers to these options as Preferences. You will find them by opening the Edit menu and selecting Preferences.
Figure 1: To start customizing QuickBooks so it works best for you, open the Edit menu and choose Preferences.
As you can see, the left vertical pane contains a list of Preference types. Click on any of these to change the option screens to the right. Always click the tabs labeled My Preferences and Company Preferences to make sure you see everything that is displayed for each type (sometimes one will have no choices).
Setting up Reminders
Let’s look more closely at one set of Preferences: Reminders. It’s very important that you visit these screens when you begin using QuickBooks. Depending on how big your company is and how complex your accounting processes are, there may be things you need to do every day, like pay bills and follow up on overdue invoices. It would be nearly impossible for you to do everything on time if you did not ask QuickBooks to keep track of critical dates and remind you of them.
Click Reminders in the left vertical tab. You will see one option under My Preferences. Do you want QuickBooks to show Reminders List when opening a Company file? If so–and this is a good idea–click the box in front of that line if there is not a check mark there already, and then click Company Preferences.
Here is where you will tell QuickBooks whether you want to see summaries or lists for each reminder, or neither. You can also specify how much advance notice you want for specific tasks by entering a number of days. QuickBooks comes with default settings, but you can easily change these.
Figure 2: QuickBooks comes with default settings for Reminders, but you can enter your own Preferences here.
As you can see, it is easy to specify your Company Preferences. Click the appropriate button under Show Summary, Show List, or Don’t Remind Me. If you’ve requested a reminder, delete any number that appears in the box in front of days before or days after and then enter your own.
Critical Areas
Make sure that you look through all of QuickBooks’ Preferences and change any that don’t fit your company. Some simply have to do with the way QuickBooks displays information and how it functions, but others have direct impact on your accounting work. As always, call the office if you have any questions.
You will probably want to visit many of the options under Preferences because each may have numerous options. Here are several examples of what you might want to consider:
- Accounting. Do you want to use account numbers and classes?
- Checking. Which accounts should QuickBooks automatically use for tasks like Open the Pay Bills, Open the Make Deposits, and Open the Create Paychecks?
- Finance Charge. Will you be assessing finance charges on late payments from customers? What is the interest rate, minimum finance charge, and grace period?
- Items & Inventory. Do you want inventory and purchase orders to be active?
- Multiple Currencies. Does your company do business using other currencies?
- Payments. Can customers pay you online? What methods can they use?
- Payroll & Employees. Will you be processing payroll using QuickBooks?
- Sales & Customers. Do you want to use sales orders? How should QuickBooks handle invoices when there are time and costs that need to be added?
You can see why it is important to study QuickBooks’ Preferences early on. It will help you avoid unnecessary roadblocks and ensure that your company’s needs are reflected well in the software.
Accuracy Tips
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Do not pay your payroll liabilities from the “Write Checks” window. If you use this window, QuickBooks will warn you to use the “Pay Liabilities” window, but will let you write the check. However when you print the 941, it will not reflect any payments that you made using the “Write Checks” window.
Use the “Pay Liabilities” window to create checks for all tax liabilities. Using this window will ensure that the payments are reflected accurately on the 941 report and that your liability accounts are properly reduced.
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If you have customers who are also vendors you may decide to trade some or all of your services / products in exchange for payment.
To record such a barter transaction, invoice the customer for the goods provided or services performed as you normally would. To record the “payment” use the “Receive Payment” function to apply the barter amount against the invoice the same as you would when receiving cash or a check as follows:
Go to Customers: Receive Payment. Payment Amount will be the barter amount (the amount of the invoice you received from your vendor). Pmt. Method will be Barter. Check the radio button for “Group with other undeposited funds”. Save this transaction.
Go to Banking: Make Deposits. The payment you just received will come up in the Payments to Deposit screen. If there are also other payments to deposit, make sure you select only the payment(s) being recorded for the barter exchange. When you hit OK the Make Deposits screen will come up with the barter deposit(s) showing. Before recording the deposit make a negative deposit entry on the next blank line below the barter deposit for the amount of the barter as follows:
Deposit To is your normal operating checking account. Date is the date you would have normally paid your vendors invoice. Memo should be changed from Deposit to Barter.
If you have entered the vendors invoice as a bill for payment, Received From is the vendor name and From Account is Accounts Payable.
If you have not entered the vendors invoice as a bill for payment, leave Received From blank. In the From Account column select the expense account you would charge the vendors invoice to, the same as if you were entering it for payment. In the Memo column note the vendors invoice number.
In the Amount column enter the vendors invoice amount with a negative sign first. This negative amount should exactly offset the deposit amount above, resulting in a “Zero” deposit transaction. Save the “deposit” and the transaction is complete.
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Day-to-day transactions like receiving payments from customers or paying vendors occur so frequently that most QuickBooks users do them automatically. However, from time to time you may encounter an infrequent transaction that will stop you in your tracks. In this article we’ll discuss several common tricky transactions and offer advice on how to handle them.
Security Deposits
Security deposits, such as for a rental space or to a utility company, require special tracking so that you can be sure to get the money back later. It’s best to maintain a separate account for each security deposit so that you can track each individually. If you have numerous security deposits, consider creating individual subaccounts for each deposit:
Choose Lists, and then Chart of Accounts (or press Ctrl-A).
Click the Account button, and then choose New (or press Ctrl-N).
As shown in Figure 1, choose Other Account Type, Other Current Asset, and then click Continue.
Assign an Account Name such as Contributions from Owner, (and account number if applicable). If necessary, click Subaccount Of, and specify the Deposits account. Click Save and Close to save the new account.
Figure 1: An easy way to manage security deposits is to post them to a new Other Current Asset account.
Refunds from utility companies, insurance companies, or other sources
Choose Banking, and then Make Deposits. Specify the vendor, and then choose the account. In the case of deposit refunds, you should have an asset account that you’ll apply the money against, as shown in Figure 2. For other types of refunds, use the expense account from which you originally paid the money.
Figure 2: Apply utility deposit refunds back to the deposit account on your balance sheet.
Owner Contributions
This is a situation where an owner of the company invests money into the firm. The owner does so in hopes of making a return on their investment, but does not have a specific timetable in mind for repayment of the loan. If you don’t already have a Contributions from Owner account, follow these steps described previously for creating a new account, but choose Equity and name the account Contributions from Owner.
Distributions to Owner
Distributions allow an owner to take profits out of the company on a non-salary basis. Distributions can be paid through payroll or on a separate check. Your chart of accounts should already include a Distributions to Owneraccount, but if it doesn’t, you can establish this new Equity account, which you can then use in either of these types of transactions.
Payroll: Distributions require special treatment in payroll because they’re not subject to income or payroll taxes in QuickBooks. The owner settles the income tax due when filing their annual return. Before you can pay distributions through payroll you must establish a payroll item. To do so, follow these steps:
Choose Employees, Manage Payroll Items, and then New Payroll Item.
Choose Custom Setup, and then click Next.
Choose Addition, and then click Next.
Enter the word Distribution and then click Next.
Choose the Distributions to Owner account from your chart of accounts, and then click Next.
Choose None for the Tax Tracking type, and then click Next.
Leave all of the taxes unselected, and then click Next.
Choose Calculate This Item Based on Quantity and then click Next when the Calculate Based on Quantity screen appears.
Accept the default choice of Gross Pay and then click Next.
Leave the Default Rate and Limit fields at zero and then click Finish.
Next, select the employee in the Employee Center, and then choose Edit Employee. Choose Payroll and Compensation Info from the Change Tabs list, and then add Distributions to the Additions, Deductions, and Company Contributions list, as shown in Figure 3. You can fill in the distribution amount now if you know the ongoing amount, or you can fill it in on the fly during the payroll process. Simply display the Paycheck Detail during the payroll process to access this field and enter the distribution amount.
Figure 3: Add Distributions to the Additions, Deductions, and Company Contributions section.
Separate check: A much simpler approach is to write a separate check to the owner. To do so, choose Banking, and then Write Checks. Choose the Distributions to Owner account and fill in the amount.
Loans to the Company
From time to time the owner may need to make a loan to the company. If the owner expects this money to be repaid, establish a Loan account on the chart of accounts and record the deposit of the loan to this new account.
Company Loans Money to Others
Sometimes your company may make a salary advance to an employee, or the firm may loan money to an affiliate. In such cases it’s important to always establish a separate Current Asset account for such transactions so that you can easily track the outstanding balance. Such accounts can be a subaccount of a general Loans Receivable account, as shown in Figure 4. As shown in Figure 5, you’ll code the check to that subaccount.
Figure 4: Make sure to create individual subaccounts for loans to employees or other parties.
Figure 5: Be sure to use the proper subaccount when issuing an employee loan.
Loan Payments
Many users struggle with loan payments because there are usually three different scenarios:
Interest only payment: In this case there’s only one account to charge, which will be Interest Expense, as shown in Figure 6.
Interest and principal payment: If you’re amortizing the loan over time – your payments include principal and interest – then you’ll have to charge two accounts on the transaction, both the Interest Expense and the Loan account itself, as shown in Figure 7. These amounts will be different each month. Your lender can provide an amortization table, or you can search for one for free on the Internet. Simply use the search term “amortization table” to uncover a variety of free resources, or use this search term to locate an Excel-based solution: “amortization table site:microsoft.com”
Extra principal payment: Extra principal payments being submitted on a separate check should be applied directly to the Loan account.
Figure 6: Interest-only loan payments post directly to the Interest Expense account.
Figure 7: Make sure to break out principal and interest when a loan payment reduces the outstanding balance.
Expert tip: You can use the QuickBooks Account Reconciliation feature to reconcile your loan balance with the periodic statement that you receive from your lender. This ensures that your financial statements are correct, and helps you confirm that the lender is applying your principal payments correctly.
Petty Cash
Many offices keep a small amount of cash on hand to simply accounting for activities like running to the post office to buy stamps or make small purchases for the office. To establish a petty cash fund, you first write a check to Cash, which you then exchange for money at your bank. Let’s say that you establish a $100 petty cash account, and need to replenish it to cover three purchases:
Lunch for the office: $24.72
Postage stamps: $44.00
Office supplies: $23.18
In QuickBooks, you would choose Banking, Write Checks, and then write another check to Cash, and code it to the corresponding expense accounts for the three purchases.
Expert tip: Petty cash is easily subjected to abuse, so be sure to require receipts for all petty cash transactions.
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In the past QuickBooks had an optional Audit Trail feature that you could choose whether or not to enable. However, recent versions of the program automatically enable Audit Trail, so every change made to a transaction in QuickBooks is logged automatically.
Although this may seem Orwellian, you may find that you sometimes need to carry out forensic research on a particular QuickBooks transaction. In layman’s terms, this means looking into who changed or deleted a transaction, determining what date the transaction changed, and how the transaction looked before it changed.
In this article we’ll discuss five different audit reports that QuickBooks provides, as well as show you some easier ways to mine the data within these reports.
Expert tip: It’s best to assign a separate user ID to each QuickBooks user. To do so, choose Company, Set up Users and Passwords, and then follow the onscreen prompts. Once you set it up, you’ll be able to have accountability for every transaction entered or modified in QuickBooks.
Audit Trail Report
As previously discussed, the Audit Trail is automatically enabled in QuickBooks, and it cannot be disabled. To view the audit trail, choose Reports, Accountant & Taxes, and then Audit Trail. As shown in Figure 1, the audit trail report will appear onscreen.
Figure 1: By default, the Audit Trail shows all activity for today.
Although the Audit Trail report defaults to today’s date, you can easily change the date range at the top of the screen. As you might expect, this report may contain a lot of data, so you may need to trim down the data shown:
- Click the Modify Report button.
- Click on the Filters tab.
- Choose Transaction Type from the Filter List, and then choose Multiple Transaction Types from the Transaction Type list. As shown in Figure 2, you can then select one or more transaction types to display.
- Click OK twice to display the report.
Figure 2: You can limit the Audit Report to certain transaction types.
Even with changing the filters and date range, you may still have a tough time navigating the report. Unfortunately QuickBooks does not allow you to search the report onscreen, however, you can easily export the report to Excel or another program so that you can carry out your research:
- To export to Excel: Click the Export button at the top of the Audit Trail report screen, choose A New Excel Workbook, and then click Export.
- To export to another program: The Export button also allows you to export the report to a CSV file, which means a comma-separated value format. This type of report is best viewed in a spreadsheet such as Excel.
- If you don’t have Excel available, choose File, Save As PDF, and then save the report to a PDF file. You should then be able to copy and paste the resulting report into the program of your choice or use the search feature within your PDF viewer – the free Adobe Acrobat Reader is a common choice.
If you choose to export the report to Excel, you’ll have some advanced filtering capabilities at your disposal:
- Excel 2007: Click on cell A1, and then press Shift-End-Home. This will select the entire workbook. You can then choose Sort & Filter from the Filtering section of the Home ribbon, and then choose Filter. As shown in Figure 3, you can then click the arrow in cell J1 and choose to which transactions to display:
- Latest means the most recent version of the transaction.
- Prior means the transaction has been edited. The Audit Trail shows both the latest and previous versions of the transaction.
- Deleted means that the transaction has been deleted and must be manually reentered in QuickBooks if necessary.
- Earlier versions of Excel: Click on cell A1, press Shift-End-Home, and then choose Data, Filter, and then AutoFilter. You can then click any of the arrows in row 1 to filter the list to meet specific criteria.
Figure 3: Sending the report to Excel enables you to filter for deleted or modified transactions.
Alternatively you can press Ctrl-F and search for the words Prior or Deleted. Click the Find Next button to move to the next transaction as you carry out your review, as shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4: Excel’s Find feature is another way to sift through a lengthy Audit Trail report.
Fraud alert: Perpetrators often generate checks or invoices under one vendor or customer ID, and then modify the accounting records to obfuscate their deed. Always review transactions with a Prior label carefully.
Voided/Deleted Transactions Summary and Detail Reports
Deleted transactions often appear as a discrepancy when you attempt to reconcile a bank or credit card account. Typically the starting balance that QuickBooks displays will differ from the ending balance on your bank statement. In such instances, it’s a good practice to first check the Voided/Deleted Transaction Reports:
- Choose Reports, and then Accountant & Taxes.
- Select either the Voided/Deleted Transactions Summary or Detail reports. Both provide basically the same information, but the Detail report includes the entire transaction, rather than just the top level information shown in Figure 5.
Figure 5: Double-click a transaction on the summary report to view its details.
Closing Date Exception Report
You can use this report to determine if anyone has made changes to transactions subsequent to you specifying a closing date in the QuickBooks preferences. To do so, choose Edit, and then Preferences. Next, choose Accounting, and then Company Preferences.
Finally, click the Set Date/Password button, and then follow the onscreen prompts. Going forward you can choose Reports, Accountant & Taxes, and then Closing Date Exception Report to monitor any chances to closed periods in QuickBooks.
Customer Credit Card Audit Log
QuickBooks offers additional protection if you store customer credit card data in QuickBooks. The Customer Credit Card Audit Log report, shown in Figure 6, records all activity related to customer credit cards:
- When credit card numbers are entered
- Whenever credit card numbers are displayed onscreen
- When credit card numbers are edited or deleted
Figure 6: The Customer Credit Card Audit Log tracks all activity related to customer credit cards.
To enable logging of customer credit card activity in QuickBooks, choose Company and then Customer Credit Card Protection. Follow the onscreen prompts once you click the Enable button.
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Do you know how to detect and protect yourself from fraud? Most of us want to naively believe it will never happen to us. In reality, fraud impacts small and mid-size businesses far more often than large corporations. Why? Smaller businesses tend to take fewer precautionary measures to prevent fraudulent behavior.
Also, fraud is often perpetrated by a family member, long time employee, or friend that’s been given too much freedom with too few controls. However, you must not be naïve when it comes to your business. Fraud is very much a reality that can happen in your business.
In this article we’ll discuss how fraud happens, how to identify if fraud is happening, and what to do if you discover fraud has happened. We’ll also discuss some measures that you can take within QuickBooks to limit your exposure.
Why does fraud happen?
A combination of three aspects usually set the stage for fraud:
Opportunity: Companies often unknowingly present opportunities for fraud. In particular, small businesses are more prone to these because it’s harder to separate duties when you have a small staff.
Pressure: Personal pressures can put people over the edge and cause irrational thinking. Someone you know may be under duress due to medical and/or financial issues, or any of a number of other personal situations that influence their judgment.
Rationalization: The perpetrator believes they can rationalize their behavior, i.e. they need the money more then the company, the company won’t ever notice, or other insidious thoughts. Indeed, fraud often starts as a “loan”, with the perpetrator fully intending to “pay it back”.
Fraudsters will go to extreme measures to cover their tracks. Many small business owners believe it could never happen to them, as their employees are like family.
However, it is critical that you separate your thoughts with regard to what happens at work versus what happens outside the four walls of your business. No business is 100% safe.
What are five popular types of fraud?
- Claiming additional payroll hours or falsifying an employee.
- Stealing merchandise or cash.
- Giving unauthorized discounts to friends and family.
- Selling private business information to outsiders.
- Exaggerating on expense reports.
Although it’s often enticing to delegate tasks to subordinates, you should keep a hand in as many of your business practices as you can, even if it’s on a random basis. Fortunately there are some simple ways you can do so:
Payroll: Hand-deliver the paychecks, and use this as an opportunity to thank your employees for their work. This will help identify any “false” employees, as well as foster good will among your team.
Further, a process for tracking hours will help to minimize extra hours appearing on anyone’s time card. You might have a manager sign off on subordinate’s time sheets, or install a modern time clock that uses swipe cards or biometric identification.
Theft of cash or merchandise: Separate duties to the extent possible. Ideally those who receive money should be different than those who that generate invoices.
You should also try to separate inventory duties, and implement checks and balances for purchase orders, receiving and invoicing. Don’t rule out video surveillance of warehouse areas, even if it feels like “Big Brother.”
Unauthorized discounts: Track discounts given to customers. In QuickBooks:
- Choose Reports, Sales, and then Sales By Item Detail.
- Click the Modify Report button, and then click the Filters tab.
- As shown in Figure 1, choose Items from the Choose Filter List.
- Select Multiple Items from the Item list, and then choose all discount and bad debt items.
- Click OK twice to view your report. If you find this report helpful, click the Memorize button and assign a benign name, such as Accounting Review.
Figure 2 demonstrates another filtering technique for the Sales by Item report. Clear the Item filter, and specify Amount, and then >=0. This will display any negative or zero amounts listed on a customer invoice, as well as credit memo items.
It may seem counterintuitive to look for amounts that are greater than or equal to zero, but in accounting jargon, invoice amounts should always be credits to an account, which means they’ll be less than zero.
Negative items or discounts on an invoice post to your books post as debits, or positive amounts, which will be greater than zero.
Figure 1: You can filter the Sales by Item report to track discounts and other write-offs.
Figure 2: It’s also helpful to search for amounts that are equal to or greater than zero.
Selling private information: This is particularly difficult to guard against. One level of defense to require employees to sign confidentiality agreements at the time of hire that discuss what the company considers confidential and the consequences of violating said agreement.
Computer systems and paper work should also be protected with passwords, lock and key and whatever other measures may be warranted to minimize unnecessary access.
In QuickBooks, choose Company, Users, and then Set Up Users and Roles to assign unique log in names and passwords. As shown in Figure 3, QuickBooks offers predefined roles that automatically limit access to specified areas, but you can easily tweak a user’s role to meet their exact needs.
You should also require users to change their passwords periodically, and whenever possible, have your IT specialist restrict access to the folder where your QuickBooks data resides. However, do be aware that anyone can purchase a password recovery tool for $45 from www.lostpassword.com.
Figure 3: Use passwords in QuickBooks to limit employee access on a need-to-know basis.
Expense Reports: Always require receipts on all reports for reimbursement with no exceptions. You should also establish guidelines so that employees know when to seek approval so that they avoid the risk of unreimbursed expenses.
Unfortunately there’s no magic cloak that you can place over your business to protect it from fraud. Your best defense is to limit opportunities and remain vigilant. Fraud perpetrators have seemingly limitless imagination, so be sure that you’re always keeping a hand on the tiller of your business.
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Although it may seem like drudgery, reconciling your bank account is a critical accounting task that you should carry out each month. Doing so helps ensure the integrity of your financial reports, since most of your accounting transactions ultimately affect cash in some fashion.
Further, QuickBooks is a much more powerful tool for your business if you use it to its fullest extent. Most likely you’ve been reconciling your bank account all along, so in this article we’ll discuss the tricks and techniques you need to know to streamline the process.
If you’re new to QuickBooks, you start the bank reconciliation process by having your bank statement in hand, and then choose Banking, and then Reconcile. The Reconciliation screen shown in Figure 1 appears. In most cases, you enter the ending balance from your bank statement, add any interest or fees, and then click Continue.
You mark transactions as cleared, as shown in Figure 2, and then click Reconcile Now. However, it’s not always that simple, so read on to learn how to sail over any hurdles that may appear.
Figure 1: The QuickBooks Begin Reconciliation window.
Figure 2: The QuickBooks Reconcile window.
1. Locate discrepancies
As shown in Figure 1, click the Locate Discrepancies button to display the Locate Discrepancies window shown in Figure 3.From there, click the Discrepancy Report button to display the report, as shown in Figure 4. This identifies any edited or deleted transactions that may affect your reconciliation.
Figure 3: QuickBooks can help you identify edited transactions that may disrupt your reconciliation.
Figure 4: Ideally your discrepancy report should never have any transactions listed.
2. Confirm your beginning balance
Your beginning balance should always tie to your bank statement, but if it doesn’t, click the Undo Last Reconciliation button until you reach a point where the beginning balance matches your bank statement. You must then redo the reconciliations to bring your books current and resolve the discrepancy.3. Don’t forget interest and fees
Be sure to record any interest and fees in the window shown in Figure 1. Alternatively you can record deposit and check transactions to record interest and fees, or the very savvy can use journal entries.If you go this route, be sure to debit cash and credit interest income for interest earnings or credit cash and debit bank charges for any fees incurred.
4. Double-check your ending balance
Always double-check your ending balance input when you start the reconciliation. A simple transposition or other error here can make it appear that you’ve missed a transaction.5. Look for transpositions
Sometimes you’ll mark all transactions as cleared, but still have a difference. In such cases, divide the difference by 9. If it divides out evenly, then there’s a good chance that you transposed a number on a transaction.For instance, a $63 dollar difference divided by 9 returns 7 could mean that a transaction was entered incorrectly. As shown in Figure 5, you can right-click on an amount, and then choose Edit Transaction to fix the error.
Figure 5:Right-click on an amount and choose Edit Transaction to correct a mistake.
6. Pick a side, any side
Don’t mix and match deposits and withdrawals. Reconcile your Deposits and Other Credits first, and then confirm that the total items you marked cleared ties to the amount shown on the Reconcile window.Then reconcile Checks and Payments – doing one side a time limits your search area for missing or misposted transactions.
7. Clear the decks
If you get tangled up in a reconciliation, click the Unmark All button shown in Figure 2 to start over.
8. Enter missing transactions
You can add missing transactions without closing the reconciliation window. Simply choose a command from the menu across the top or from the Home screen. Saved transactions will instantly appear in the reconciliation window.9. Check undeposited funds
Choose Banking, and then Make Deposits. If the window shown in Figure 6 appears, you must complete the deposit process for these transactions.Figure 6: Undeposited funds can pose problems with your reconciliation.
10. Hide unnecessary transactions
Click the Hide Transactions after the Statement’s End Date check box shown in Figure 2 to have fewer transactions to sift through.11. Void old transactions
Old, uncleared transactions can linger on forever – locate such transactions within your register, choose Edit, and then Void. The banking system generally considers checks to be stale after six months.Such lingering transactions are often duplicates of a transaction that cleared.
12. Clear voided transactions
Always clear transactions with a zero balance as these won’t affect your reconciliation, but do clutter up the Reconcile window.13. Bank online
Some institutions allow you to synchronize your records with your online statement. This involves a matching process that automatically clears transactions that match, and makes it easy to quickly post new transactions.14. Use your keyboard
Rather than using your mouse to click on each transaction that you wish to clear, use the arrow keys on your keyboard to move up and down. Press the spacebar to toggle a transaction as cleared or uncleared.15. Walk away and come back later
If you just can’t seem to get the unreconciled difference down to zero, the best thing to do is click the Leave button shown in Figure 2, and then resume the reconciliation tomorrow. A fresh eye can do wonders.16. Reconcile More Frequently
If you can access your bank account online, you can reconcile your bank statement as often as you wish. Consider reconciling accounts with heavy volume weekly or twice a month. -
Just about every QuickBooks user relies on the Report Center and Reports menu, but if you’re like most, you have a small handful of reports that you tend to rely on. In this article we’ll go off the beaten path and explore ten reports that many users overlook. Even if you are using some of these reports, we’re sure you’ll find a few more to add to your repertoire.
1. Profit & Loss Summary Prev Year Comparison: To access this report, choose Reports, Company and Financial, and then Profit & Loss Summary Prev Year Comparison. Most business owners rely on the Profit & Loss Summary report, but comparing your results to last year can provide quick insight into whether your revenue is growing or contracting-as well as how fast expenses are rising.
2. Balance Sheet Prev Year Comparison: You’ll find this report also within the Company and Financial section of the Reports menu. As with your income statement, it’s important to compare where certain balances stand now versus last year:
- Cash
- Accounts Receivable
- Inventory
- Accounts Payable
- Other Liabilities, such as lines of credit or short term loans
3. Statement of Cash Flows: As with the two preceding reports, you’ll find the Statement of Cash Flows in the Company & Financial section of the Reports menu. Profit & Loss reports enable you to see what you earned, while Balance Sheet reports help you determine what you have-as well as what you owe. However, neither report necessarily provides a clear picture of where cash is coming from, or going to. As shown in Figure 1, you’ll be able to see:
- How much cash you’ve taken in from sales and spent on expenses
- Cash inflows or outflows from borrowing, repayment, or investing activities
In short, this report shows you exactly what caused your bank balance to increase or decrease during a given report period.
Figure 1: The Statement of Cash Flows report explains changes in your bank account balance.
4. Collections Report: Tricky economic times mean it is more important than ever to keep track of your collections. Fortunately QuickBooks makes it easy to contact customers with overdue invoices: choose Reports, Customers & Receivables, and then Collections Report. As shown in Figure 2, the report provides a phone list and shows all overdue invoices. However, you can also use this report to quickly e-mail copies of overdue invoices to your customers. To do so, double-click on a transaction within the Collections report to view the invoice, and then click the Send button at the top of the invoice form to display the Send Invoice form shown in Figure 3. You can modify the wording shown to be more direct, such as a subject line of “Overdue Invoice” or perhaps e-mail text along the lines of “I’ve attached a copy of your overdue invoice. If there’s a problem with our products or services, please let me know immediately, otherwise I trust that you’ll remit payment promptly.” To change the default e-mail text, choose Edit, Preferences, and then choose Send Forms. Select Invoice from the Change Default For list, make your changes, and then click OK.
Figure 2: The Collections Report gives you a jump start on dunning overdue customers.
Figure 3: You can adjust the wording of an overdue invoice e-mail for one customer at a time or change the default text.
5. A/P Aging Summary: Although it’s key to make sure that your customers are paying in a timely fashion, it’s just as important to pay your vendors, too. Unpaid bills can result in phone calls, e-mails, and other unnecessary interruptions. Choose Reports, Vendors & Payables, and then A/P Aging Summary to display the report shown in Figure 4. As with most reports in QuickBooks, you double-click on amounts to ultimately drill down to the original transaction.
Figure 4: The A/P Aging Summary helps you determine when bills are slipping into overdue status.
6. Trial Balance: Many business owners overlook the Trial Balance report, since it’s one of the few reports in QuickBooks that uses the terms Debit and Credit. However, it’s a helpful report, as it shows you all account balances in a concise format. If anything looks out of order, simply double-click on the amount to view the underlying detail. Choose Reports, Accountant & Taxes, and then Trial Balance to view this report.
7. Voided/Deleted Transactions Summary: It’s no surprise that small businesses are much more prone to fraud than large businesses. Small business employees usually wear multiple hats, so it’s often impossible to separate financial duties (bigger businesses can do this with ease). Fortunately QuickBooks makes it hard for perpetrators to cover their tracks: choose Reports, Accountant & Taxes, and then Voided/Deleted Transactions Summary. As shown in Figure 5, you’ll be able quickly identify any transactions that have been deleted from QuickBooks. Granted, this isn’t an end-all solution by any means, but it is a helpful management tool. Plus, if a transaction ends up “vanishing” from QuickBooks, you can use this report to see who deleted it!
Figure 5: The Voided/Deleted Transactions Summary enables you to find transactions that appear to have vanished.
8. Audit Trail: The audit trail was an optional feature in earlier versions of QuickBooks, but is permanently enabled in recent versions of QuickBooks. This provides a complete record of every entry made in QuickBooks, as shown in Figure 6. The downside to that is that you can end up with a massive report. Don’t worry, as it’s easy to filter this report and narrow your search. To do so, choose Reports, Accountant & Taxes, and then Audit Trail. Once the report appears, click the Modify button, and then click on the Filters tab. You can filter by date range, amount, or dozens more fields.
Figure 6: The audit trail shows every transaction-including modifications-in QuickBooks.
9. Previous Reconciliation: It’s a good practice to always print at least the summary report once you’ve reconciled a bank or credit card account. Someone else could edit a reconciled transaction, which could cause the reconciliation to be out of balance. A printed copy of the report shows that the account reconciled as of the report date, although you will still have to untangle the edited transaction. However, if you close out the reconciliation screen, you have a second chance to print your report: choose Reports, Banking, and then Previous Reconciliation. As shown in Figure 7, you can choose from multiple reports.
Figure 7: The Previous Reconciliation report option allows you to reprint missing account reconciliation reports.
10. Transaction History: Think of this as a “report within a report”, as you can only run it in certain circumstances. As shown in Figure 6, you must have a transaction open on the screen or single-click on a transaction within a report. You can then choose Reports, and then Transaction History. As shown in Figure 8, QuickBooks will display a report that shows the entire history for a given transaction.
Figure 8: The Transaction History report provides shows all activity related to a given transaction.
Did You Know?
The Microsoft web site offers hundreds of free spreadsheet and word processing templates. Options range from timesheets to analysis tools to contract documents. Visit http://office.microsoft.com/templates, and then search for a template by use (home, office, school), collection (real estate, small business, wedding), or keyword. Indeed, if you’ve created a template that you rely on, you can submit it to the site and share your work with others!
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Does the mere mention of accounting ratios may put your teeth on edge, and bring back bad memories of Accounting 101? It shouldn’t as ratios can help your quickly determine how your business compares against others.
Banks often use ratios to analyze your financial statements as part of the loan approval process, so it’s helpful to know in advance how you’ll be measured. Even better, ratios allow you to compare your business against your peers since many trade groups publish lists of average ratios within an industry.
Although ratios may have made you drowsy during accounting class, they can be a fascinating way to measure your company’s financial performance.
Gross Profit Margin
Simply put, gross profit margin-sometimes referred to as gross margin-is your revenues less your cost of sales. For some industries, this is a very meaningful metric, while it won’t mean as much to others. For instance, manufacturers, restaurants, and retailers often treat gross profit as a key performance indicator.
In such environments, one typically purchases inventory at one price, and ideally sells it to someone else at a higher price. The spread between these two numbers is the gross profit margin.
Let’s say that you buy $40 of pine straw (we’re trying to avoid the accounting class term widget) and sell it for $60. In this case, $20 of gross margin divided by $60 of sales yields a gross margin percentage of 33%. Thus one-third of your sales are available to put toward overhead items, such as office supplies, payroll, rent, taxes, and so on.
Ideally your gross margin is high enough to cover your overhead and leave you with a profit. With that example in mind, let’s see how you can calculate your own gross profit margin.
Caveat: Gross profit margin isn’t meaningful to everyone. For instance, if you’re a self-employed service provider, you may not have any cost of sales.Your salary is arguably all or most of your profit. You can certainly count your salary as cost of sales and compute a gross profit margin, but you might not find much value in the result.
To begin, choose Reports, Company and Financial, and then Profit & Loss Standard. As shown in Figure 1, look for the Gross Profit amount, and then divide this by Total Income.
Figure 1: The Profit and Loss Standard report provides the figures you need to calculate gross profit.
In this case, $30,953.20/$51,241.16 shows a gross profit margin of 60.4%. Is that good? Is it bad? Very often the answer is “it depends”, which is why you should try to compare yourself to similar companies in your industry.
However, let’s consider the restaurant industry. Many owners strive to keep their gross margin at around 63%, which means a cost of goods sold percentage of 37%. The gross profit ratio enables you to track this key measurement, but you must ensure that your transactions are being recorded in the proper accounts.
The percentages can skew if, let’s say a telephone bill, is miscoded to Food Costs, instead of Telephone. Similarly, your cost of goods sold might look great only because someone miscoded food costs into an overhead account, such as Supplies.
Profit Margin
Profit margin is another commonly used ratio that you can derive from the Profit & Loss Standard report by dividing Net Income by Total Income. In essence, this is the percentage of sales that the owner of a business gets to keep-before Uncle Sam gets his share. Profit margins vary widely by industry.
For example, a grocery store chain may have profits of $2 billion, but a profit margin of just 2.6%. An oil company may have staggering profits in dollars, but their profit margin is often just 10%. Conversely, some software companies have a profit margin of 28% or more.
As with gross profit, the best way to determine whether a profit margin is reasonable is by comparing the result to one’s peers. The construction company shown in Figure 1 has Net Income for the period of $13,123.48, which when divided by Total Income of $51,241.16 returns a profit margin of 25.6%.
Inventory Turnover Ratio
This ratio illustrates how many times a year that you’re selling your entire inventory. This can help you gauge whether you may be holding too much inventory, or not enough. This ratio is based on cost of goods sold divided by average inventory.
As you’ve seen, cost of goods sold appears on the Profit and Loss Standard report-look for Total COGS-but you’ll have to perform a quick calculation to determine average inventory. To do so, divide the sum of your beginning inventory plus ending inventory by 2.
Although you can use several different reports in QuickBooks to determine the beginning and ending balance of your inventory, try this first: choose Reports, Company and Financial, and then Balance Sheet Prev Year Comparison.
Change the report date to This Fiscal Year, and then look for the inventory account balance, as shown in Figure 2.The ending balance for last year is also the beginning balance for this year.
If you need beginning and ending balances for a shorter period, such as a quarter, choose Reports, Accountant and Taxes, and then General Ledger. Set the report dates to the period of your choice, and then use the beginning and ending balances for your inventory account.
Figure 2: The Balance Sheet Prev Year Comparison can provide beginning and ending inventory balances.
Average Collection Period
This ratio helps you determine how long it takes your customers to pay their invoices. The formula is a little more complex than some of the other ratios: number of days multiplied by average accounts receivable balance, divided by credit sales.
For instance, let’s say that your average accounts receivable balance is $30,000, and you had total sales of$400,000 for the year. 365 multiplied by 30,000 is 10,950,000. This amount divided by our total sales of $400,000 is 27.38, meaning that on average your customers pay their invoice in just under 30 days.
Be sure to monitor your average collection period, as your cash flow can tighten quickly if that ratio increases. If you typically invoice your customers, then you can use the Total Income figure from your Profit & Loss Standard report.
Keep in mind: Average collection period won’t be of interest if your customers pay on the spot, such as in a retail store or restaurant.
Although QuickBooks doesn’t directly provide a figure for average accounts receivable, you can quickly customize a report to aid in this calculation:
- Choose Reports, Company and Financial, and then Balance Sheet Standard.
- Click the Modify report button, and then set the From and To dates to match the period shown on your Profit & Loss report. As shown in Figure 3, change the Display Columns By to Months, and then click OK.
Figure 3: Change Display Columns By to Months when you want a month-by-month report.
When QuickBooks displays the 12-month report, as shown in Figure 4, click the Export button, and then click OK to send the report to Microsoft Excel.
Figure 4: You can convert the Balance Sheet Standard report into a twelve-month format.
As shown in Figure 5, row 9 contains the Accounts Receivable figures. In cell R9, enter this formula to calculate your average accounts receivable balance: =AVERAGE(F9:R9).
Figure 5: Use the Accounts Receivable figures to calculate your average accounts receivable balance.
As you can see, the average collection period ratio enables you to determine how long it takes your customers to honor your invoices, which in turn has a direct impact on your cash flow.
Other Common Ratios
Current Ratio: Divide current assets by current liabilities to determine a firm’s liquidity.
Quick Ratio: Subtract inventory from current assets, and then divide by current liabilities to apply a more severe liquidity measurement.
Debt Ratio: Divide total debt by total assets to determine how much of the company is financed by debt.
Return On Assets: Banks often add net income plus interest expense together, and then divide this by total assets to determine the firm’s return on assets. This figure typically needs to exceed the interest rate of a loan that you may be contemplating.Compare Yourself to Others
Now that you understand how to calculate ratios based on your financial results, the next step is to compare yourself to your peers. You may belong to a trade group that makes benchmarks available to its members. If not, a good first step is the BizStats web site, at www.bizstats.com.
Your line of business may be included in their free offerings, but even more information is available on a subscription basis. You can find even more resources by searching the Internet search for the term “industry benchmarks”.
Did You Know?
You can send your thoughts about QuickBooks to Intuit directly from within QuickBooks. To do so, choose Help, Send Feedback Online, and then one of these choices:
- Product Suggestion, as shown in Figure 6
- Bug Report
- Help System Suggestion
Any of these links will display an online from in your web browser so that you can submit your thoughts directly to the QuickBooks development team. QuickBooks frequently updates its products, so before you send a bug report, choose Help, and then Update QuickBooks. Click the Update Now button to ensure that you have the latest patches and fixes for your version of QuickBooks.
Figure 6: Submit your wish-list items directly to the development team from within QuickBooks.
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It’s not just a catchy ad slogan: It’s true. Unless you have dozens of employees or numerous exceptions each payday, you can literally process a payroll run in just a few minutes using the employee compensation tools in QuickBooks.
No matter which version of desktop QuickBooks you’re using, payday chores are similar. Even if you’ve subscribed to Full Service Payroll and are having most of the work done by Intuit, you still have to enter the number and type of hours worked for each pay period.
If you’re doing payroll manually or through a payroll service, you might be surprised at how quickly and easily your payroll tasks can be completed once you’ve finished entering information about your company and its employees, taxes and deductions.
A Simple Process
When you get a reminder that it’s time to run payroll, go to Employees | Pay Employees and choose Scheduled Payroll to get to this window:
Figure 1: No matter how many payrolls you’ve run, it’s important to verify that these dates are correct.
When you click Start Scheduled Payroll, a new screen displays your employee list in a spreadsheet grid. By default, QuickBooks displays several columns, including Employee, Regular Pay and Sick Hourly; you can opt to include others, like Employee Number. If you hide columns that contain information, that data will still be used in paycheck calculation. Then:
- Verify that the information at the top of the screen is correct (Payroll Schedule, Bank Account, etc.).
- Make sure that all employees to be paid have check marks next to their names.
- Enter the number of hours worked for each hourly employee, placing them in the correct pay type column.
Select one and click Open Paycheck Detail to see a complete breakdown of compensation and withholding — all calculated automatically by QuickBooks based on your setup data — within the Preview Paycheck screen. Close the window when finished.
Figure 2: The Preview Paycheck screen shows the numbers behind the check amount.
Checking Your Work
If you’re satisfied that everything is correct, click Continue. In the next screen, you’ll verify Payroll Information again and check a box to indicate whether checks will be printed or handwritten (you can assign a starting check number to the latter). QuickBooks displays a grid containing each employee’s total gross pay, total taxes and deductions, net pay, employer taxes, contributions and total hours. The Direct Deposit field will be checked if the individual is signed up.
If you’re not sure that your payroll information is correct, you can click Finish Later, otherwise, select Create Paychecks.
The Final Step
QuickBooks will then display your results:
Figure 3: Once you’ve previewed and approved a payroll, you can simply click to print any paper checks and pay stubs.Check the box at the bottom of this window next to Do not advance the dates of this payroll schedule in the Payroll Center if you still have employees to process for this run. If the box isn’t checked, QuickBooks will change the dates in the Pay Employees window to reflect your next pay period.
When you select Print Paychecks or Print Pay Stubs, the selection window opens. You can toggle among views of Paychecks, Direct Deposit or Both. Select the ones you want to dispatch and click Print or E-Mail. You’ll have the option to reprint any checks if you need to; otherwise, click OK.
Figure 4: Click Preferences in the print selection window to customize paycheck vouchers and pay stubs.No Room for Errors
Sounds simple, and it is — as long as your setup was error-free. As you well know, you can’t make mistakes running payroll or you’ll initiate a whole series of incorrect numbers, making employees, benefits providers and government agencies unhappy.
So do not proceed if something doesn’t look right; QuickBooks always gives you an out. And let us know how we can help with setup, taxes or payroll runs — or anything in between.
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Whether your accounting tasks are done on a single PC or you have multiple users working on different screens, it’s critical that you make use of all that QuickBooks offers in terms of internal controls.
First Stop: Audit Trail
An audit trail is a very large report that displays every addition, deletion and modification of every transaction. In older versions of QuickBooks you could turn it on and off, but it’s permanently on now.
Because of its size, you’ll probably have to use QuickBooks’ filtering tools to zero in on the user and/or date(s) you’re looking for. Go to Reports | Accountant & Taxes | Audit Trail. Click Customize Report | Filters to set up your search.
Your audit trail won’t alert you when someone tries to enter a prohibited area, and it won’t detect changes to lists. Setting up permissions will help (Company | Set Up Users and Passwords | Set Up Users), but you need more than that.
Figure 1: Be especially careful when granting user access to areas that contain customer, vendor and employee information.
Run the Right Reports
Other QuickBooks features help prevent fraud as well. Review these reports regularly:
- Closing Date Exception. Why were those changes necessary?
- Voided/Deleted Transactions. Is there supporting documentation? Should you be reviewing these daily?
- Expenses by Vendor Detail. Look for irregularities, especially multiple payments made to a vendor in a short period of time.
- Check registers. Use the Balance Sheet for this. Go to Reports | Company & Financial | Balance Sheet Standard and customize the report for the correct period and, if necessary, for specific customers, vendors and/or jobs.
Adhere to Best Practices
You undoubtedly implement financial best practices in your personal life. You reconcile your accounts. You don’t give your online banking password to anyone. And you glance through your recently-posted transactions on your financial institutions’ websites.
If your company is large enough that you have multiple accounting employees, you probably can’t be as hands-on as you are at home. But you can still set up internal control procedures.
Figure 2: Debit? Credit? Reverse the transaction? No one should be making General Journal entries but you. It’s easy to err here; talk to us before using this feature.
For example, if your company has grown to the point where you’re removed from the daily workflow, you may still want to have approval rights for some procedures, like bank balance adjustments, refunds and credits, printed checks (you should still be signing them), timesheets and expense reports.
It goes without saying that you should password-protect your QuickBooks company file and change the password regularly, even–and especially–if you are the entire accounting department. It’s important to protect yourself from external fraud too. We can do a review of your security procedures and make suggestions.
Reinforce the Rules
Figure 3: Anyone in your company who has access to accounting data should have a background check.
Know who your employees are (consider running background checks) and, if you can, rotate the duties assigned to accounting staff. If you have only one person managing all of your bookkeeping work, conduct an even more thorough background search: credit, references, and criminal activity.
Finally, make sure that all employees understand the definition and consequences of fraud. Let them know about the steps being taken to prevent it, but do some unannounced auditing on your own. Include a session on fraud in orientation and get current staff up to speed. Explain that this is necessary for their protection, too. Make it easy to report fraud anonymously, with no fear of repercussions.
This may seem like a lot of extra tasks in your workday, but imagine the time you’ll lose tracking down fraudulent activity if it occurs. So spend a fraction of that time upfront.
If you have questions on this subject, or anything else Accounting or QuickBooks related, give us a call or email. We’re here to be your partner.
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If you used small business accounting products in the early days, you know how frustrating it was to print checks correctly from your software. Pre-printed checks weren’t cheap, and you probably printed at least a few that didn’t line up right or were otherwise unusable.
Figure 1: The Write Checks window in QuickBooks 2013.
Printing checks from QuickBooks has gotten easier, and online banking has made this task less of a necessity for many businesses. But when you do print checks, precision is still required.
So to minimize frustration, save time and money, and ensure that everything will be accurate when your checks are processed at the bank, it’s important that you use the tools that QuickBooks offers appropriately.
If you’ve been having trouble with check-printing or you’re considering attempting it, keep these tips in mind:
1. First, be sure you are creating standard checks, not paychecks. Go to Banking | Write Checks or click the Write Checks icon on the home page.
2. QuickBooks offers a few options for check creation. Click Edit | Preferences | Checking | My Preferences. Here, you can specify a default account for the Write Checks function. Click Company Preferences for additional options.
Figure 2: Check the boxes here to activate options.
3. You can customize the appearance of your checks. Click File | Printer Setup | Check/PayCheck. Specify printer options and check style, change the fonts in some fields, designate a partial page printing style (using the envelope feed) and add your company’s name and address, logo and a signature image.
Figure 3: The Printer Setup window provides access to your output options.
4. Be sure that your printer has enough ink or toner before you begin a job.
5. If you print a lot of checks, consider dedicating one printer to that task. But secure your blank checks. Don’t leave them in the printer.
6. Does your printer process pages in reverse order, last page first? This can cause problems when you’re printing multiple checks. You have several options here. You can:
- Modify your printer’s property settings in Windows and/or consult your printer documentation
- Load the paper to accommodate reverse printing or
- Alter the check numbers in QuickBooks. Go to Lists | Chart of Accounts and open the correct checkbook register to change them. (This option is the least elegant and most risky, and not something you want to do on a regular basis. Let us help you with your printer setup if you can’t resolve the problem.)
7. QuickBooks supports batch printing. If you’re writing multiple checks that you’ll want to print later, click the Print Later or To be printed link (depending on your version of QuickBooks). When you’re ready, you can either select File | Print Forms | Checks or click the Print Checks link on the home page. Both will open this window:
Figure 4: Uncheck any items you don’t want printed to remove them from the batch job.
8. Printing a batch of checks and realize that you’ve set something up wrong? Hit the Esc key to halt it.9. Double-check to make sure that your numbers match before you launch a print job. Compare the number in the First Check Number field to the number of the first check queued up in the printer.
10. Ruin a check or an entire page of them? If your accounting protocol allows you to skip check numbers, just start over by changing the First Check Number so that it corresponds with the starting number on a fresh batch of check blanks. If not, you’ll have to create a check for each one that was ruined, choosing a name and account and an amount of $0.00. Then void the check(s). (Click Banking | Use Register and select the account. Highlight the transaction(s), select the edit option and void. Do not delete them.
Check-printing can be tricky, but it must absolutely follow the rules. Let us know if you get stuck or want some guidance upfront ‘ or if you want to switch to online banking and bill-pay.
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QuickBooks is intuitive, easy to use, and flexible, but it is not an accounting manual or class or tutorial.
If your business is not particularly complicated, you might get by without knowing a lot about the principles of bookkeeping. Still, it helps to understand the basics, so let’s take a look at some terms and phrases that are helpful for you to understand.
Account. You set up financial accounts like checking and savings in QuickBooks, but in accounting terms, these are referred to as the accounts in your Chart of Accounts: asset, liability, owners’ equity, income and expense.
Figure 1: A QuickBooks Chart of AccountsAccounts Payable (A/P). Everything that you owe to vendors, contractors, consultants, etc. is tracked in this account.
Accounts Receivable (A/R). This account tracks income that hasn’t been realized yet, like outstanding invoices.
Accrual Basis. This is one of two basic accounting methods. Using it, you record income as it is invoiced, not when it’s actually received, and you records expenses like bills when you receive them. Using the other method, Cash Basis, you would report income when you receive it and expenses when you pay the bills.
Asset. What physical items do you own that have value? This could be cash, office equipment and real estate. In QuickBooks you’ll be managing two types. Current Assets are generally used within 12 months (or you could convert them to cash in that length of time). Fixed Assets refers to belongings like vehicles, furniture and land, property that you probably won’t use up in a year and which usually depreciates in value. Depreciation is very complex; you may need our help with that.
Average Cost. This is the inventory costing method that programs like QuickBooks Pro and Premier use to calculate the value of your stock.
Figure 2: QuickBooks provides a Statement of Cash Flows report.Cash Flow. This refers to the relationship between incoming and outgoing funds during a specific time period.
Double-Entry Accounting. This is the system that QuickBooks uses–that all legitimate small business accounting software uses. Every transaction must show where the funds came from and where they went. Each has a Credit (decreases asset and expense accounts) and Debit (decreases liability and income accounts) which must balance out (other types of accounts can be affected).
Equity. This refers to your company’s net worth and is the difference between your assets and liabilities.
General Journal. QuickBooks handles this in the background, so it’s unlikely you’ll ever be exposed to it. We sometimes have to create General Journal Entries, transactions required for various reasons (errors, depreciation, etc.) that contain debits and credits. Please leave that to us.
Item Receipt. You’ll create these when you receive inventory from a vendor without a bill.
Job. QuickBooks often associates customers with multi-part projects that you’ve taken on, like a kitchen remodel.
Net income. This is your revenue minus expenses.
Non-Inventory Part. When you purchase an item but don’t sell it or you buy something and resell it immediately to a customer, this is what it’s called. It’s merchandise that isn’t stored by you for future sales.
Payroll Liabilities Account. QuickBooks tracks federal, state and local withholding taxes, as well as Social Security and Medicare obligations, that you’ve deducted from employees’ paychecks and will remit to the appropriate agencies.
Figure 3: QuickBooks helps you track and remit Payroll Liabilities.Post. You won’t run into this term in QuickBooks. It simply refers to recording a transaction within one of your accounts.
Reconcile. QuickBooks helps you with this. It’s the process of making sure your records and those of your financial institutions agree.
Sales Receipt. This is how you record a sale when payment is made in full during the transaction.
Statement. You’ll generally use invoices to bill customers in QuickBooks, but you can also send statements, which contain transaction information for a given date range.
Trial Balance. This standard financial report tells you whether your debits and credits are in balance. Should you run this report and find a problem, let us know right away.
Vendor. With the exception of employees, QuickBooks uses this term to refer to anyone who you pay as a part of your business operations.
These are just a few of the terms you should recognize and understand. We hope you’ll contact us when you need help understanding how the accounting process fits into your workflow.
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Sending invoices to your customers to bill for products and/or services is probably one of the more enjoyable parts of your job–second only to recording payments received. And thanks to the company file you’ve built in QuickBooks, creating invoices is generally a very simple process that requires no duplicate data entry.
Figure 1: You probably use QuickBooks’ invoice forms frequently, so you know how much easier it is to fill them out than to create paper bills.QuickBooks also includes easy-to-use templates for another kind of customer form: the statement. These forms are generally not used nearly as frequently as invoices. However, you may find them more appropriate if you:
- Want to create a form that lists all of a customer’s open charges
- Have a customer who accrues multiple charges before being billed
- Receive advance–or regular–payments, or
- Need a historical accounting of a customer’s activity, including charges, payments, and balance.
Limitations of Statements
QuickBooks places some restrictions on statements. For example if you have a number of related charges for which you want to create a subtotal for, you’ll have to use an invoice. Statements also cannot include sales tax, percentage discounts, or payment items. Products or services requiring descriptions that run more than a paragraph can’t go on a statement. Customization options, too, are limited: you can’t add custom fields to the statement form, nor can you include a message to your customers, like, “We appreciate your business.”
The “Reminder Statement”
There may be occasions when you want to create a form that lists invoices received, payments made, and any credits given for one or more customers. This may be necessary when, for example, a customer disputes a charge. You may also want to send out these statements to remind customers of delinquent payments.
You do not have to enter any new data for these statements. Instead QuickBooks will pull the existing activity that you ask for in the Create Statements window, shown below. To get there, either click on the Statements icon on the home page, or open the Customers menu and select Create Statements.
Figure 2: The Create Statements window in QuickBooks offers multiple options for defining the statements you want to send to customers.As you can see, QuickBooks offers a lot of flexibility in the creation of statements. You can specify:
- The active date range. Under SELECT STATEMENT OPTIONS, you can either enter a date range or request a statement for every customer who has open transactions as of the Statement Date (be sure that this date is correct before proceeding). You can also ask to include only transactions that are past due by a specified number of days.
- The customers to include. Do you want to use the conditions you just outlined to apply to All Customers? If so, click on the button in front of that options. If you choose Multiple Customers, a small button labeled Choose… will appear. Click on it, and a window displaying your customer list opens. One Customer also opens your list of customers. If you’ve assigned types to your customers and want to include only those in one category (like Residential or Commercial), click Customers of Type. And Preferred Send Method lets you limit your statement output to customers who receive either emailed or printed forms.
- The template to use. Click the down arrow to see the statement templates available. If you have not customized QuickBooks’ standard form and want to do so, let us help.
- Whether QuickBooks prepares one statement per customer or per job. This is a very important distinction, so choose carefully.
- Miscellaneous attributes of your statement run. Click on the box in front of any that should apply.
If you assess finance charges, you can do so here. This is an advanced activity in QuickBooks, and we’d be happy to provide guidance in this area.
When you’re done, you can Preview your statements, Print, or E-Mail them by clicking those buttons.
Entering Individual Charges
If you need to enter individual charges, you’ll have to work with QuickBooks’ customer registers. You’ll find these by either opening the Customers menu and selecting Enter Statement Charges or highlighting a customer in the Customer Center, then clicking the down arrow next to New Transactions and selecting Statement Charges.
Figure 3: A Statement Charge in the customer register.We highly recommend that you let us help you get started if individual charges are necessary. Like many of QuickBooks’ functions, this isn’t a difficult activity once you understand it. But it’s much easier and economical for you to get upfront guidance than for us to come in and untangle your company file.
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How many calendars do you maintain? Many businesspeople have more than one. Maybe you use a web-based or desktop application like Google Calendar or Outlook for meetings, task deadlines, travel dates, etc. Your Customer Relationship Manager (CRM) might have another. Perhaps you still have a paper calendar as back-up.
But where do you keep track of bills that need to be paid, invoices that have to be sent, inventory items that must be ordered, etc.? Do you include that information in your general business calendar(s) and hope they don’t get lost in the shuffle?
QuickBooks has a better solution. The software contains a dedicated set of tools that automates the process of setting up and displaying reminders. Once you’ve created them, they can be the first thing you see when you open QuickBooks in the morning.
Warning: If you do not launch QuickBooks frequently, consider tracking your critical accounting tasks using a different method.
Getting a Head Start
QuickBooks lets you specify exactly when you want to receive reminders of upcoming activities. To set this up, open the Edit menu, click Preferences, and then click Reminders | Company Preferences.
Note: If you want QuickBooks to display your reminders every time you launch the software, click on the My Preferences tab and make sure that the box in front of Show Reminders List when opening a Company file is checked. If it isn’t, click in the box.
Figure 1: QuickBooks provides personalization tools for your reminders.As you can see, QuickBooks offers three options for every activity type. It can either display a summary of the tasks that need to be completed, or it can actually list all of them in the Reminders window. And you’ll be able to tell QuickBooks how many days prior to the deadline your reminders should appear. You can also opt not to be reminded.
Making modifications in this window is easy; just click in the appropriate circle next to each task to indicate your preference, and change any numbers in the Remind Me column to tell QuickBooks when it should start showing the reminder.
If you didn’t indicate that you wanted the Reminders window to open every time you launch QuickBooks, you can always access it by opening the Company menu and selecting Reminders.
Using the List
Figure 2: Reminders in the left column are current, and those on the right are upcoming tasks.The Reminders list displays items in two columns. Tasks that need to be done on the current day appear on the left (overdue tasks appear in red). The list in the right column consists of upcoming transactions that will need to be processed soon. Each type of activity has a number in parentheses after it; this tells you how many individual tasks are pending. Click on the arrow to see the list, and double-click on any entry to open the actual transaction form.
You can add generic to-do items to either column by clicking on the plus sign in the upper right. These will appear along with your other reminders. If you want to modify anything related to your reminders, click on the gear icon in the upper right. This opens the Preferences window again.
Recurring Reminders
Transactions that repeat on a regular basis (bills, invoices, etc.) can be memorized. If the amount is always the same, create the transaction and enter the amount; if not, just leave that field blank. Click Memorize to open the Memorize Transaction window and click on the button in front of Add to my Reminders List. Open the drop-down list to the right of How Often and select the desired frequency. Make sure that the Next Date is correct, and then click OK.
Figure 3: QuickBooks can add memorized transactions to your reminders list.Reminders can help prevent serious accounting problems such as cash flow irregularities. Let us know if you’re experiencing these. We can help you determine whether poor task management is contributing to your shortfall, or if there are deeper issues that we can work with you to resolve.
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How many calendars do you maintain? Many businesspeople have more than one. Maybe you use a web-based or desktop application like Google Calendar or Outlook for meetings, task deadlines, travel dates, etc. Your Customer Relationship Manager (CRM) might have another. Perhaps you still have a paper calendar as back-up.
But where do you keep track of bills that need to be paid, invoices that have to be sent, inventory items that must be ordered, etc.? Do you include that information in your general business calendar(s) and hope they don’t get lost in the shuffle?
QuickBooks has a better solution. The software contains a dedicated set of tools that automates the process of setting up and displaying reminders. Once you’ve created them, they can be the first thing you see when you open QuickBooks in the morning.
Warning: If you do not launch QuickBooks frequently, consider tracking your critical accounting tasks using a different method.
Getting a Head Start
QuickBooks lets you specify exactly when you want to receive reminders of upcoming activities. To set this up, open the Edit menu, click Preferences, and then click Reminders | Company Preferences.
Note: If you want QuickBooks to display your reminders every time you launch the software, click on the My Preferences tab and make sure that the box in front of Show Reminders List when opening a Company file is checked. If it isn’t, click in the box.
Figure 1: QuickBooks provides personalization tools for your reminders.As you can see, QuickBooks offers three options for every activity type. It can either display a summary of the tasks that need to be completed, or it can actually list all of them in the Reminders window. And you’ll be able to tell QuickBooks how many days prior to the deadline your reminders should appear. You can also opt not to be reminded.
Making modifications in this window is easy; just click in the appropriate circle next to each task to indicate your preference, and change any numbers in the Remind Me column to tell QuickBooks when it should start showing the reminder.
If you didn’t indicate that you wanted the Reminders window to open every time you launch QuickBooks, you can always access it by opening the Company menu and selecting Reminders.
Using the List
Figure 2: Reminders in the left column are current, and those on the right are upcoming tasks.The Reminders list displays items in two columns. Tasks that need to be done on the current day appear on the left (overdue tasks appear in red). The list in the right column consists of upcoming transactions that will need to be processed soon. Each type of activity has a number in parentheses after it; this tells you how many individual tasks are pending. Click on the arrow to see the list, and double-click on any entry to open the actual transaction form.
You can add generic to-do items to either column by clicking on the plus sign in the upper right. These will appear along with your other reminders. If you want to modify anything related to your reminders, click on the gear icon in the upper right. This opens the Preferences window again.
Recurring Reminders
Transactions that repeat on a regular basis (bills, invoices, etc.) can be memorized. If the amount is always the same, create the transaction and enter the amount; if not, just leave that field blank. Click Memorize to open the Memorize Transaction window and click on the button in front of Add to my Reminders List. Open the drop-down list to the right of How Often and select the desired frequency. Make sure that the Next Date is correct, and then click OK.
Figure 3: QuickBooks can add memorized transactions to your reminders list.Reminders can help prevent serious accounting problems such as cash flow irregularities. Let us know if you’re experiencing these. We can help you determine whether poor task management is contributing to your shortfall, or if there are deeper issues that we can work with you to resolve.
Advanced Features
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Just about every QuickBooks user relies on the Report Center and Reports menu, but if you’re like most, you have a small handful of reports that you tend to rely on. In this article we’ll go off the beaten path and explore ten reports that many users overlook. Even if you are using some of these reports, we’re sure you’ll find a few more to add to your repertoire.
1. Profit & Loss Summary Prev Year Comparison: To access this report, choose Reports, Company and Financial, and then Profit & Loss Summary Prev Year Comparison. Most business owners rely on the Profit & Loss Summary report, but comparing your results to last year can provide quick insight into whether your revenue is growing or contracting-as well as how fast expenses are rising.
2. Balance Sheet Prev Year Comparison: You’ll find this report also within the Company and Financial section of the Reports menu. As with your income statement, it’s important to compare where certain balances stand now versus last year:
- Cash
- Accounts Receivable
- Inventory
- Accounts Payable
- Other Liabilities, such as lines of credit or short term loans
3. Statement of Cash Flows: As with the two preceding reports, you’ll find the Statement of Cash Flows in the Company & Financial section of the Reports menu. Profit & Loss reports enable you to see what you earned, while Balance Sheet reports help you determine what you have-as well as what you owe. However, neither report necessarily provides a clear picture of where cash is coming from, or going to. As shown in Figure 1, you’ll be able to see:
- How much cash you’ve taken in from sales and spent on expenses
- Cash inflows or outflows from borrowing, repayment, or investing activities
In short, this report shows you exactly what caused your bank balance to increase or decrease during a given report period.
Figure 1: The Statement of Cash Flows report explains changes in your bank account balance.
4. Collections Report: Tricky economic times mean it is more important than ever to keep track of your collections. Fortunately QuickBooks makes it easy to contact customers with overdue invoices: choose Reports, Customers & Receivables, and then Collections Report. As shown in Figure 2, the report provides a phone list and shows all overdue invoices. However, you can also use this report to quickly e-mail copies of overdue invoices to your customers. To do so, double-click on a transaction within the Collections report to view the invoice, and then click the Send button at the top of the invoice form to display the Send Invoice form shown in Figure 3. You can modify the wording shown to be more direct, such as a subject line of ‘Overdue Invoice’ or perhaps e-mail text along the lines of-I’ve attached a copy of your overdue invoice. If there’s a problem with our products or services, please let me know immediately, otherwise I trust that you?ll remit payment promptly. To change the default e-mail text, choose Edit, Preferences, and then choose Send Forms. Select Invoice from the Change Default For list, make your changes, and then click OK.
Figure 2: The Collections Report gives you a jump start on dunning overdue customers.
Figure 3: You can adjust the wording of an overdue invoice e-mail for one customer at a time or change the default text.
5. A/P Aging Summary: Although it’s key to make sure that your customers are paying in a timely fashion, it’s just as important to pay your vendors, too. Unpaid bills can result in phone calls, e-mails, and other unnecessary interruptions. Choose Reports, Vendors & Payables, and then A/P Aging Summary to display the report shown in Figure 4. As with most reports in QuickBooks, you double-click on amounts to ultimately drill down to the original transaction.
Figure 4: The A/P Aging Summary helps you determine when bills are slipping into overdue status.
6. Trial Balance: Many business owners overlook the Trial Balance report, since it’s one of the few reports in QuickBooks that uses the terms Debit and Credit. However, it’s a helpful report, as it shows you all account balances in a concise format. If anything looks out of order, simply double-click on the amount to view the underlying detail. Choose Reports, Accountant & Taxes, and then Trial Balance to view this report.
7. Voided/Deleted Transactions Summary: It’s no surprise that small businesses are much more prone to fraud than large businesses. Small business employees usually wear multiple hats, so it’s often impossible to separate financial duties (bigger businesses can do this with ease). Fortunately QuickBooks makes it hard for perpetrators to cover their tracks: choose Reports, Accountant & Taxes, and then Voided/Deleted Transactions Summary. As shown in Figure 5, you’ll be able quickly identify any transactions that have been deleted from QuickBooks. Granted, this isn’t an end-all solution by any means, but it is a helpful management tool. Plus, if a transaction ends up ‘vanishing’ from QuickBooks, you can use this report to see who deleted it!
Figure 5: The Voided/Deleted Transactions Summary enables you to find transactions that appear to have vanished.
8. Audit Trail: The audit trail was an optional feature in earlier versions of QuickBooks, but is permanently enabled in recent versions of QuickBooks. This provides a complete record of every entry made in QuickBooks, as shown in Figure 6. The downside to that is that you can end up with a massive report. Don’t worry, as it’s easy to filter this report and narrow your search. To do so, choose Reports, Accountant & Taxes, and then Audit Trail. Once the report appears, click the Modify button, and then click on the Filters tab. You can filter by date range, amount, or dozens more fields.
Figure 6: The audit trail shows every transaction-including modifications-in QuickBooks.
9. Previous Reconciliation: It’s a good practice to always print at least the summary report once you’ve reconciled a bank or credit card account. Someone else could edit a reconciled transaction, which could cause the reconciliation to be out of balance. A printed copy of the report shows that the account reconciled as of the report date, although you will still have to untangle the edited transaction. However, if you close out the reconciliation screen, you have a second chance to print your report: choose Reports, Banking, and then Previous Reconciliation. As shown in Figure 7, you can choose from multiple reports.
Figure 7: The Previous Reconciliation report option allows you to reprint missing account reconciliation reports.
10. Transaction History: Think of this as a ‘report within a report’, as you can only run it in certain circumstances. As shown in Figure 6, you must have a transaction open on the screen or single-click on a transaction within a report. You can then choose Reports, and then Transaction History. As shown in Figure 8, QuickBooks will display a report that shows the entire history for a given transaction.
Figure 8: The Transaction History report provides shows all activity related to a given transaction.
Did You Know?
The Microsoft web site offers hundreds of free spreadsheet and word processing templates. Options range from timesheets to analysis tools to contract documents. Visit http://office.microsoft.com/templates, and then search for a template by use (home, office, school), collection (real estate, small business, wedding), or keyword. Indeed, if you’ve created a template that you rely on, you can submit it to the site and share your work with others!
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Although it may seem like drudgery, reconciling your bank account is a critical accounting task that you should carry out each month. Doing so helps ensure the integrity of your financial reports, since most of your accounting transactions ultimately affect cash in some fashion.
Further, QuickBooks is a much more powerful tool for your business if you use it to its fullest extent. Most likely you’ve been reconciling your bank account all along, so in this article we’ll discuss the tricks and techniques you need to know to streamline the process.
If you’re new to QuickBooks, you start the bank reconciliation process by having your bank statement in hand, and then choose Banking, and then Reconcile. The Reconciliation screen shown in Figure 1 appears. In most cases, you enter the ending balance from your bank statement, add any interest or fees, and then click Continue.
You mark transactions as cleared, as shown in Figure 2, and then click Reconcile Now. However, it’s not always that simple, so read on to learn how to sail over any hurdles that may appear.
Figure 1: The QuickBooks Begin Reconciliation window.
Figure 2: The QuickBooks Reconcile window.
1. Locate discrepancies
As shown in Figure 1, click the Locate Discrepancies button to display the Locate Discrepancies window shown in Figure 3.From there, click the Discrepancy Report button to display the report, as shown in Figure 4. This identifies any edited or deleted transactions that may affect your reconciliation.
Figure 3: QuickBooks can help you identify edited transactions that may disrupt your reconciliation.
Figure 4: Ideally your discrepancy report should never have any transactions listed.
2. Confirm your beginning balance
Your beginning balance should always tie to your bank statement, but if it doesn’t, click the Undo Last Reconciliation button until you reach a point where the beginning balance matches your bank statement. You must then redo the reconciliations to bring your books current and resolve the discrepancy.3. Don’t forget interest and fees
Be sure to record any interest and fees in the window shown in Figure 1. Alternatively you can record deposit and check transactions to record interest and fees, or the very savvy can use journal entries.If you go this route, be sure to debit cash and credit interest income for interest earnings or credit cash and debit bank charges for any fees incurred.
4. Double-check your ending balance
Always double-check your ending balance input when you start the reconciliation. A simple transposition or other error here can make it appear that you’ve missed a transaction.5. Look for transpositions
Sometimes you’ll mark all transactions as cleared, but still have a difference. In such cases, divide the difference by 9. If it divides out evenly, then there’s a good chance that you transposed a number on a transaction.For instance, a $63 dollar difference divided by 9 returns 7 could mean that a transaction was entered incorrectly. As shown in Figure 5, you can right-click on an amount, and then choose Edit Transaction to fix the error.
Figure 5:Right-click on an amount and choose Edit Transaction to correct a mistake.
6. Pick a side, any side
Don’t mix and match deposits and withdrawals. Reconcile your Deposits and Other Credits first, and then confirm that the total items you marked cleared ties to the amount shown on the Reconcile window.Then reconcile Checks and Payments – doing one side a time limits your search area for missing or misposted transactions.
7. Clear the decks
If you get tangled up in a reconciliation, click the Unmark All button shown in Figure 2 to start over.
8. Enter missing transactions
You can add missing transactions without closing the reconciliation window. Simply choose a command from the menu across the top or from the Home screen. Saved transactions will instantly appear in the reconciliation window.9. Check undeposited funds
Choose Banking, and then Make Deposits. If the window shown in Figure 6 appears, you must complete the deposit process for these transactions.Figure 6: Undeposited funds can pose problems with your reconciliation.
10. Hide unnecessary transactions
Click the Hide Transactions after the Statement’s End Date check box shown in Figure 2 to have fewer transactions to sift through.11. Void old transactions
Old, uncleared transactions can linger on forever – locate such transactions within your register, choose Edit, and then Void. The banking system generally considers checks to be stale after six months.Such lingering transactions are often duplicates of a transaction that cleared.
12. Clear voided transactions
Always clear transactions with a zero balance as these won’t affect your reconciliation, but do clutter up the Reconcile window.13. Bank online
Some institutions allow you to synchronize your records with your online statement. This involves a matching process that automatically clears transactions that match, and makes it easy to quickly post new transactions.14. Use your keyboard
Rather than using your mouse to click on each transaction that you wish to clear, use the arrow keys on your keyboard to move up and down. Press the spacebar to toggle a transaction as cleared or uncleared.15. Walk away and come back later
If you just can’t seem to get the unreconciled difference down to zero, the best thing to do is click the Leave button shown in Figure 2, and then resume the reconciliation tomorrow. A fresh eye can do wonders.16. Reconcile More Frequently
If you can access your bank account online, you can reconcile your bank statement as often as you wish. Consider reconciling accounts with heavy volume weekly or twice a month. -
Does the mere mention of accounting ratios may put your teeth on edge, and bring back bad memories of Accounting 101? It shouldn’t as ratios can help your quickly determine how your business compares against others.
Banks often use ratios to analyze your financial statements as part of the loan approval process, so it’s helpful to know in advance how you’ll be measured. Even better, ratios allow you to compare your business against your peers since many trade groups publish lists of average ratios within an industry.
Although ratios may have made you drowsy during accounting class, they can be a fascinating way to measure your company’s financial performance.
Gross Profit Margin
Simply put, gross profit margin-sometimes referred to as gross margin-is your revenues less your cost of sales. For some industries, this is a very meaningful metric, while it won’t mean as much to others. For instance, manufacturers, restaurants, and retailers often treat gross profit as a key performance indicator.
In such environments, one typically purchases inventory at one price, and ideally sells it to someone else at a higher price. The spread between these two numbers is the gross profit margin.
Let’s say that you buy $40 of pine straw (we’re trying to avoid the accounting class term widget) and sell it for $60. In this case, $20 of gross margin divided by $60 of sales yields a gross margin percentage of 33%. Thus one-third of your sales are available to put toward overhead items, such as office supplies, payroll, rent, taxes, and so on.
Ideally your gross margin is high enough to cover your overhead and leave you with a profit. With that example in mind, let’s see how you can calculate your own gross profit margin.
Caveat: Gross profit margin isn’t meaningful to everyone. For instance, if you’re a self-employed service provider, you may not have any cost of sales.Your salary is arguably all or most of your profit. You can certainly count your salary as cost of sales and compute a gross profit margin, but you might not find much value in the result.
To begin, choose Reports, Company and Financial, and then Profit & Loss Standard. As shown in Figure 1, look for the Gross Profit amount, and then divide this by Total Income.
Figure 1: The Profit and Loss Standard report provides the figures you need to calculate gross profit.
In this case, $30,953.20/$51,241.16 shows a gross profit margin of 60.4%. Is that good? Is it bad? Very often the answer is ‘it depends’, which is why you should try to compare yourself to similar companies in your industry.
However, let’s consider the restaurant industry. Many owners strive to keep their gross margin at around 63%, which means a cost of goods sold percentage of 37%. The gross profit ratio enables you to track this key measurement, but you must ensure that your transactions are being recorded in the proper accounts.
The percentages can skew if, let’s say a telephone bill, is miscoded to Food Costs, instead of Telephone. Similarly, your cost of goods sold might look great only because someone miscoded food costs into an overhead account, such as Supplies.
Profit Margin
Profit margin is another commonly used ratio that you can derive from the Profit & Loss Standard report by dividing Net Income by Total Income. In essence, this is the percentage of sales that the owner of a business gets to keep before Uncle Sam gets his share. Profit margins vary widely by industry.
For example, a grocery store chain may have profits of $2 billion, but a profit margin of just 2.6%. An oil company may have staggering profits in dollars, but their profit margin is often just 10%. Conversely, some software companies have a profit margin of 28% or more.
As with gross profit, the best way to determine whether a profit margin is reasonable is by comparing the result to one’s peers. The construction company shown in Figure 1 has Net Income for the period of $13,123.48, which when divided by Total Income of $51,241.16 returns a profit margin of 25.6%.
Inventory Turnover Ratio
This ratio illustrates how many times a year that you’re selling your entire inventory. This can help you gauge whether you may be holding too much inventory, or not enough. This ratio is based on cost of goods sold divided by average inventory.
As you’ve seen, cost of goods sold appears on the Profit and Loss Standard report look for Total COGS but you’ll have to perform a quick calculation to determine average inventory. To do so, divide the sum of your beginning inventory plus ending inventory by 2.
Although you can use several different reports in QuickBooks to determine the beginning and ending balance of your inventory, try this first: choose Reports, Company and Financial, and then Balance Sheet Prev Year Comparison.
Change the report date to This Fiscal Year, and then look for the inventory account balance, as shown in Figure 2.The ending balance for last year is also the beginning balance for this year.
If you need beginning and ending balances for a shorter period, such as a quarter, choose Reports, Accountant and Taxes, and then General Ledger. Set the report dates to the period of your choice, and then use the beginning and ending balances for your inventory account.
Figure 2: The Balance Sheet Prev Year Comparison can provide beginning and ending inventory balances.
Average Collection Period
This ratio helps you determine how long it takes your customers to pay their invoices. The formula is a little more complex than some of the other ratios: number of days multiplied by average accounts receivable balance, divided by credit sales.
For instance, let’s say that your average accounts receivable balance is $30,000, and you had total sales of$400,000 for the year. 365 multiplied by 30,000 is 10,950,000. This amount divided by our total sales of $400,000 is 27.38, meaning that on average your customers pay their invoice in just under 30 days.
Be sure to monitor your average collection period, as your cash flow can tighten quickly if that ratio increases. If you typically invoice your customers, then you can use the Total Income figure from your Profit & Loss Standard report.
Keep in mind: Average collection period won’t be of interest if your customers pay on the spot, such as in a retail store or restaurant.
Although QuickBooks doesn’t directly provide a figure for average accounts receivable, you can quickly customize a report to aid in this calculation:
- Choose Reports, Company and Financial, and then Balance Sheet Standard.
- Click the Modify report button, and then set the From and To dates to match the period shown on your Profit & Loss report. As shown in Figure 3, change the Display Columns By to Months, and then click OK.
Figure 3: Change Display Columns By to Months when you want a month-by-month report.
When QuickBooks displays the 12-month report, as shown in Figure 4, click the Export button, and then click OK to send the report to Microsoft Excel.
Figure 4: You can convert the Balance Sheet Standard report into a twelve-month format.
As shown in Figure 5, row 9 contains the Accounts Receivable figures. In cell R9, enter this formula to calculate your average accounts receivable balance: =AVERAGE(F9:R9).
Figure 5: Use the Accounts Receivable figures to calculate your average accounts receivable balance.
As you can see, the average collection period ratio enables you to determine how long it takes your customers to honor your invoices, which in turn has a direct impact on your cash flow.
Other Common Ratios
Current Ratio: Divide current assets by current liabilities to determine a firm’s liquidity.
Quick Ratio: Subtract inventory from current assets, and then divide by current liabilities to apply a more severe liquidity measurement.
Debt Ratio: Divide total debt by total assets to determine how much of the company is financed by debt.
Return On Assets: Banks often add net income plus interest expense together, and then divide this by total assets to determine the firm’s return on assets. This figure typically needs to exceed the interest rate of a loan that you may be contemplating.Compare Yourself to Others
Now that you understand how to calculate ratios based on your financial results, the next step is to compare yourself to your peers. You may belong to a trade group that makes benchmarks available to its members. If not, a good first step is the BizStats web site, at www.bizstats.com.
Your line of business may be included in their free offerings, but even more information is available on a subscription basis. You can find even more resources by searching the Internet search for the term ‘industry benchmarks’.
Did You Know?
You can send your thoughts about QuickBooks to Intuit directly from within QuickBooks. To do so, choose Help, Send Feedback Online, and then one of these choices:
- Product Suggestion, as shown in Figure 6
- Bug Report
- Help System Suggestion
Any of these links will display an online from in your web browser so that you can submit your thoughts directly to the QuickBooks development team. QuickBooks frequently updates its’ products, so before you send a bug report, choose Help, and then Update QuickBooks. Click the Update Now button to ensure that you have the latest patches and fixes for your version of QuickBooks.
Figure 6: Submit your wish-list items directly to the development team from within QuickBooks.
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If you’re like most QuickBooks users, you rely on the Profit & Loss Standard report to monitor how your business is doing. However, you may have overlooked an even more valuable report: the Statement of Cash Flows.
The Profit & Loss Standard (P&L) report is important in its own right, but it only provides partial insight into the health of your business. While the P&L shows what you earned and spent, the Statement of Cash Flows shows you where the cash came from and went to, also known as sources and uses.
As you’ll see in this article, you can use the Statement of Cash Flows to determine the how various activities increased or decreased your cash balance during a given report period.
Cash versus Accrual
Unlike some accounting packages, QuickBooks allows you to run most reports on either the cash or accrual basis.
Cash-basis means that transactions don’t appear on your Profit & Loss statement until either your customer pays their invoice or you pay a vendor (or employee). So, if you enter a bill in QuickBooks to be paid later, the expense won’t immediately appear on a cash-basis P&L.
Similarly, invoices that you send to customers won’t immediately appear on a cash-basis P&L. The expense appears when you write a check to the vendor, and the revenue appears when the customer honors their invoice. Accordingly, cash-basis reports don’t necessarily report a company’s true financial performance.
You could have a stellar looking Profit & Loss Report, but a list full of unpaid bills in QuickBooks. Accordingly, many accountants prefer that business owners use accrual-basis reports.
Accrual-basis reports recognize the effect of every transaction on your P&L immediately. Customer invoices appear on accrual-basis P&L reports as soon as you save the transaction, as do unpaid vendor bills. You can easily see the significance of these differences in Figures 1 and 2.
Figure 1: Cash-basis reports only reflect paid transactions.
Figure 2: Accrual-basis reports include all transactions – both paid and unpaid.
Accrual-basis reports provide a much better picture of where the business stands, but can make it harder to understand your current cash position. However, a cash-basis P&L isn’t a panacea for managing cash flow, as your business has many transactions that don’t affect the P&L.
For instance, loan payments, owner distributions, and owner contributions affect your balance sheet, which tracks assets, liabilities, and equity. Fortunately, the Statement of Cash Flows reflects these types of transactions and more, so it’s a great companion to both cash-basis and accrual-basis P&L reports.
Set Your Preference
You can instruct QuickBooks to always display your reports on either cash or accrual basis:
- Choose Edit, and then Preferences.
- Choose Reports & Graphs, and then Company Preferences.
As shown in Figure 3, specify either Cash or Accrual, and then click OK.
Figure 3: You can set either cash or accrual as your default report format.
Of course, at any time you can change a report to the other format. For instance, if your preference is set to accrual, but you may sometimes want to view a cash basis P&L:
- Choose Reports, Company & Financial, and then Profit & Loss Standard.
- Click the Modify Report button, and then choose Cash in the Report Basis section, as shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4: You can change the accounting method for your P&L on the fly.
NOTE: Most, but not all, reports in QuickBooks allow you to change between cash and accrual. When a report is onscreen, choose Modify Report.
If you don’t see the Report Basis section, shown in Figure 5, then you’ll know that you can’t toggle the report basis. Now that you understand the ins-and-outs of running cash and accrual basis reports, let’s explore the Statement of Cash Flows.
The Statement of Cash Flows
Let’s say that your cash balance at the beginning of your fiscal year was $100,000, and today it is $75,000. The net income figure on your P&L won’t give you the full details on why your cash balance decreased, but the Statement of Cash Flows will. To do so, choose Reports, Company & Financial, and then Statement of Cash Flows.
Report periods: As shown in Figure 5, this report automatically defaults to This Fiscal Year-To-Date, but you can choose another time period if you wish. To do so, make a choice from the Dates drop-down list, or modify the From and To dates, and then click the Refresh button.
Figure 5: The Statement of Cash Flows defaults to the current fiscal year.
Your Statement of Cash Flows report will include up to three major sections:
- Operating Activities
- Investing Activities
- Financing Activities
Don’t worry if your report only includes one or two of these sections – sections only appear when you had relevant transactions during the report period. Let’s explore each of these sections individually.
Operating Activities
The Operating Activities section of the Statement of Cash Flows recaps activities related to running your business. This section will always start with Net Income, followed by an adjustments section.
The adjustments reconcile your net income with the net cash provided by the operating activities. For instance, refer to Figure 5. Net income s $112,999 but the Net Cash Provided by Operating Activities is $42,584. Accordingly, the statement of cash flows identifies the $70,415 difference. Let’s investigate a couple of the items:
Accounts Receivable (-$71,759): During the report period we sent invoices to our customers, of which $31,503.08 remain unpaid. These unpaid invoices are reflected in the Net Income figure, so QuickBooks deducts these because we haven’t received this cash yet.
Inventory Asset (-$17,354): Amounts that we spend on inventory don’t become part of Net Income until we’ve sold the items. At that point QuickBooks posts the expense to cost of good sold, and reduces our inventory account accordingly. Purchasing inventory is a use of cash, so it appears as a negative amount on our Statement of Cash Flows.
Remember: The purpose of the Statement of Cash Flows is to reconcile our net income with the actual change in our cash account. Thus non-cash activities, such as unpaid customer invoices or amortized prepaid expenses get subtracted or added from Net Income, so that you can get a clear picture of where cash went during the report period.
Employee Advances (-$62): We paid $62 to an employee as an advance, which has not yet been repaid. This amount isn’t included in Net Income, but is a use of cash, so the amount is deducted. When our employee repays the advance, our Statement of Cash Flows will reflect a positive amount, since at that point we’ll have a $100 source of cash.
Prepaid Insurance ($893): During the report period we amortized, or used up, $893 of prepaid insurance. This expense is included in our Net Income figure, but we didn’t write a check for it during this report period, so QuickBooks adds this expense back.
Accounts Payable ($13,537): We’ve entered bills into QuickBooks totaling $13,537 that we haven’t paid yet. In effect, we’re temporarily borrowing this money from our vendors, so it’s a source of cash. Later, our Statement of Cash Flows will show a use of cash when we pay the vendor bills. This same treatment applies to credit cards and other liabilities.
As you look through the Statement of Cash Flows, you may also see Investing and Financing activities. Investing activities may include owner contributions as a source of cash, or in the case of the report in Figure 5, the purchase of $11,500 in furniture as a use of cash.
Financing activities will show borrowing on a line of credit or other loan as a source of cash, while loan repayments (net of interest) will appear as uses of cash. In the end, you’ll see exactly what caused your cash balance to increase or decrease during the report period.
Research: You can easily investigate why amounts appear on your Statement of Cash Flows. As shown in Figure 6, the QuickZoom icon appears when you hover over an amount. Double-click to display a detailed report, as shown in Figure 7.
Figure 6: The QuickZoom icon indicates that you can drill-down within a QuickBooks report.
Figure 7: A detailed report appears when you double-click on an amount within a QuickBooks report.
Organizing the Statement of Cash Flows
QuickBooks makes an educated guess at what accounts in your chart of accounts should appear on the Statement of Cash Flows. However, you may encounter instances where activities appear in the wrong section, or don’t appear at all on the report. You can easily remedy such situations:
- Choose Edit, and then Preferences.
- Choose Reports & Graphs, and then Company Preferences.
- Click the Classify Cash button, shown in Figure 3.
As shown in Figure 8, place a checkbox in the appropriate column. You cannot remove balance sheet accounts from the statement, but you can optionally include income and expense accounts. However, keep in mind that this is not a typical need, and you should only proceed under the guidance of your accountant or tax advisor.
Figure 8: QuickBooks allows you to classify accounts as operating, financing, or investing activities.
Did You Know?
QuickBooks has a Product Information window that can provide a dizzying array of information. Press Ctrl-1 to display the window shown in Figure 9. Some key elements on this screen include the product number shown at the top.
Each QuickBooks user in your office should have the same release number. The size and location of your QuickBooks file is shown in the File Information section, while you can use the List Information section to determine how many customers and vendors you have in QuickBooks.
Figure 9: Press Ctrl-1 to view the Product Information window.
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The price of gasoline is just one of many factors putting pressure on our economy as a whole. Now it’s more important than ever to keep a close eye on your company’s performance. Many business owners compare financial results to an annual budget. If you don’t have your budget in place yet, we’ll show you how to get started. Even if you have, we’ll show you how to use last year’s results as a measuring stick with comparative financial reports. Once you understand these techniques, we’ll explain why you should create a monthly appointment with yourself to ensure that your results continue to measure up and take action if they don’t.
TIP: Keep in mind that tough financial years do have a silver lining-you’ll likely pay less in income taxes. If revenues are down or expenses are up, don’t forget to trim your withholding or estimated tax payments accordingly. Doing so enables you to boost your cash flow now, rather than waiting around on a tax refund next spring.
Budget Basics
The QuickBooks Planning & Budgeting menu gives you the ability to create budgets and forecasts. In reality, both features work the same way, so we’ll use creating a budget as our example. But which one should you use? You might find it helpful to use the Forecast feature as an alternate budget and as a best-case scenario, while the Budget feature offers a better expectation of reality. Either way, here’s how to create a budget in QuickBooks:
1. Choose Company, Planning & Budgeting, and then Set Up Budgets.
2. When the Set Up Budgets window appears, click the Create New Budget button in the upper right-hand corner.
3. Select the year that you’d like to create a budget for (such as 2010 or 2011), select Profit and Loss, and then click Next.
Balance sheet budgeting: QuickBooks offers the ability to create a budget for balance sheet accounts, such as planning for expected levels of cash, inventory, accounts receivable, liabilities, and so on. However, most small business owners find that just a Profit and Loss budget is sufficient for their needs.
4. Most users will choose No Additional Criteria on the next screen. However, QuickBooks does provide the option for a more granular budget that you break down to the customer, job, or class level. Click Next once you make a selection.
5. The next screen asks if you want to start with a blank budget from scratch or if you want to use last year’s actual data as a starting point. Most users will find it helpful to use the previous year as a starting point. Click Finish after you make a choice.
6. At this point you’re presented with a screen similar to Figure 1. You won’t see any numbers if you chose the From Scratch option in step 5.
Figure 1: Starting with prior-year actual numbers can jumpstart your budget process.
7. Proceed with entering or updating your budget. Click the Save button as needed to preserve your work as you go, and then click the OK button when you’re finished.
Budget Tips: The Copy Across button enables you to copy the same amount across all twelve months. As shown in Figure 2, the Adjust Row Amounts button provides a quick way to adjust existing numbers up or down by either a percentage or dollar amount. You can edit your budget at any time: choose Company, Planning & Budgeting, and then Set Up Budgets. Choose your budget from the Budget list, and then make changes as needed.
Figure 2: The Adjust Row button makes it easy to quickly increase or decrease budget figures by a dollar amount or percentage.
Budget Reports
QuickBooks offers four budget and two forecast reports. You’ll use these steps to run most of these reports:
1. Choose Reports, Budget & Forecasts, and then the report of your choice.
2. A three-screen wizard appears, asking you first which budget or forecast you wish to use. Once you’ve made a selection, click Next.
3. The next screen asks which report layout to use – you may only choose one, Account by Month – click Next after you confirm your choice.
4. Click Finish to display your report:
- Budget Overview – As shown in Figure 3, this report provides a twelve-month view of your budget.
- Budget vs. Actual – This 52 column report can be tricky to navigate, as the default format shows these columns for each month, as well as a 12-month total.
Figure 3: Budget overview gives you a birds-eye view of your 12-month budget.
Report Taming Tips: There are a couple of ways to bring this report down to size. First, most users can eliminate the % of Budget column. To do so, click the Modify Report button, and then deselect % of Budget in the Add Subcolumns For section. Next, you can shrink the width of the columns. To do so, drag the diamond between the first actual and budget columns to the left, as shown in Figure 4. When you release the left mouse button, choose Yes when asked if you want to resize all of the columns. Alternatively, click the Export button to send the report to Excel.
Figure 4: Narrow column widths can condense particularly wide reports.
- Profit & Loss Budget Performance – This report compares your month and year-to-date actuals to the budgeted amounts, and also displays the 12-month budget. Although this report doesn’t display dollar or percentage variances, you can easily add these columns. Click the Modify Report button, and then select $ Difference and/or % Of Budget in the Add Subcolumns For section, as shown in Figure 5.
Figure 5: It’s easy to add or remove columns on any QuickBooks report.
- Budget vs. Actual Graph – This report doesn’t enable you to choose a budget – the current year budget is displayed automatically. As shown in Figure 4, this report enables you to get a graphic view of how your results measure up to your budget. You can choose between different budget views:
- P&L By Accounts – This view compares your Profit & Loss accounts, also known as income and expense, to the corresponding budgets. The report automatically sorts variances by difference, and you can view up to six accounts at a time.
- P&L By Accounts and Jobs – This view compares your P&L accounts on a job-by-job basis. Jobs with the largest total variance from budget will be presented first, and as with accounts, you can view six at a time.
- P&L By Accounts and Classes – This view compares your P&L accounts on a class basis. As with the other views, you can view up to six classes at a time. This button appears even if you haven’t set the Enable Class Tracking preference.
Class Tracking: Classes allow you to you track costs by department, project, or other categories. To enable class tracking, choose Edit, Preferences, and then Accounting. On the Company tab, select Enable Class Tracking.
Graph Printing limitation: You cannot print more than one page of the budget graphs at a time, so you’ll have to click Next Group and then click Print to create a hard copy of each report group. QuickBooks doesn’t provide a way to print all of the graphs in one fell swoop. You also can’t modify the graph format, other than to choose a different date range.
Comparative Reports
Regardless of whether you use budgets in QuickBooks or not, it’s always helpful to compare this year’s results to last year. Doing so enables you to see trends in your data, such as how automobile expenses have increased. Such a report is just a couple clicks away:
1. Choose Reports, Company and Financial, and then Profit & Loss Prev Year Comparison.
2. By default you’ll see this year compared to last year. However, you can easily create a multi-year comparison:
a. Click the Modify Report button.
b. In the Columns section, choose Year from the Display Columns By drop-down list, and then click OK.
c. On the report screen, choose a date range, such as 1/1/04 through 12/31/08, and then click the Refresh button. As shown in Figure 6, a multi-year comparison will appear onscreen. If you find this format helpful, click the Memorize button to save this report for later use.
Figure 6: You can convert the Profit & Loss Prev Year Comparison into a multi-year report.
Summary
In this article we discussed how you can use the budget and forecast feature in QuickBooks to plan the future of your business. As each month rolls by, you can compare your plan to actual results. In addition, you can compare this year’s results to last year, or even the last several years.
Did you know?
Did you know that an accountant’s copy of a QuickBooks file can be converted to a normal QuickBooks company, i.e. a .QBW file? There are limited circumstances where you’d want to do so, because it’s not possible to merge two .QBW data files together. However, let’s say that you lose access to your QuickBooks company because your hard drive crashes or someone steals your laptop. These are situations where a converted accountant’s copy would be better than starting from scratch. If you need to do this, ask your accountant to carry out these steps in their version of QuickBooks:
1. Choose File, Utilities, and then Convert Accountant’s Copy to Company File (QBW).
2. Choose the Accountant’s Copy to convert.
3. Click OK on the prompt shown in Figure 7.
4. Assign a name to the new company file, and then click Save.
A final warning prompt will appear to confirm that this copy will overwrite any existing client copy of the books.
Figure 7: Converting an accountant’s copy to a working QuickBooks company can serve as a disaster recovery method.
Of course, the best defense is to make frequent back-ups of your QuickBooks data on removable media, such as the USB flash drives that often cost less than $10. These easily allow you to carry your QuickBooks back-up offsite, such as in your purse or briefcase. But, it’s good to know that your accountant might be able to provide a working QuickBooks company – as long as you recently sent your accountant’s copy along to them.
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QuickBooks Pro can be used to manage many different files. In your case, you could have a QuickBooks file called “Business”, and a completely separate QuickBooks file called “Home” to manage the separate checkbooks. For more information on the creation of a new company file, click on File in the menu bar, then New Company.
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Do you know where your physical inventory items are? Whether you keep them in a closet, in an unused office, or a warehouse, you need to keep a close watch on how many products you have, how many have been ordered, and when it’s time to reorder. Fortunately, QuickBooks has tools that help you track all of those numbers. If you’re conscientious about making use of them, you should have a good sense of the state of your inventory, wherever you store it.
Note: These tools are not available in Simple Start or QuickBooks Online.
Inventory 101
Let’s take a look at the life of an inventory item. First, you have to tell QuickBooks that you will be selling products. It asks for this information during the EasyStep interview, but if for some reason you didn’t set this up, you can still do it. Click Edit/Preferences, then Items & Inventory, and then Company Preferences. Make sure the first line is checked, as well as any others you want active, as seen in Figure 1.
Figure 1: You can have QuickBooks track your inventory by selecting this option in the Preferences window.
Next, check your Chart of Accounts to see if you need to add any accounts to meet your inventory needs. This is easy. Go to Lists/Chart of Accounts, or click the icon on the home page. The Chart of Accounts is simply a list of the accounts your company uses, and the balance for each. QuickBooks sets a chart up for you based on the type of company you have, but as your business grows, you may need to add more. Figure 2 shows an example of the Chart of Accounts window.
Figure 2: The Chart of Accounts window shows you the balance for each of your accounts.
To add a new account, click on the arrow next to Account and click New. Select the correct type of account, and answer the questions in the Add New Account window. If you have any questions here, consult QuickBooks’ help file.
See Your Inventory In High Definition
Next you’ll have to define your company’s products. Click Items & Services on the home page. The Item list opens. You can always come back here when you need to edit an item, but you may want to create one now. So click Item/New. You’ll see a screen similar to the one pictured in Figure 3, but its fields will be blank. Item records in QuickBooks contain a good amount of information about each item, which will be used in forms like invoices and documents like reports.
Figure 3: An item record allows you to define your company’s product.
Fill out the information in each item record for each item you sell. You won’t be able to alter the numbers in the lower right corner; these come from other parts of the program. As for the other values, the need to make changes depends on the field. When you defined the item, you entered an On Hand amount. This of course will change as you sell, so you can change the reorder point. Conversely, the average cost (value of your inventory) is calculated by the program; it’s the total cost of items in stock divided by the number of items in stock. On P.O. and On S.O. simply indicate how much of your inventory is promised on purchase orders and sales orders.
Get Better Organized
QuickBooks lets you create assemblies, groups of items that are sold together as a kit. If you want to create one, click Lists/Item List, then click the arrow next to Item and click New. Click the arrow under Type, and select Inventory Assembly. Fill in the blanks on the window as you would for a single item, and select the individual inventory items in the box at the bottom. This box is pictured in Figure 4.
Figure 4: An item assembly.
Once you’ve defined your items and assemblies, you can use them in two places primarily: transactions forms and records. Let’s say you’re creating an invoice. As you’re filling out the form, you’ll be able to click the arrow under ITEM and view a list of the items you’ve created. Click on one, and the details you’ve entered (like price) will appear. Click Reports/Inventory to customize and run the reports available.
Maintaining an adequate inventory-not keeping too much or too little on hand-is critical to your company’s financial balance. QuickBooks’ tracking tools can help you meet that ongoing goal.
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Settle Up Fast with Quickbooks’ Bill Paying Tools
Some of the financial crystal ball-types are telling us there are signs that the recession may be drawing some of its last breaths. But those bills are still coming in, and you may have had a long, dry summer and less income that you can use to meet those business obligations.
The desktop versions of QuickBooks can help. They can’t magically make more money appear in your coffers, but they can help you manage your bills so you’re always aware of what’s coming up and don’t get any nasty surprises. This keeps both you and your vendors happy, and minimizes the chance of affecting your credit report adversely. You can also maximize cash flow by being hyper-aware of when each bill is due and timing them appropriately.
(These bill-paying tools are available in all QuickBooks versions above Simple Start.)
Enter First, Then Pay
Of course, you can mimic your old manual method of bill paying by simply using QuickBooks’ check-writing convention. But if you do this, you risk paying the bill twice. If you follow the process shown in Figure 1 by entering and the then paying, you’ll ensure that you record the expense in the same period it occurred.
To start, click the Enter Bills or Vendors/Enter Bills icon. The Enter Bills dialog box opens as shown in Figure 2. If you received a bill, be sure that box in the upper right is checked, and that the Bill radio button is filled in.
Figure 1: You’ll find these icons on QuickBooks’ graphical flow chart.
Figure 2: The Enter Bills dialog box.
Next, click the arrow next to the Vendor line to select an existing vendor or add a new vendor. Change the date if necessary, and enter a reference number (this may avoid confusion later). Then, enter the amount due.
When you initially set up vendors, you either set up terms for each vendor or accepted the default. So the Terms field should already be filled in, and will generate the correct bill due date. Enter a descriptive memo in that field if you’d like.
Tip: Use the right-click menu when you’re entering bills to see more options.
Since this was an expense, you’ll want to record it as such. Make sure the Expenses tab is highlighted, and click in the Account field. Click the arrow that appears to drop down the list, and select the appropriate expense type. Fill in the rest of the field on the line, making sure to check the Billable box if this is something you can bill back to a customer. If the expense needs to be split into separate categories, create a new line and amount for each. Your bill now looks something like Figure 3.
Click the Items tab and fill out the fields there if your expense involves products. You must have Inventory turned on to do this. Click Save & Close or Save & New. QuickBooks now works in the background, increasing Accounts Payable and dropping the bill into several reports.
Figure 3: Make sure your completed bill entry screen is as complete as possible.
Paying Your Debts
When it’s time to pony up, click on the Pay Bills icon, or click Vendors/Pay Bills. You’ll see a screen similar to Figure 4. Check the radio button next to the correct preference to view all bills, or to limit the list to those on or before a specific date. Put a check mark next to the bill(s) you want to pay. The correct amount should fill in by default, but you can change this to make a partial payment.
If you want to view the bill, take a discount, or use credits, click on those buttons. Select a payment date, method (check or credit card), and toggle to the correct account if it’s not showing.
Figure 4: The Pay Bills dialog box. Make sit easy to finish the job.
Once you’ve paid a bill, your Accounts Payable and checkbook balances decrease, and the vendor balance and reports are updated. QuickBooks stamps a PAID watermark on the bill to avoid confusion later on.
Tip: To find bills you’ve already paid, go to the Vendor Center.
So stop stacking your bills on an old spindle and ruffling through them every day to see what’s due. You’ll find that there are numerous benefits to using QuickBooks’ bill-paying features, such as an improved credit rating, a dearth of past-due notices, and better cash flow.
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We are living in a period of “accelerated change”. Indeed, the ground does seem to be shifting beneath us almost faster than we can comprehend, so it’s important to stay nimble in these difficult times.
One way you can do so is to closely manage your prices. In some cases you may need to ratchet your prices up to cover a commodity cost-spike. Or, you may want to offer special deals to your best customers to help retain their business.
In this article we’ll discuss four methods you can use to manage prices (and change) within QuickBooks.
Create Discount Calculations
Studies have shown that it’s far easier to get additional sales out of existing customers rather than from new customers. Targeted discounts are just one way to try to encourage your customers to buy more.
However, if you do offer a discount, don’t just type over your standard prices on the QuickBooks invoice, create a discount calculation instead. This accomplishes two things:
- Your customers see on their invoice exactly how much of a break you’ve given them.
- You can track how successful your campaign was.
It’s easy to set up a discount calculation:
- Choose Lists, and then Item List.
- Click the Item button, and then choose New from the menu (or press Ctrl+N).
- As shown in Figure 1, Choose Discount from the Type list.
- Assign an item name, complete the description field, and then enter an amount or a percentage.
- Choose an account from the list-you may wish to create a separate account so that you can easily track the amount of discounts that you’ve offered.
- Choose Tax or Non-tax to indicate whether the discount is applied before or after sales tax, and then click OK.
Figure 1: A discount item allows you to create and track percentage or amount based discounts.
Keep in mind that discounts only apply to the previous row of the invoice or sales receipt. To apply the discount to multiple items, you must create a Subtotal item:
- Choose Lists, and then Item List.
- Click the Item button, and then choose New from the menu (or press Ctrl+N).
- Choose Subtotal from the Type list, and then assign an Item Name and Description, as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 3 shows a multi-line invoice, along with a subtotal and a discount on all of the items.
Figure 2: A subtotal item allows you to apply a discount to multiple items on an invoice or discount.
Figure 3: Include a subtotal on your invoice when you wish to discount multiple items.
Use Price Levels
Price negotiations are becoming more prevalent and you may find that you have to offer a standard discount to one or more customers in order to keep their business.
In such cases, you might find the price level feature helpful, so that you don’t have to remember to include a discount item on each invoice:
- Choose Lists, and then Price Level List.
- Click the Price Level button, and then choose New (or press Ctrl-N).
- As shown in Figure 4, assign a name to the price level, such as 10% Discount.
- QuickBooks Pro users can only establish Fixed % price levels, which are applied globally to all products. QuickBooks Premier and Enterprise users also have the option to create Per Item discounts, where you can selectively discount only certain items.
- Specify whether to increase or decrease item prices, and optionally choose a rounding method.
Figure 4: Price levels allow you to apply automatic discounts to everything a customer purchases.
Note: You can use price levels to increase or decrease prices.
Change Item Prices
Competitive or other pressures may mean that you need to globally change all of your prices at once. Fortunately, you can use the Change Item Prices feature to do so:
- Choose Customers, and then Change Item Prices.
- As shown in Figure 5, select an Item Type from the list, and then select the items you wish to change, or click the Mark All checkbox.
- Indicate a percentage or dollar amount to increase prices by. This can be based on the current price or current cost of the item. Enter a positive number to increase the price, or negative number to decrease the price.
- Click the Adjust button to see the impact of your changes in the New Price column, and then click OK to make the changes permanent.
Timesaver: You can also manually fill-in the New Price column if you prefer to make targeted adjustments to selected items. This is easier than manually opening each item one at a time.
Figure 5: The Change Item Prices feature allows you to adjust multiple prices at once.
Add a Surcharge
We’re fortunate that gas prices are currently far less than were they were just a few months ago. However, who knows how far they may go this summer during peak driving season.
At some point you may need to consider adding a fuel or other type of surcharge to help recover costs beyond what you’ve factored into your existing prices:
- Choose Lists, and then Item List.
- Click the Item button, and then choose New from the menu.
- As shown in Figure 6, choose Other Charge from the Type list.
- Assign an item name, complete the description field, and then enter an amount or a percentage.
- Choose an account from the list, and then click OK. As shown, you may wish to create a separate account so that you can easily track the amount you earn from the surcharge.
Important: As with discounts, Other Charge items only apply to the preceding row on an invoice or sales receipt. Be sure to add a Subtotal item to your invoice if you want the surcharge to apply to multiple rows of your invoice or sales receipt.
Figure 6: The Other Charge feature allows you to compute fuel and other surcharges.
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As it usually does this time of year, Intuit has introduced new versions of its Pro and Premier products. QuickBooks 2012 promises to help you get better organized, save steps, and acquire more in-depth financial insights.
The new Express Start is designed for businesses that want to blast through setup and start entering customers and invoices. You have two other options though.
Advanced Setup is the old EasyStep interview that solicits more details. You can also open an existing file or convert data from Quicken or other accounting software.
Express Start requires minimal input. Company name, industry, company type, tax ID, and contact information is all that’s required. After you save your company file, it lets you start adding or importing customers/vendors/employees, products/services, and bank accounts.
Figure 1: Express Start simplifies company setupAn Activity-Driven Calendar
QuickBooks’ Reminders keep you apprised of each day’s tasks, but they don’t provide any information about the past or future. QuickBooks 2012 solves this problem with its new Calendar. When you enter an appointment, to-do, or key business task (invoices, bills, purchase orders, etc.), it appears in the calendar. You can display a graphical view of the month that tallies activities for each day and lists them below. Daily and weekly views are in list form and links open the original documents.
Figure 2: The new Calendar displays daily, weekly, and monthly views of your financial transactionsSave Excel Formatting
Once you’ve formatted a QuickBooks report in Excel, it’s frustrating to have to reformat it each time you run it for different time periods and/or with your ever-changing content. Excel Integration Refresh simplifies this process. You can now export a report to Excel, make formatting changes and save them, and then reapply them later to the same type of report using different date ranges and your updated QuickBooks data. Acceptable alterations include:
- Row and column header font formatting
- New formulas
- Renamed column and row headers, and report titles
- Resized columns
- Inserted columns and rows
- Inserted formula text
You can do this by opening your report in QuickBooks and clicking Update an existing worksheet, or by launching your report in Excel and clicking the QuickBooks tab on the toolbar, then the Update Report button.
Figure 3: This window opens when you click Update Report in ExcelA New Report Community
There’s always room for more report formats. QuickBooks 2012 offers a library of Contributed Reports, variations created either by Intuit or your fellow users. You can select one of these, like Customer Sales By Quantity By Item Detail and instantly populate it with your own data.
You can sort these templates by industry and rating, and view them as a list, in a grid, or in the Report Center’s Carousel view.
Centralized Operations
QuickBooks 2012 also saves you time with its new Centers. The Inventory Center works similarly to those available for customers, vendors, and employees. It’s a clearinghouse of item records and transactions that can be viewed and sorted. You can also do inventory housekeeping tasks here, like adding items and launching transactions.
The Lead Center helps you carefully track new leads that you either paste in from Excel or enter manually. You can add to-dos and notes to contact records, and convert them into customers.
Upgrading Can Be Tricky
Intuit has included other, smaller time-saving organizational and reporting tools in QuickBooks 2012, like One-Click Transactions, which lets you create related transactions from existing ones (i.e., invoice to credit memo) with one click.
There’s nothing especially difficult about using most of QuickBooks 2012’s new features. But upgrading and setup are sometimes quirky, and the Excel Integration Refresh tool has a learning curve. We’re happy to help you start your company file on the right foot or get acclimated to this latest version.
Figure 4: Track your leads and convert them into customers in the new Lead Center -
Billing for inventory parts is easy. Pick the items from a list and specify a quantity. Poof. Done.
Billing for costs, time or mileage is a little more complex. QuickBooks has built-in tools to help you do this, but it’s a bit of a process.
To simplify your workflow, do this groundwork first:
- Go to Edit | Preferences | Time & Expenses | Company Preferences. Click the Yes button under Time tracking and indicate your choices under Invoicing options. If you plan to mark up some costs and want a default number, enter a percentage and account (these can be changed on individual invoices).
Figure 1: As you do with other QuickBooks processes, make sure that your Preferences are set correctly.- Add any billing items necessary by clicking Lists | Item List and then Item | New in the lower left corner.
- If you plan to bill for mileage, go to Lists | Customer & Vendor Profile List | Vehicle List and enter information about every business vehicle.
Invoicing for Services
If you’re a service-oriented company, you bill for time frequently. This is easy. You’re probably already familiar with the Enter Time entry in the Employees menu. Whether you make individual time entries or complete a timesheet, it’s critical that you make the correct selections for each Customer: Job, Service Item and Payroll Item field, and check the Billable box.
When you create invoices, this box will open after you select a customer:
Figure 2: QuickBooks lets you know when there are time and costs to be billed for each customer.You can let QuickBooks enter the time totals now, or add them later by clicking the Add Time/Costs button. Either way, the Choose Billable Time and Costs window opens. Add a checkmark next to each entry that should be billed, and click Options… to indicate whether you want one line for each time entry or would rather combine all similar service item types.
Figure 3: QuickBooks wants to know which entries should be invoiced.More Complexity
If you’re done with billable expenses for this invoice, click OK. If there are other costs that you covered, click the Expenses tab to see all transactions that you earmarked for this client on a bill, check or credit card. You have the option here to mark up the cost by a percentage or amount (even if you established this in Preferences), and to specify an account.
Do the same for Mileage, which you would have entered previously — when it was incurred — at Company | Enter Vehicle Mileage. Then select any Items that you purchased for the customer. Your records should be correct, assuming that you were conscientious about assigning expenses to customers and jobs.
Figure 4: It’s easy to pull billable expenses into invoices if they’re documented carefully.Turning expenses into invoices and then into income can be complicated. Let us know if we can help. We are your partner in building a successful business.
QuickBooks Tip:
Here’s a cool little keyboard shortcut. Hit F2 while you’re in QuickBooks, and you’ll get the Product Information screen. It’ll tell you everything you want to know about your specific copy of QuickBooks, like your release and license number, the file size, number of users logged in, audit trail status and the total number of accounts, customers, employees, etc.QuickBooks News Update
Please note that as of May 31, 2012, Intuit is discontinuing support for QuickBooks Pro, Premier and Simple Start 2009, QuickBooks for Mac 2009 and QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions 9. You can continue to use these solutions, of course, but live technical support and add-on services like payroll, credit card processing, online banking and bill-pay will not be accessible. Talk to us about upgrading if you’re using any of these products or services.
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Much of the work you do in QuickBooks is short-term. You send an invoice and it gets paid. Your purchase order is fulfilled, and the products move into your inventory. You run payrolls and submit their related taxes and other payments.
Managing the life cycle of your fixed assets is an exception. Fixed assets are physical entities that you purchase to help your business generate revenue, like property, a vehicle or a commercial oven. By definition, they must be in use for over 12 months.
Figure 1: You’ll need our help in depreciating the book value of your fixed assets, but careful recording of them will make your QuickBooks reports, your taxes and your company’s worth more accurate.QuickBooks can help you track these, but both the value of your company and your tax obligations–and the sale price, should you eventually sell them–are affected by how the book value of your fixed assets is depreciated. It’s important that you work closely with us over the life of each one. What you can do on your own, though, is to maintain absolutely accurate records in this area.
Two Paths
The best time to start recording information about a fixed asset is while you’re creating a transaction related to its purchase. You can build an item record for it as you’re filling out the Item section of Enter Bills, Write Checks, Enter Credit Card Charges or Purchase Order.
Let’s say you’re writing a check for a new company truck. You’d go to Banking | Write Checks and fill in the blanks. Click the Items tab below the MEMO field, and then click the down arrow in the ITEM field. Scroll up to the top of the list if necessary and select . You’ll see this menu:
Figure 2: Keep track of your company’s fixed assets by creating item records for them. You can do this as you’re entering transactions for their purchase.Click on Fixed Asset to open the New Item window.
Transactions Not Required
There may be times when you’ll want to create an item record for a fixed asset when you’re not processing a transaction. Such situations include:
- Cash purchases
- Transfer of a personal asset to your company
- Purchase of a fixed asset with personal funds, or
- A multi-item purchase.
To do this, click on the Lists menu and select Fixed Asset Item List. If youâre adding a new one, right-click anywhere in the list part of the screen and select New (or click the down arrow next to the Item button in the lower left of the screen and click New). The same New Item window that you opened from the check-writing screen appears.
You’ve already chosen Fixed Asset as the TYPE, so your cursor should be in the Asset Name/Number field. Enter an easy-to-recognize name so that youâll be able to quickly identify it in reports. Select the correct Asset Account (ask us if you’re not sure) and type a description in the Purchase Description field, clicking the correct button for new or used.
Enter the Date purchased, the Cost and the Vendor/Payee. Don’t worry about the SALES INFORMATION fields until–and if–you eventually sell the asset.
Figure 3: You should be able to complete the New Item window in QuickBooks for your fixed assets on your own, but consult with us on any questions.Under ASSET INFORMATION, enter the Asset Description (you can write a lengthier description here), its Location, PO Number if applicable, Serial Number and warranty expiration date. Add Notes if you ‘d like, and you’re done–unless you want to incorporate Custom Fields. If so, click the Custom Fields button in the upper right, then Define Fields.
(We can provide the depreciation and book value numbers under FIXED ASSET MANAGER.)
Your fixed asset records are critical elements of QuickBooks. You may be storing similar information elsewhere in your office records, but QuickBooks needs it, too, so you’ll have a comprehensive accounting of your company’s value.
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How do you let your customers know how much they owe you, and for what products or services? In these days of ecommerce and merchant accounts, your customers may provide a credit card number over the phone or on a website. Or perhaps you send invoices after a sale and receive checks or account numbers in the mail. QuickBooks can help you both create the invoices and record the payments.
There’s another type of sales document that you can use in certain situations: the sales receipt. You’d probably be most likely to use one of these when customers pay you in full for products or services at the same time they receive them.
If you receive full payment for a product or service at the same time the customer receives it, you should use a sales receipt.Completing a sales receipt is similar to filling out an invoice or purchase order. Click Create Sales Receipts on QuickBooks’ home page or open the Customers menu and select Enter Sales Receipts. A screen like the one above will open.
Choose a Customer from the drop-down list and a Class (if applicable). If you have created more than one Template (more on that later), make sure that the correct one appears in the field. Verify that the appropriate Date and Sale No. read as they should. Click on the type of payment you’re receiving, and enter the check or credit card number where necessary (a small window will open for the latter).
Note: If you are working with a type of payment that does not appear in the four icons, click on the arrow below More to add it.
Now you’re ready to select the products or services you sold by clicking on the arrow in the field under Item to open the available list (if you have not created a record for what you’re selling, select and complete the fields in the New Item window that opens). Enter the quantity (Qty. ). The Rate, Amount, and Tax fields should fill in automatically, based on the information you entered when you create the item’s record.
When you’ve entered all of the items that the customer is paying you for, you can choose which Customer Message will appear on the sales receipt (you can see your options in the drop-down list found in the lower left corner of the screen). Anything you enter in the Memo field will be for your internal use only; it will not appear on the printed or emailed sales receipt.
Click Save & Close or Save & New.
Customizing Sales Receipts
QuickBooks provides tools for customizing forms, including sales receipts.QuickBooksâ forms contain the fields most often used by small businesses. But you can alter them in numerous ways to meet your company’s needs. To customize a sales receipt, open the Sales Receipt window and click on the Formatting menu. Select Manage Templates.
You’ll want to make a copy of the original sales receipt so that the original will always be available. Click the Copy button in the lower left. “Copy of Custom Sales Receipt” appears in the list of templates. In the Preview pane on the right, click in the field next to Template Name and replace the existing name with a new, more descriptive one if you’d like. Click OK.
The Basic Customization window opens. Click on Additional Customization at the bottom of the screen. You’ll see a window like the one in the image above. Click the Columns tab. The list on the left displays all of the columns that can be included in the body of your sales receipt.
Click in the boxes below Screen and Print to indicate which columns should display on your QuickBooks screen and which should appear on the customer’s copy. The numbers in the Order column can be changed to reflect which column will come first, second, etc.
Numerous Options
There’s a lot more you can do to customize your QuickBooks forms. And there are other situations where you might want to issue a sales receipt. We’ve only been able to touch on both topics here, but would be happy to schedule time with you to explore these elements of QuickBooks.
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Are you considering processing your own payroll in QuickBooks? Whether you’re moving from a payroll service or getting ready to pay your first employee, you’re taking on a complex set of tasks that requires a great deal of setup and absolute precision. But the reward is complete control over your compensation records and transactions, and constant access to your payroll data.
If you have no experience dealing with paychecks, deductions, and payroll taxes, we strongly recommend that you call the office before you get started. While QuickBooks simplifies the actual mechanics of setting up and running payroll, there’s still a lot you need to know.
It goes without saying that accuracy is critical here. You’re responsible for your employees’ livelihoods and for maintaining any benefits they receive. Federal, state and local taxing agencies will count on you to submit the proper payroll taxes and filings on time; failure to do so can result in stiff penalties and worse.
A Look Around Payroll Items
That said, here is a brief preview of how QuickBooks Payroll Items work. First, make sure that payroll is turned on. Next, open the Edit menu and click Preferences, then click Payroll & Employees | Company Preferences.
The Company Preferences screen in Payroll & Employees PreferencesUnder QUICKBOOKS PAYROLL FEATURES, make sure the button in front of Full Payroll is filled in by clicking on it. If you’re interested in exploring Intuit’s online payroll service, someone can tell you about that, as well as advise you on the other options displayed here.
This element of your accounting is complicated enough that QuickBooks has a separate setup tool to guide you through the myriad details you’ll need to provide. You find this tool by going to Employees | Payroll Setup. This is a multi-screen, wizard-like tool that walks you through the process of providing information about employees, compensation, benefits and other additions/deductions, and taxes. Each page poses questions, and you provide answers by entering data and selecting options from drop-down lists. In doing so, you’re creating Payroll Items.
This is a time- and labor-intensive process, one that will send you scrambling for all of the minutiae that make up your payroll system. Once you have your payroll framework established, though, as we said earlier, everything will be in one place and easily accessible.
A Useful List
The information you entered in Payroll Setup is likely to change and need modification. Maybe you forgot to account for something while you were working in the wizard, or perhaps you just want to look up a bit of payroll data. To do any of these, open the Lists menu and click on Payroll Item List.
You can access this menu from the bottom of the Payroll Item List screen.The window that opens contains a list of the Payroll Items you created. It looks like a checkbook register, with one line devoted to each item. You’ll be able to view, for example, its Type, any Limit imposed, the Payable To name, and Tax Tracking designations. At the bottom of this list, you’ll see three drop-down menus: Payroll Item, Activities, and Reports. When you click on the down arrow next to Payroll Item you’ll see the menu displayed in the above image.
Warning: There are many options in this menu for altering Payroll Item definitions. QuickBooks allows you to do this, but use caution here. If it involves an action that you are not familiar with, please call the office for assistance.
This is fairly self-explanatory. To Edit or Delete a Payroll Item or make it Inactive, highlight it in the list and click on the correct option. You can also Customize Columns in the table and perform other related tasks. When you click on New Item and select EZ Setup on the next page, this window opens:
You can add Payroll Items by working your way through this wizard-like progression of screens.QuickBooks will help you here by asking questions and building a Payroll Item based on your responses.
There’s much more to know about working with Payroll Items and assigning them to employees. When you’re ready to start processing payroll in QuickBooks, don’t hesitate to call the office for help getting started!
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For the past year, you’ve been faithfully creating new records, entering transactions, and recording payments. You’ve run basic reports. You’ve done your collection duties. You may have even paid employees and submitted payroll taxes.
Now that another year has come and gone, if you haven’t done so, it’s time to wrap and review those work tasks that should have been completed by December 31. First up is your annual QuickBooks wrap-up.
Create and send year-end statements.
Figure 1: As your customers wrap up 2016, too, it’s good to send statements to past-due accounts.In an ideal world, all of the invoices that were due in December would be paid off by the end of the year. We all know that that’s not usually the reality. Two reports can help you here: the A/R Aging Summary and Open Invoices.
If you didn’t give everyone a chance to clear their accounts before December 31 by sending statements, do so now. Click Statements on the Home page (or Customers | Create Statements) to open the window pictured above.
You have multiple options here that are fairly self-explanatory. The screen above is set up to create statements for all customers who have an open balance as of the date you select, but not for inactive customers or those with a zero balance or no account activity.
That way, no one who’s paid in full to date will receive a statement. Of course, if you didn’t want statements created for anyone who’s less than 30 days past due, you’d click in the box in front of Include only transactions over and enter a “30” in the following field.
Tip: You can also find out who is overdue by clicking on the Customers tab in the left vertical pane to open the Customer Information screen. Click on the down arrow to the right of the field just below Customers & Jobs. QuickBooks provides several filters for your list.
Reduce your inventory.
Figure 2: Want to discount all or selected items in your inventory by the same percentage or amount? Open the Customers menu and click Change Item Prices.If you only sell a few products, you probably already know what didn’t sell well in 2016. If your stable of products is larger, you can run QuickBooks reports like Inventory Stock Status by Item and Sales by Item Detail to identify your slow-sellers and discount them now. You may need to filter your reports to see the right data. Please call to discuss customization options if you’re unsure of how to do this.
Clean up your contact lists.
If you don’t maintain your customer and vendor lists, you’ll eventually start wasting time scrolling through them when you enter transactions. So this would be a good time to designate those contacts that you’ve not dealt with in 2016 as Inactive (you can delete their records entirely, but we advise against that). Simply open a Customer record, for example, and click the small pencil icon in the upper right to edit it. Click on the box in front of Customer is inactive.
Send holiday greetings to customers and vendors.
If you didn’t get around to doing this last month, then consider sending a greeting in January (Best Wishes for a Successful 2017!) when your customers’ and vendors’ lives have slowed down a bit. You’re less likely to get lost in the crowd. If your lists are short enough, personalize these cards as much as possible. At least sign them by hand if you can.
Tip: You can print customer labels for your cards directly from QuickBooks. Open the File menu and then click Print Forms | Labels.
Run advanced reports.
Finally, if you’re not already using a QuickBooks professional to create and analyze advanced financial reports (found in the Accountant & Taxes submenu of Reports) monthly or quarterly, then you should be. They’re important, and they give you insight into your business financials that you can’t get on your own. Please call if you need assistance with this task.
Thank you for being a client in 2016 and best wishes for a successful 2017!
Efficiency Tips
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- Click on File
- Click Back Up
- Complete the location where the file will be backed up (i.e. floppy disk in A: or other disk)
- Click the Back Up button
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Over time, your QuickBooks company can grow in size to the point that it becomes difficult to find specific transactions. For instance, let’s say that you hire a new employee, and want to order another desk to match the ones in your office.
You vaguely remember the last time that you ordered a desk, but can’t remember which vendor, or how much you paid. In this article we’ll discuss seven ways that you can search QuickBooks to find transactions such as this, or when necessary, determine if a transaction was deleted.
#1: Registers
QuickBooks maintains a register for each account on your balance sheet, which includes bank accounts, inventory, accounts receivable, and other assets. There are also registers for accounts payable, loan accounts, and owners’ equity.
Depending upon what you’re looking for, a register might be a fast way to find what you’re looking for, such as that desk we mentioned at the start:- Choose Edit, and then Use Register (or press Ctrl-R). Alternatively, you can choose Banking, and then Use Register.
- As shown in Figure 1, choose your Furniture account from the list, and then click OK. QuickBooks will then present a window similar to Figure 2.
Figure 1: Every balance sheet account’not just cash accounts’has a register.- As also shown in Figure 2, you can use the Go To button to search the register. This can help you narrow your search within a register that contains many transactions.
Figure 2: The register displays a searchable listing of all transactions within a balance sheet account.
Keep in mind that registers are just one way to find transactions in QuickBooks, and won’t always be appropriate for every situation. For instance, income and expense accounts don’t have a register’in those cases you need to take another approach.
#2: Simple Find
Think of the Simple Find feature as an expanded version of the Go To feature within a QuickBooks register. Choose Edit, and then Find (or press Ctrl-F) to display the window shown in Figure 3.
If necessary, click the Simple tab at the top of the window. You can then carry out searches based on transaction type, such as Invoice, Estimate, Bill, Check, and so on:- Choose a transaction type from the list.
- Optionally limit your search by completing the Customer/Job, Date, Transaction #, and Amount. It’s not necessary to complete these additional fields, however without doing so you’ll return a list of all transactions of a given type, which may or may not be helpful.
Figure 3: Simple Find allows you to search within a single transaction type.
Once your list of transactions appears on the screen, you have several options:- Double-click on a transaction to view it, or click once on the transaction and then click the Go To button.
- Click the Report button to display a Find report onscreen. As we’ll discuss later in this article, you can then click the Modify Report button to further refine the results of the Find report.
- Click the Export button to export the results to a comma-separated values (CSV) file or Excel spreadsheet.
#3: Advanced Find
This feature, shown in Figure 4, is akin to the Simple Find on steroids. You can search QuickBooks based on any combination of dozens of criteria. For instance, Figure 4 shows a search on customers in the city of Middlefield who bought appliances costing $500 or more.
To use Advanced Filter, simply choose a field from the Filter column, and then set the desired criteria. Your input choices will vary based on the field that you choose.
For instance, if you click on Name City, you can enter a single city.
Conversely, you can make multiple selections when you choose a field like Item or Account. Keep adding new filters as needed. You can craft some very elaborate searches in this fashion. To eliminate a filter, click once on the item within the list on the right, and then hit the Delete key. Alternatively, the Reset button will also clear the decks for you.
Figure 4: Advanced Find allows you to specify criteria for dozens of available fields.
#4: Search
Current versions of QuickBooks feature a Search command on the Edit menu. You may be prompted to enable Google Desktop the first time that you choose this command. Doing so will allow you to use the same search terms and conventions that you use on the Internet to locate transactions within QuickBooks.
As shown in Figure 5, this feature is not automatically enabled, and doing so may cause minor performance degradation on your computer. As shown in Figure 6, Google Desktop automatically groups transactions by type, and you can choose to sort by date.
Figure 5: You must enable Google Desktop Search within QuickBooks.
Figure 6: Google Desktop search automatically groups transactions by type.
Indexing required: Google Desktop initially runs an indexing process on your QuickBooks data. The length of time required for this varies, based upon the size of your QuickBooks company.
You’ll get the best results from your search if you wait until Google Desktop has completed its initial index. New transactions will automatically be indexed after this one-time process completes.
#5: Customized Lists
By default, QuickBooks customer and vendor lists only display names and balance totals. You may not realize that you can add additional columns, such as phone number, and that each column is sortable:- Choose Customers, and then Customer Center (or press Ctrl-J).
- Right-click on the customer list, and then choose Customize Columns.
- As shown in Figure 7, you can add as many additional fields as you wish to the list, as well as move fields up and down within the list. Click OK once you’ve made your changes.
Figure 7: You can add or remove columns from list windows in QuickBooks.- As shown in Figure 8, you can resize the columns within the list. Place your mouse between field names, and then drag to the left or right to resize the field.
Figure 8: QuickBooks list columns are resizable and sortable.- Click the name of a field within the list to sort based on that column. As shown in Figure 8, you can use this technique to search for a customer simply based on telephone number.
#6: Report Filters
Some QuickBooks reports are like a fire hose of data, giving you far more information than you really need. Fortunately, every report has a Modify Report button in the upper-left-hand corner of the screen, which enables you to pare down the results of the report.
As shown in Figure 9, you can click the Filters tab of the Modify Report window and make the same choices that we discussed previously in the Advanced Filter dialog box.
Figure 9: Most QuickBooks reports allow you to apply filters to limit the amount of data shown.
#7: Audit Trail: If you’ve exhausted all of the previous methods to find a transaction in QuickBooks, one final place to look is the audit trail. Someone could have deleted the transaction, either on purpose, or accidentally.
The audit trail formerly was an optional feature in QuickBooks, but starting with the 2006 versions and onward, it’s always on, so you’ll always have a searchable record of every transaction ever entered in QuickBooks.
You cannot view the details of deleted transactions in the audit trail, but at least you’ll know why it didn’t appear through any of the other search methods:- Choose Reports, Accountant & Taxes, and then Audit Trail.
- Once the report appears on screen, you can change the date range to pick a broader range if necessary. You can also click the Modify Report button and apply any filters that you wish. As shown in Figure 10, any deleted transactions will be marked as such.
Figure 10: The audit trail shows deleted transactions.Summary
Hopefully you now have at least a couple of new ways to retrieve transactions or contact information from QuickBooks. Not every technique is appropriate for every search, but understanding these seven ways to search QuickBooks can broaden your skills, and help you retrieve information about anything within your accounting records.
Did You Know?
There are hundreds of add-on products available for QuickBooks that may be able to help you streamline business processes that you currently carry out by hand. Visit http://marketplace.intuit.com to search the list of available products by industry or business need.
Many applications are certified by QuickBooks, and most products include customer product ratings. Free trials are often available, so you can try products before you buy. The web site also includes a list of developers, so you can have a custom application written for you if can’t find an existing tool to meet your needs. -
Use the Open Previous Company option found on the File menu to give you fast access to company files you have used recently
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Here’s how you delete some of those old invoices that have been hanging around. This is a common problem in QuickBooks. Here’s the fix – for each entry that is showing up in your Reminders list under “Invoices to Print”, double- click on it. This action should take you to the invoice itself. Once here, remove the check mark in the box in the lower left hand corner that says “to be printed”, then click “Save and Close”. This invoice should no longer show up in the “Invoices to Print” list.
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When filtering reports in QuickBooks you may want to select most of the items on a particular list, but not all items to appear on your report. First choose the “selected” option from the list (selected accounts, selected names, etc).
Normally you would check each item that you want to appear on your report. However, if you want to check all the items on the list, click the first item and do not release the mouse button. While holding down the mouse button, slide the mouse pointer down just below the list.
When QuickBooks is done all of the items on the list will be checked. Release the mouse button. Now you can manually click the items to remove the ones that you do not wish to include in your filter.
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QuickBooks offers capable tools for tracking the items you sell, but it’s also quite a competent time-tracker. If you pay employees based on the hours they work, QuickBooks can ease your bookkeeping burden. Tracked time can flow to both invoices and payroll, helping you pay employees and collect on services provided to customers.
Before you start tracking time, you’ll need to turn on the related tools. Click Edit | Preferences, and then Time & Expenses. Click on the tab titled Company Preferences. You’ll see the window shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Before you can start tracking and billing for time, you’ll need to fill out some of the fields in this Company Preferences window.
In this window, be sure you’ve checked Yes, and then select the first day of the work week from the drop-down list.
If you are going to want billable time to flow directly to invoices, check the first box under Invoicing Options. The other options in this window relate to expense and item tracking; check with us to see if your business needs to use them.
Tip: If you want to use payroll to pay employees for time worked, be sure to check the box labeled “Use time data to create paychecks” when you’re building employee records, as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2: To facilitate the flow from time to paychecks, be sure to check the box for “Use time data to create paychecks.”
If you’re planning to use QuickBooks’s job tracking, click on Sales & Customers in the left pane, then on the My Preferences tab (see Figure 1). Here, you can choose how you want QuickBooks to handle available time and costs when you’re preparing an invoice.
Single Activities or Time Sheets?
QuickBooks offers two ways to enter time. You can record hours on individual tickets or fill out weekly timesheets. No matter which you choose, the information is always available in the other form. You can switch methods at any time, and your work will be preserved.
Let’s start with the individual time tickets. Open the Employee Center in the toolbar, or click on the Employeesmenu. Click Enter Time, then Time/Enter Single Activity. The window shown in Figure 3 opens:
Figure 3: It’s easy to record hours on this single-activity ticket by simply filling in the blanks.
QuickBooks pulls in data from other parts of the program, records you’ve already created. First, enter the activity’s date or select it from the calendar. Click the arrow next to Name and choose the appropriate employee from the list.
Second, if the hours are going to be billed to a customer or job, click the next arrow and select the correct one (ignore this if you’re just recording company time, like regular compensation or sick time). Finally, pick the service that the employee performed, if applicable. Be sure to check the Billable box when it’s appropriate.
Tip: You can create a new record on the fly here if, for example, you haven’t set up the service you need to record. Click < Add New > in the drop-down list.
Linking to Payroll
You can also use QuickBooks’s timer if you’re going to bill for a timed activity such as a phone call. And you can add notes that will be saved to the ticket.
QuickBooks provides other ways to describe hours spent so that they’re recorded properly. If you have payroll turned on and have associated a payroll item with the selected service item, the Payroll Item field (which indicates how much the employee should be paid) will automatically be filled in. You can easily change this field if necessary.
If you haven’t created a payroll item, select Add New. A wizard will walk you through the process. This relationship can be a bit confusing so talk to us if you have any questions. When you’re done, click Save & Close or Save & New.
Week at a Time
Weekly timesheets can save you a lot of time. To get there, open the Employee Center in the toolbar, or click on the Employees menu. Click Use Weekly Timesheet. You’ll see a window similar to the one shown in Figure 4:
Figure 4: Rather than entering each activity individually, you can document an entire week at a time using the Weekly Timesheet.
You can speed through weekly timesheets, using the drop-down lists to select the appropriate data and entering the number of hours worked. Click Copy Last Sheet if you want to duplicate the configuration from the last pay period.
QuickBooks Time Tracker offers another way to save time and avoid errors. Employees can send their timesheets from any computer that has an Internet connection. Your staff who handles payroll can then download and incorporate them into the company’s payroll. Prices start at $10/month for one user.
Whether you’re bringing employees in for seasonal help or your regular payroll incorporates time worked as well as items sold, QuickBooks contains the tools you need to both invoice customers accurately and dispatch proper paychecks.
If you need help with this feature, or you have any questions on QuickBooks’s reporting, don’t hesitate to give us a call.
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Unfortunately, your work with QuickBooks doesn’t end just because it’s summer, the weather’s great, and school’s out. But there are ways to minimize your time spent managing your money and maximize your time at the beach. Memorizing transactions is one such way. When you memorize a transaction, QuickBooks remembers all of the relevant details and either processes it automatically or reminds you that it’s due.
A memorized transaction could be bills that show up in the same amount every month, like your Web-hosting payment, or obligations that change regularly, like your utility bill. You can specify the amount due if it’s static, or leave the amount open if it regularly changes, making this feature very flexible and easy to set up.
Jog your memory
Once you start teaching Quickbooks to memorize transactions, you’ll wonder why you didn’t use this handy feature before. Say you want to automate your electric bill. First, create a transaction without an amount, like the one shown in Figure 1. Click the Edit menu, and then click Memorize Bill. The dialog box shown in Figure 2 opens.
Figure 1: To memorize a bill payment that changes regularly, fill out the transaction form minus the amount.
Figure 2: When you click Edit/Memorize Bill, this dialog box opens.
The vendor’s name appears in the Name field. If you want a more descriptive name so you’ll recognize it in a list, change it here. You have a few decisions to make in order to set up the repetitive transaction:
Do you want QuickBooks to remind you in advance of the bill’s due date? Click Remind Me. If not, click Don’t Remind Me. And if it’s a bill whose amount remains the same every time, you can click Automatically Enter. If the transaction is a part of a group you’ve created, click the With Transactions in Group button.
How often do you pay this bill? Generally, it will be monthly, but QuickBooks gives you several options.
Check the Number Remaining box if you have a transaction with a finite number of payments, such as paying off a company vehicle.
How much warning do you want? Enter a number in the Days In Advance To Enter field.
If you’ve created a group and you want this transaction to be a part of it, select the name from the drop-down list.
When you want to use a memorized transaction, click the Lists menu, then Memorized Transactions List to open the dialog box shown in Figure 3. You can also “memorize” repetitive reports. Open the report you want to work with by clicking, for example, Reports/Company & Financial/Profit & Loss YTD Comparison. A dialog box like the one in Figure 4 opens. Accept the name presented, or change it to one that you’ll more easily recognize. If you want to save reports in groups you’ve created, like Accountant, select the group from the drop-down list.
Figure 3: The Memorized Transactions List allows you to customize to your preference.
Figure 4: The Memorize Report dialog box…
Thanks for the memories
Memorized transactions and reports can not only save you time for more summer adventures: They provide another way for QuickBooks to give you a quick look at what you owe and are owed, and how your company is performing overall.
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Changing the prices of your company’s services and inventory items can solve one of two problems, depending on why you’re looking for a solution. Say your materials suppliers have upped their prices. You may choose to increase your affected products to maintain your profit margin. Or maybe an item or service has not been moving well. A drop in price might trigger improved sales.
Those examples, of course, are simplifications of what needs to be a thoughtful, studied process. They’re critical business decisions that should be made with the guidance from your trusted ProAdvisor. We’re not experts in just QuickBooks – we also understand the flow of profit and loss, and we can be valuable allies in your battle for continued growth.
We’ll explore the tools that QuickBooks offers to help simplify price changes once your decisions have been made. They’re not overly difficult to use, but we want to ensure your intentions are carried out accurately. And there are related inventory issues that may be impacted by your modifications.
First Steps
First, make sure that QuickBooks is set up to accommodate price levels. Click Edit | Preferences and select Sales & Customers in the left vertical pane. Then click the Company Preferences tab. You’ll see the window shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Before attempting price level changes, be sure the Use price levels box is checked. If it’s not already checked, click on the box next to Use price levels. Then click OK.
Multiple Options
QuickBooks offers options related to item price changes. You can simply alter the cost of one item, or you can modify several at once. Your adjustments can be in the form of either percentages or fixed amounts.
There are two ways to get to the price-changing window. You can click the Customers menu, then Change Item Prices. Or you can select the Items & Services icon from the home page. If you do the latter, simply open the Activities menu at the bottom of the screen and select Change Item Prices to see a window similar to the one shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2: The Change Item Prices window displays lists of your products.
By opening the drop-down list below Item Type, you can select the desired type of product: Service, Inventory Part, Inventory Assembly, Non-Inventory Part, or Other Charges.
Targeting Your Changes
Once you’ve selected the right type, click in the column next to the item(s) you want to change. A check mark will appear. If you want to increase or decrease the prices of all of them, click next to Mark All at the bottom of the screen, as pictured in Figure 3.
Figure 3: Click the box next to Mark All if you want to change the prices of all entries.
Based on your discussions with us, you should now know how you want to adjust the selected price(s). You may have just decided on a new price, in which case you can simply enter it in the New Price column.
Here’s an alternative. In the box to the right of Adjust price of marked items by (amount or %), enter either an individual number to increase by that amount, or a number with a % sign after it to up it by that percentage. To decrease the cost, enter a negative number.
The next step is a little trickier. If you simply want to alter the price of an entry based on its current sales price, leave the Current Price option showing in the next box. But if you want to change it based on its Unit Cost, you’ll have to consult us or do some digging to learn what that is.
If you want the resulting numbers to be rounded up, click the arrow next to Round up to nearest. When you’re satisfied with your work, click Adjust to see your changes reflected in the New Price column. Make any desired modifications, then click OK.
One Exception
Of course, no existing transactions will be altered. But if any of your newly priced items or services occur in memorized transactions, you’ll have to edit them. Go to Lists | Memorized Transaction List. Highlight the affected transaction, then right-click and delete it. Enter a new transaction and memorize it again. If you know only that transaction will be affected, you can select Edit Memorized Transaction instead of deleting it.
Don’t know where all of those items occur? Go to Edit | Find to locate them as shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4: You can easily find items in memorized transactions using the Find tool.
Making price changes in QuickBooks – even global ones – isn’t terribly difficult, but it involves a business decision that’s best made in conjunction with us. It can lead to increased profitability no matter which direction you go, as long as you take into account the issues and potential outcomes involved.
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Turn over a new leaf. Make a New Year’s Resolution. Make a fresh start. Get your ducks in a row. All familiar cliches, but their message is valid: At this time of year, you probably feel like renewing your commitment to running a more successful, productive business.
There are numerous ways to do this, but you might consider adopting the concept of best practices (if you haven’t already). Most industries have them, primarily larger businesses. Best practices are a set of operational guidelines that are expected to produce a favorable outcome. Run your business using these techniques or methods, and you’re likely to be more successful.
Accounting has best practices. While they’re not carved in stone, sticking with some tried-and-true, common-sense procedures will likely lead to increased efficiency. Perhaps adopting some or all of them will make a difference in your business. QuickBooks can help.
The Three I’s
Let’s look at the three stages you’ll encounter when you decide to apply best practices to your company.
Identify
What problems are you trying to solve? Where are your bottlenecks? Are collections a problem? Cash flow? Timely, accurate payroll? Have you seen a reduction in your customer base? Are your bills being paid late? Having trouble keeping up with inventory?
Bring your employees in on this process. They’re on the front lines, and will have insight into where your systems are breaking down. They’ll be pleased to be asked, and they may have ideas that will evolve into best practices.
Figure 1. When you’re formulating ideas that could evolve into best practices, use your best resource: your employees.
Implement
Turn your ideas into policies, and formalize them. Make a big deal out of introducing them to all staff related to accounting, and explain the rationale behind them. They’re intended to improve your company’s financial bottom line, which should translate into a positive outcome for everyone. Don’t turn your presentation into a critique of past performance; emphasize the constructive nature of the changes. Put it in writing, too.
Here are some examples of best practices that other businesses have implemented.
Invoice at the time of service/shipment, instead of once or twice monthly.
Set a specific time interval to deal with collections, like once a week. If you’re running QuickBooks 2011, you can use the Collections Center. Previous versions have numerous helpful reports, like A/R Aging Detail, Open Invoices, and Collections Report.
Figure 2. QuickBooks 2011 features the automated Collections Center.
Estimate your income tax obligation monthly, not just quarterly. When payments come due, there won’t be any major surprises.
Make sure everyone who works with accounting has a backup person who can fill in. Consider having us do the training.
If you don’t have a merchant account – which QuickBooks supports – get one, and encourage customers to pay in this fashion. Pay your bills the same way wherever possible. Use all of the technology that makes sense for you.
When it’s logistically possible, have employees who incur billable time use a timer. A few minutes lost here and there adds up. QuickBooks has a built-in timer; remote employees can use Time Tracker.
Figure 3. Have employees time billable activities whenever possible.
When was the last time you looked at your pricing structure? Are you building in enough profit? Evaluate your selling ratios on a schedule. Run inventory reports regularly.
See? It’s not rocket science. It’s a matter of emulating the practices of the most successful businesses. You might network with other companies to see how they handle this formalizing of processes. Talk to us, too.
Insure
Don’t leave it at that. Evaluate the effectiveness of the new best practices by scheduling follow-up meetings with employees. What’s working, and what isn’t? Do you need to tweak your methods?
This step is absolutely critical. You might want to appoint a compliance officer who follows up with individual employees and departments. If your business is small and informal, you could bring in lunch one day a month for follow-up – and for the development of new best practices.
Not just for mega-companies
You may already know something about best practices, but have always assumed that the concept was designed for big business. While it may be more of an imperative for large companies, even a sole proprietor with a bookkeeper can benefit. It’s really just a matter of putting the most effective work processes into place and maintaining them. Implementing best practices can be a good first step towards a more successful 2011. Call us if you have any questions.
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Data entry and modifications in QuickBooks can be tedious. Beginning with QuickBooks 2010 Pro Edition and above, that job got a lot easier. The Add/Edit Multiple List Entries tool does just what its name implies: It lets you add entries to your lists of customers, vendors, services, inventory parts, and non-inventory parts. It also makes changing one or several of them quick and easy.
Using this feature, you can:
- See customized views of your list data
- Enter missing information
- Create new entries from duplicates of existing ones
- Do a mass change of a whole column
- Copy and paste records from Excel
There are a myriad of applications for this tool. You could use it, for example, when you’re changing Preferred Vendors for a group of items and you don’t want to edit each individual item record. Or, when the area code for select customers or vendors has changed. You could use it if you’re adding an inventory item that’s just slightly different from another, or when your accountant tells you to change the name of an account.
Building the perfect view
To get started, click Lists | Add/Edit Multiple List Entries. In the screen that opens, click the arrow next to the Listbox and select the type of data you want to see, like Customers. Then select the group that you want displayed by dropping the View list down. Click the Customize Columns button. This window opens:
Figure 1: Make sure your columns are correct and in the right order.The list on the left represents all possible column labels. To make the list on the right reflect what you want to see in your table, highlight the correct item and use the Add or Remove buttons and the Move Up or Move Down buttons. When you’re satisfied, click OK. The table will change to display those columns in that order.
TIP: You may have a lot of empty space between columns. To close those gaps, put your cursor on the faint vertical line that separates two column names. A cross-like symbol will appear. Drag it left or right until the columns are positioned well.
Let’s say that a customer commissions a new job. Since so much information will remain the same as in previous jobs, you can duplicate her record. Highlight the last entry in her list of jobs and right-click. Select Duplicate Row. The new entry will contain her default information, except the name will change to DUP [NAME OF PREVIOUS JOB]. Change that phrase to the name of the new job and click Save Changes if you’re done.
Figure 2: It’s easy to duplicate an entry’s information.
Mass changes
You may occasionally want to make the same change to a subset of records. Say a city’s zip code changed and you want to find the customers affected. You’d open the Customers list, click on the View arrow and select CustomFilter. Then:
- In the Search list, choose from All, Active, etc.
- In the For box, enter the common attribute, like the zip code.
- Click on the arrow next to the in box, and tell QuickBooks where you want to search (address fields, all common fields, etc.).
Figure 3: You can search for a group of entries that share a common characteristic.- Click Go. QuickBooks will display a list of all of the matching entries.
- Make your change to the entry at the top of the list, then right-click on it. You’ll see this menu:
Figure 4: The Copy Down command changes all entries in a column to match the top one.When you select Copy Down, all of the entries duplicate the first one in the list.
Some housekeeping
Anything you change in these views, as long as you click Save Changes, will be reflected throughout QuickBooks, wherever that record appears. If you’ve made an error, like using a dollar sign, you’ll get a message telling you to fix it.
You can use Add/Edit Multiple List Entries in other ways. For example, it’s a good way to see how thorough your recordkeeping is. Take a look at your lists occasionally to spot missing data. Or say you were at a trade show and signed up new customers, but you didn’t have QuickBooks on your laptop so you entered them in Excel. Once you’ve made sure that your column names and order in Excel match those displayed in Add/Edit Multiple List Entries, you can just copy and paste the new customers in.
This feature is easy to use, but be cautious. We can help with complex modifications. Add/Edit Multiple List Entries is one of the ten best features QuickBooks has incorporated in recent years. It’s an easy way to get a birds’ eye view of your lists, and a great time-saver.
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Next to payroll, paying bills is probably your least favorite task in QuickBooks. You don’t have to use this feature — you can keep stacking bills on your desk, scrawling the due dates on a paper calendar, and writing checks.
If you’re still operating this way, though, you’re missing out on the numerous tools that QuickBooks offers to track your accounts payable, including the ability to:
- Enter bills as they come in
- Set reminders for bills due
- Pay bills easily
- Locate a bill or payment quickly
- Enter bills as (or after) you receive items
- Link bills to purchase orders
- Have instant access to a bill’s status
Receiving the goods
When an expense bill comes in (from a utility company, for example), click the Enter Bills icon on the home page, or Vendors | Enter Bills. A window like the one displayed above opens. Select the vendor and fill in the blanks. Make sure that the Expenses tab below is selected and the appropriate account number and amount fields are completed. If it’s a bill for an item that already has a related Item Receipt (the shipment preceded the bill), QuickBooks instructs you to use Vendor | Enter Bill for Received Items. Follow the prompts.Note: Dealing with incoming inventory is complex. Consult with us if you plan to use this feature.If the bill came simultaneously with items, click Vendors | Receive Items and Enter Bill. When you select the vendor from the list, this box opens (if you have sent a purchase order):
Figure 2: QuickBooks is telling you that you have open orders with this vendor.Click Yes. The Open Purchase Orders box opens, containing a list of open POs. Select the one(s) you want and click OK. The bill form opens, containing the details of that purchase order. Change quantities if they don’t match the shipment, and edit other fields as necessary. Save the bill.
Settling your debts
It’s good to set reminders for bills. Go to Edit | Preferences and click Reminders. Make sure that the Show Reminders List…box is checked, then click Company Preferences. Find the Bills to Pay row and enter the advance notice you’d like. Indicate whether you want to see a list or a summary, then click OK.When bills are due, click the Pay Bills icon or select Vendors | Pay Bills. A window opens displaying all outstanding bills. You can pare this down by selecting a date in the Due on or before field and filtering by vendors. The screen will look something like this:
Figure 3: You can easily select the bills you want to pay.
Enter a check mark next to the bills you’re paying, and change the amount in the Amt. To Pay field at the end of the row if necessary. At the bottom of the screen, you can set the payment date and type, use any discounts or credits, and make sure the correct payment account is selected. When you’re done, click Pay Selected Bills.Tip: You can have credits and discounts automatically applied by going to Edit | Preferences | Bills.After You’ve Paid Up
There are a number of places where your bills appear in QuickBooks, including:
- The Unpaid Bills Detail report
- The A/P Aging Detail report
- The Vendor Center
- QuickReports
- In the Recent Transactions pane of some forms
- On the bills themselves
Figure 4: QuickBooks displays the Paid status of bills.QuickBooks also lets you void and delete bills, and copy and memorize them. Check with us before voiding and deleting, as this can make some complicated changes in your accounts.
You can just pay bills by using Banking | Write Checks or Enter Credit Card Charges. But the payoff for tracking bills is instant access to your accounts payable status, better relations with vendors, and a more insightful accounting of your company’s cash flow.
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QuickBooks’ standard reports are critical to understanding your company’s past, present, and future. But the program also offers innovative tools that can make them significantly more insightful and comprehensive.
QuickBooks offers two simple conventions that let you identify related data: classes and types. Classes are used in transactions. Types are assigned to individual customers, vendors, and jobs.
For example, you might use classes to separate transactions that relate to different departments, locations, or types of business. A construction company might want to track classes using New Construction, Remodel, and Overhead. Your customer types might help you isolate groups by characteristics like Industry or Geographical Location.
Creating Classes
First, make sure that QuickBooks is set up to use classes. Go to Edit | Preferences | Accounting | Company Preferences. Make sure that Use class tracking is checked. If you want to be prompted for a class designation in transactions, check that box, too. QuickBooks already contains a Type field in customer, vendor, and job records.
It’s easy to build lists of options for both. To define classes, go to Lists | Class List. In the bottom left corner of the screen, click on Class, then select New from the menu. You’ll see this:
Figure 1: To create a class, just give it a name and click OK
Let’s say that you’re a contractor and you want to separate remodeling jobs into room types, like Bathroom or Kitchen. Go through the above steps again. Enter “Bathroom” in the Class Name field and click the box next to Subclass of. Open the list and choose “Remodel.” Click OK.Tip: If your class list grows lengthy and you want to tidy it up, you can make classes that you’re not currently using inactive by checking the box in this window. It will remain in your QuickBooks records and can be reactivated again.
Putting Classes to Work
Now you can use classes in transactions. Open a blank invoice and select a customer. The Class field will be next to the customer name. If the entire invoice will be assigned to the same class, click the drop-down list and select it. You can also assign separate classes to individual line items:
Figure 2: You can assign different classes to individual line items in transactions.
Not all invoice templates include a column for classes. You can add this by selecting the invoice form you want to modify and clicking Customize in the toolbar.QuickBooks comes with two reports specially designed for tracking class-based transactions: Profit & Loss by Class and Balance Sheet by Class (both can be found in the Reports menu, under Company & Financial). Of course, you can filter other reports to include a class column. You can also create a QuickReport for individual classes. Go to Lists | Class List and select a report or graph.
Figure 3: You can filter by class in QuickBooks reports.
Warning!
The Balance Sheet by Class report is complicated and may produce unexpected results. Let your ProAdvisor help you work with this one. They can also help you set up a solid class structure.A Simpler Assignment
Customer, vendor, and job types are a bit less complicated. Job types are especially useful; you can track, for example, profitability and time spent on individual projects. Customer and vendor types can produce output for things like targeted mailings and reports.
Creating types is very similar to creating classes. Go to Lists | Customer & Vendor Profile Lists, and select the type you want to work with. You’ll follow the same instructions here as you did for classes. Types do not appear on transactions; they’re designed for your own internal use, and they’re stored in records.
Figure 4: Customer, vendor, and job types are specified in their records.
Classes and types can be used very effectively in your bookkeeping, but they require a good deal of thought and planning upfront to get accurate, meaningful reports. Let your ProAdvisor know if he/she can assist as you attempt to use these powerful forms of classification. -
No matter which version of QuickBooks you’re using, there are always ways to make your workday easier. As with any software, we tend to learn the features we need and not much more. But small changes in the way you operate can add up to significant time savings and more accurate files. If you jumped into QuickBooks without a thorough introduction, consider these tips.
Use the Open Window list
Spend some time in Preferences, and you’ll be surprised to learn that you have more flexibility than you knew. QuickBooks is designed to work for a tremendously wide variety of businesses, so it comes with some features activated but many dormant.
The Open Window list is a good example. Do you tire of closing windows to find a screen that you used several tasks ago? Make sure that you’re in one-window view (View | One Window), and then click View | Open Window List. Click on any entry to move to that page.
Figure 1: The Open Windows list lets you easily move among active screensMake account assignment mandatory
QuickBooks lets you enter transactions without assigning them to accounts. So your Chart of Accounts has two accounts labeled Uncategorized Income and Uncategorized Expenses that serve as repositories for these transactions. This means that when you run reports or prepare for taxes, you may have a hard time remembering the circumstances of those transactions and will find it difficult to assign them to accounts.
Do yourself a favor. Set up QuickBooks so that you must assign an account to every transaction. This will take extra time upfront, but not as much as if you try to recall the transaction three months from now. Go to Edit | Preferences | Accounting | Company Preferences and make sure that Require Accounts is checked. If you have questions on this, please call or email us.
Use the Account Prefill fields
Speaking of accounts, here’s a little time-saving tip. If you have vendors that are always assigned to the same account(s), you can establish this constant in the vendor record. Simply open the Edit Vendor window for a client and click the Account Prefill tab. Select the appropriate selection(s) from the drop-down lists. If a payment is sometimes split between multiple accounts, you’ll handle this division when you add transactions.
Figure 2: Designate vendor accounts to save time when creating transactionsUse “Pending Sales”
Invoices, sales receipts and credit memos can be earmarked as “pending.” These sales do not show up in registers or reports (except for the Pending Sales report) and can’t be used for transactions where payment has already been applied. Create the transaction and click Edit | Mark [form name] As Pending. To finalize it, open the form and click Edit | Mark [form name] As Final.
This action can be useful in multiple situations, including:
- Backordered items
- Draft approvals
- Estimates
- Time-tracking for jobs
- Profit and loss reports that show the impact of pending sales (choose Either as the posting status [Non-posting or Posting] under Filters)
Figure 3: You can mark a payment as “pending” in several situationsBe kind to your accountant: Set a closing date
Once we’ve worked with your QuickBooks file up to a certain date, entering, editing or deleting transactions prior to that date wreaks havoc with the balance of your books. To be safe, your administrator should password-protect the ability to do this, so that no one does this intentionally or unintentionally. Go to Edit | Preferences | Accounting | Company Preferences and enter a closing date and password. We will change the date each time we complete our work.
Figure 4: Password-protect closed periods to preserve the accuracy of your booksThese are just a few examples of ways you can customize QuickBooks to make your workdays more productive and your record-keeping safer and more reflective of your business. We can help you further tailor the software to make it a better fit.
If you have questions on this or any other QuickBooks feature, call or email us. We’re your partner and we’re here to make your business better.
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If you make one resolution about improving your accounting procedures in 2012, it should be this: Make extensive use of the tools that QuickBooks offers for report modification. Comprehensive, meticulously-shaped reports that flow out of your carefully-constructed records and transactions are your reward for pounding on the keys every day, conscientiously recording income and expenses.
QuickBooks supplies you with a wide variety of pre-formatted reports whose modification options can help you do focused, critical analysis of your financial data. The right set of numbers will help you understand your history and plan for the future more effectively.
Note: The reports discussed and pictured here shows only one possible set of customization options. There are many variations. We can answer your questions.
Check your preferences
When you created your company file in QuickBooks, you chose between reporting on a cash (income and expenses are recorded when money changes hands) or accrual (recorded when you invoice or receive a bill) basis. This affects summary reports, but not those that break out individual transactions or are simply lists.
If you want to change this, click Edit | Preferences | Reports & Graphs | Company Preferences and click the desired button:
Figure 1: You can establish a preference for your summary reports’ basis here.You can set other preferences in this window that will affect your report output here, too, as you can see.
Altering the display
Open the Income by Customer Summary report (Reports | Company & Financial). Change the dates to reflect a range you’d like to see. Want the data displayed by different time increments — like week or quarter — instead of just the total? Click the arrow next to Columns and select Four week.
Figure 2: You can do some report display alterations from this toolbar; the options it offers vary by report.By default, your report rows display alphabetically. If you want to view a column by total in ascending or descending order, select the column by hovering over the top number until the magnifying glass appears, and click on it. Click the arrow next to Sort by and choose Total, then click the AZ [down arrow] icon (in some reports, there will be other options here).
Additional options in this toolbar let you:
- Memorize the report
- Print, email or export it to Excel
- Hide or Show the Header
- Collapse or Expand the columns
- Refresh the report if you’ve made changes that will alter data
More display options
Click Customize Report to open this window:
Figure 3: This window outlines your report’s content options.Some of the options here duplicate what you saw in the toolbar. In addition, you can switch between Accrual and Cash for just this report, and add subcolumns in some. The latter is a complicated operation, one that you must understand well in order to glean any insight from it. We can help you with this.
Sometimes the subcolumns are generic, as shown in the screen above. In other reports, they’re very specific to that group of data.
Clicking on Revert takes you back to the default format, and Advanced opens additional options specific to the current report.
More customization = more insightful results = more informed financial choices
Transaction reports have many similarities and two major differences: You can change the column order by hovering your cursor over the column label until a hand appears. Click, hold and drag the column to the desired spot and let go. You can also add or delete columns by clicking Customize Report and checking or unchecking labels.
Figure 4: In transaction — or detail — reports, you can alter the column structure.Learn the mechanics of report display modification well, and your company’s finances will come into much sharper focus, improving the wisdom of future choices. Up next month: filtering your reports for additional clarity.
If you have questions on this or any other QuickBooks feature, call or email us. We’re your partner and we’re here to make your business better.
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Accounting in the cloud is closer than you might think. In fact, it’s here, in some cases. QuickBooks Online, of course, is entirely cloud-based, but it does not yet offer all of the features found in Intuit’s top-of-the-line products, Premier and Enterprise.
In the meantime, Intuit itself, as well as third-party developers, have built online apps that fill in some of the gaps. These add-on solutions exist on websites, but they can collect data and synchronize it with desktop QuickBooks. So can that iPhone or Android that’s sitting on your desk right now.
Many Mobile Applications
To find these apps, go to the Intuit App Center and click on All Apps. There are dozens of them, arranged by category (Billing and Invoicing, Customer Management, Inventory Management, Apps by Intuit, etc.).
Your first stop should be at Intuit’s QuickBooks Connect (this is the name of the online application that you’d use on a remote PC or laptop; the name of the smartphone app is QuickBooks Mobile). This app gives you easy access to your customer and sales data when you’re away from your office.
Figure 1: QuickBooks Mobile, shown here on the Android operating system, gives you sales tools when you’re away from desktop QuickBooks.Remote Sales Tools
Whether you’re working in web-based QuickBooks Connect or on a smartphone, your data and transaction options are similar. QuickBooks Connect has a few more features, like an Item List and Customer Center, but both let you:
- Access multiple company files
- View, add, and edit customers, estimates, invoices, and sales receipts, using QuickBooks’ custom templates
- E-mail these forms to customers
QuickBooks Mobile and QuickBooks Connect use the Intuit Sync Manager — located on the desktop where QuickBooks is installed — to keep data current everywhere. That computer must be running for syncs to work.
Figure 2: You can create and e-mail invoices from QuickBooks Mobile.Manage Travel Expenses
Concur Breeze grabs the data you need (customers, employees, jobs, etc.) from QuickBooks to record expenses on the road. You can enter charges directly into a form or snap a picture with your phone — it’ll be attached to your expense report. These charges are then sent to a report template that thoroughly documents the charge, letting you specify variables like the trip purpose, travel policy type, project and client. The status of your approval and payment are also included here.
You can send travel itineraries from your free TripIt Pro account and credit card charges directly to an existing expense report to accelerate the process. And once an expense report is approved, money can be moved automatically from the designated company bank account to an employee’s account. $8 per month per user; free 30-day trial.
Figure 3: Concur Breeze provides mobile expense management.Mobile Time-Tracking
If your company has employees or contractors who work remotely and submit hours for approval, consider eBillity Time Tracker for Intuit QuickBooks. After it pulls in customers, service items, and employees from QuickBooks, you can invite workers to track their time on their smartphones by either entering it manually or using the timer, and then sync it with the online application.
Mobile workers can use the application in offline mode; entries are uploaded when they reconnect. Prices start at $10/month for Admin and one user.
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When you think about it, it’s pretty amazing that Intuit is able to pack the lion’s share of your financial data into one giant company file. Certainly makes it easier to separate from QuickBooks and move when necessary.
There are actually three options for saving and relocating that file. You know about backups, since you should be producing them religiously. You generate them so that if QuickBooks — or your computer itself — stops working or your file becomes corrupt, you can re-create the entire environment. Portable company files are more limited, and are best used when you want to save your file to a temporary location and/or email it to someone else.
You would only use an Accountant’s Copy, of course, when you want us to check your progress. We’ll work with you on setting this up.
Figure 1: Once you save and send off an Accountant’s Copy, you can’t work on transactions created before the dividing date.The Critical Backup
We can’t emphasize this enough: Losing your financial data can be the beginning of the end of your company. You won’t know what you’re owed, so you’ll be unable to collect. You’ll miss vendor payments. Payroll will be impossible to reconstruct, and you won’t be able to submit payroll taxes. And how will you know what your income tax obligation is?
It can happen to you.
QuickBooks simplifies this process. Click File | Create Backup You’ll be asked whether you want to back up locally — to a network folder or thumb drive, for example — or to the cloud, using Intuit Data Protect (fees apply). If you select the local preference, click on Options to designate a location in this window:
Figure 2: Choose from options in this window to create a backup profile.Click OK, then Next. QuickBooks will ask when you want to save your backup copy and offer scheduling options. When you’re done, click Finish.
Warning: If you’re using Intuit Sync Manager, there are special rules about copying the company file. Let us help you handle this safely.
Just the Facts
Portable company files are more compact than backup files, so they can be easily e-mailed as attachments or copied onto another computer. But they don’t contain everything that backups do. They lack, for example, letters, logos, attachments, images and templates. Don’t use this option if changes will be made, since they can’t be merged back into the file.
Be sure to create a current backup before you begin to move your file.
To save a portable company file, click on File | Create Copy (you can do this to copy any kind of file, actually). This window opens:
Figure 3: Click File | Create Copy to access any of QuickBooks’ three options.Select Portable company file and click the Next button. In the following window, you’ll browse to a location for your file. QuickBooks will already have entered the name and will save your data in .qbm format. Click Save, then OK when QuickBooks tells you it must close and reopen your file first. Click OK again when you’re told that the file has been created.
Opening the File Elsewhere
When you’re ready to open the file at another location, click File | Open or Restore Company In the window that opens, select Restore a portable file. The Open Portable Company File window opens; make sure that the file’s location is displayed in the Look in: field. Click Open. QuickBooks then asks where you want to restore the file.
The following step is critical. Rename your file unless you want to overwrite your current company file. You can add a date or some other identifying information like a version number.
Click Save. QuickBooks will convert your portable file to a standard company file with a .qbw extension.
QuickBooks makes it easy to create copies of your data, but an error here can threaten your company’s future. We can help ensure that that doesn’t happen.
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You’ve undoubtedly created reports that were so lengthy that you got tired of scrolling up and down to find totals for each individual section. QuickBooks lets you collapse and expand reports to see primary totals only, but this command affects the entire report.
If you want to just collapse a section or two, here’s how you do it. As an example, go to Reports | Company & Financial | Balance Sheet Standard. In QuickBooks 2012, you’d click the Excel button (your version may say Export). Indicate that you want to create a new worksheet and click Advanced. This window opens:
Figure 1: Be sure to enter a figure in the Reorder Point field so QuickBooks can remind you to reorder.Make sure that Auto Outline (allows collapsing/expanding) is checked, then click OK and start the export. When your report opens as an Excel spreadsheet, you’ll notice that there is a series of vertical lines to the left of your data, and a group of numbers that corresponds to them running above horizontally.
Figure 2: Excel’s Auto Outline feature adds tools to the left of your data that let you collapse and expand subsections.To collapse a section so that only the totals show, click on the minus (-) sign next to the line that should remain (in this example, it’s Total Checking/Savings). Do the same for Total Accounts Receivable and Total Other Current Assets. Then scroll down and do the same thing for the other asset subtotals. Here’s what you’ll see:
Figure 3: As you can see, the minus (-) signs have turned into plus (+) signs, which allows you to expand the rows back to their original states.Auto Outline is a very useful feature, but there’s more than one way to implement it. And its availability and operation can vary in different versions of both Excel and QuickBooks. We can help you master this, as well as other QuickBooks-to-Excel tools.
Hidden Gems
Here are some other less-commonly-used QuickBooks features that you may want to try:
- Getting ready to send an invoice but want to check a related transaction from the same job a few months ago? You could use the Find tool, which is a seriously underused feature that can often answer a question quickly. But that takes a few clicks. Instead, just hit Ctrl + L, and that Customer/Job screen pops open in the Customer Center. Click Ctrl + E from that screen to see the Edit Job dialog box.
- CTRL+Y on transaction screens opens the Transaction Journal, which shows you the behind-the-scenes debits and credits. If the Account column is truncated, click and drag the little diamond symbol to the right.
- QuickBooks offers numerous helpful payroll reports, but it also transfers your data into Excel for more comprehensive views of your employee compensation information over customizable date ranges. Go to Reports | Employees & Payroll | Summarize Payroll Data in Excel and More Payroll Reports in Excel.
Figure 4: Summarize Payroll Data in Excel is actually a series of reports, available by clicking this navigational bar at the bottom of the screen.- Allowing multiple windows in QuickBooks and tired of clicking the little x repeatedly to start with a clean slate? Click Window | Close All. This drop-down menu also displays the list of open windows; click on one to go there.
- There may be no more frustrating task than reconciling your bank accounts. If you’re using online banking, consider doing this more than once monthly. Also, don’t let QuickBooks do an automatic adjustment for a considerable discrepancy unless it was a mistake made by a financial institution: Click the Undo Last Reconciliation button and try to find the error. And don’t forget about the Leave button. You may do better attacking it later.
- If you occasionally need to enter a transaction for an entity that isn’t a customer, vendor or employee, go to Banking | Other Names List. You can add, edit and delete these, as well as converting them to customers, vendors or employees.
There’s more than one way to do a lot of things in QuickBooks. We can tell you about more, and evaluate your workflow to see how else we can improve your accounting experience.
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Although Intuit did a great job of giving QuickBooks’ home page a fresher, more open� look in its 2013 versions, maybe some of your screens have become unnecessarily cluttered. Perhaps your QuickBooks company file needs some attention as well. By taking a few minutes to do some �spring cleaning� you’ll have a tidier workspace, and you’ll save time and frustration. The following suggestions will help you do just that.
Make a Clean Start
One simple way to take care of cluttered screens is to do the following:
- Minimize icons. That pretty graphical process map on the home page is great for quick access to frequently-used actions. Some of them must remain there if they’re related to activities you do (i.e., Invoices has to stay if you use Estimates), but you can remove some of the ones you don’t use. Go to Preferences | Desktop View | Company Preferences. You’ll see this:
Figure 1: You can turn off some of the feature icons on your home page.Some of the options have been grayed out because they support other processes. To remove an active feature icon like Inventory, click on it. In the window that opens, uncheck the box next to Inventory and purchase orders are active (you can also modify options here).
Figure 2: Clicking the checkbox next to Inventory and purchase orders are active grays out the other options and removed related feature icons from the home page.To reduce the number of feature icons even more, go to the Finance Charge, Jobs & Estimates, Payroll & Employees, Sales & Customers, Sales Tax and Time & Expenses. QuickBooks removes the related icons and reroutes the process map on the home page.
More Time-Saving Tweaks
- Don’t allow multiple windows to open in your work area. Tired of seeing all of those overlapping open windows on your desktop? Open the View menu and select One Window. All of your open windows remain active in the background. To return to one of them, open the Window menu and select the one you want to move to the front (Window | Close All returns you to a blank work area).
Figure 3: Your Icon bar can be your fastest route to often needed screens ‘ if you modify it to only contain the functions you use, in order of importance. You can also change the labels to make them more meaningful to you.- Trim down your icon bar. Seems like a minimal change, but it’s one of those things that can add unnecessary moments of frustration throughout the day (Where’s the Calendar!�). Click View | Customize Icon Bar.
- Customize columns in ,b>Lists. You probably work in QuickBooks’ Lists often, but are you spending too much time tracking down the right information? Customize their columns so your registers contain only what you usually need (and add additional ones if it’s helpful). Open a list, right-click anywhere within it and select ,b>Customize Columns to modify the display (resize column widths by placing your cursor on the vertical set of dots between labels and dragging).
Figure 4: When you customize your columns in Lists, you’ll find what you’re looking for faster.- Hide inactive items. Highlight an item, right-click and select Make Item Inactive. Open the Item menu in the lower left and click Hide Inactive Items (this action won’t delete them).
Internal Cleaning
These may all seem like cosmetic changes, but you will save time and frustration over the long run.
The most critical spring cleaning task is company file analysis and maintenance. We can handle this for you. QuickBooks can slow down and start generating error messages when the data file becomes unwieldy and sloppy. Preventing file corruption before it crashes your system is a lot faster and less expensive than a reconstruction project.
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If Intuit named its desktop versions of QuickBooks by the version number rather than the year we’d be in version 20-something by now. QuickBooks, still the preferred software for small businesses, keeps getting smarter in its annual upgrades. Rather than pile on tons of new features in its upgrades, for many years now, Intuit has concentrated on making it easier for you to access the tools and data that are already there.
QuickBooks 2014 is no exception. Its combination of small-but-effective changes makes it easier to get in and do what needs to be done quickly and then get out and move on to activities that will help build your business.
A Superior View
If you do upgrade to QuickBooks 2014, head first to the new Income Tracker (Customers | Income Tracker). QuickBooks offers numerous reports and other tools for following the progress of your incoming revenue, but this new feature provides the best we’ve seen in the software.
Figure 1: QuickBooks 2014’s new Income Tracker gives you real-time access to the status of your receivables.You may find yourself spending a lot of time on this screen because it gives you a birds-eye view of your receivables that isn’t available anywhere else in the program. You can click on any of the four colored bars that run across the top of the screen –
Estimates, Open Invoices, Overdue and Paid Last 30 Days
–to change the data that appears below. Within each bar is the number of related transactions and their total dollar amount.
You’ll use the drop-down lists directly below these navigational bars to set filters that define a subset of transactions. These are CUSTOMER:JOB, TYPE, STATUS and DATE.
The last column in the table is labeled ACTION. Once you’ve earmarked a transaction or transactions that you want to work with by checking the box in front of each name, you can select an action you want to take. If OPEN INVOICES is active, for example, you can receive payment for the transaction(s), print or email them. Where applicable, you can open a drop-down menu in the lower left of the screen and batch-produce invoices, sales receipts and credit memos/refunds.
More Descriptive Email
If you regularly send invoices through email, you may have wondered how many of them actually get opened by your customers in a timely fashion. QuickBooks 2014 contains a new tool that makes the details of each invoice available within the body of the email itself.
Figure 2: You can modify this template or leave it as is: QuickBooks 2014 will fill in the relevant details for each customer.To access this template, open the Edit menu and select Preferences. Click on the Send Forms tab, then Company Preferences. Open the drop-down list to select the type of form you want to view or modify (pay stub, sales receipt, credit memo, etc.). Click the Edit button to see the actual template, and open the Insert Field drop-down menu to see your options. When you email a form, QuickBooks will replace the text and numbers in brackets with the correct details for each recipient.
This is what is called a mail merge. They’re fairly simple to use, but one error will throw your message off. We can help you get set up with these.
Smaller Changes
Intuit has made many small-but-useful features to QuickBooks 2014, all designed to help you work faster and smarter, and simply to support more convenient operations. For example, the Ribbon toolbars on transactions now include a tab or menu that lets you open related reports.
Figure 3: You can now access reports directly from the Ribbon toolbar on transaction screens.In addition:
- QuickBooks’ color scheme has been changed.
- The program runs faster.
- You can now copy and paste lines within forms.
- We can communicate with you (and vice versa) via an email window that’s been embedded into the software. This tool even auto-pastes the transaction in question into the email window.
- There’s been some retooling of online banking (now called “Bank Feeds”), making it more accessible and understandable.
Upgrading to a new version of QuickBooks can be challenging, so we encourage you to let us know if you’d like to explore the process. New functionality and usability that improves your workflow and your understanding of your finances can be worth the time and trouble.
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Undoubtedly, there are some QuickBooks tasks that are more enjoyable than others. It’s no fun paying bills, for example, and making collection calls on unpaid invoices can be downright unpleasant.
But you probably don’t mind recording payments after all of your hard work creating products or providing services, sending invoices or statements, and generating reports to make sure you’re on top of it all.
QuickBooks offers more than one way to document customer remittances, and it’s important that you use the right one for the right situation.
Defining the destination
Figure 1: Uncheck the box on the farthest right if you think you may want to direct payments to other accounts sometimes.Before you begin receiving payments, you need to make sure they will end up in the correct account. The default is an account called Undeposited Funds. To make sure that this setting is correct, open the Edit menu and select Preferences, and click the Company Preferences tab. Use Undeposited Funds as a default deposit to account should have a check mark in the box next to it.
If you think you’ll sometimes want to deposit to a different account, leave the box unchecked. Then every time you record a payment, there will be a Deposit to field on the form. Talk to us if you’re planning to use any account other than Undeposited Funds, as you can run into serious problems down the road if payments are earmarked for the wrong account.
The right tool for the job
Probably the most common type of payment that you’ll process will come in to pay all or part of an invoice or statement that you sent previously.
Figure 2: You’ll record payments on invoices you’ve sent in this window.To do this, open the Customers menu and select Receive Payments. In the window that opens, click on the arrow in the field next to RECEIVED FROM to display the drop-down list, and choose the correct customer. You’ll see the outstanding balance. Enter the amount of the payment you received in the AMOUNT field and change the date if necessary. Click the arrow in the field next to PMT. METHOD, and then select the type of payment.
If you established a credit card as the default payment method in the customer record, the card number and expiration date will be filled in. If not, or if a check was submitted, enter the information requested.
Any outstanding invoices will appear in a table. Make sure that there’s a check mark in front of the correct one(s). If the customer only made a partial payment, you’ll have to indicate how you want to handle the underpayment. Here are your options:
Figure 3: You can select how to handle partially-paid invoices here.When you’re done, save the payment.
Instant income
There may be times when you receive payment immediately, at the time your products or services change hands. In these cases, you’ll want to use a sales receipt. Open the Customers menu again and click Enter Sales Receipts.
Select a customer from the drop-down list or add a new one, then fill out the rest of the form like you would an invoice, selecting the items and quantities sold, and indicating the type of payment made (cash, check, credit).
Figure 4: Fill out a sales receipt when payment is received simultaneously with the sale.Other scenarios
These are the most common methods of receiving payments from customers, and you may never have to do anything other than simple payment-recording and sales receipts.
But unusual situations may arise that leave you stumped. For example, a customer may want to make a partial, advance payment before you’ve created an invoice or at the same time you’re entering it. In a case like this, you’ll have to create a payment item so that the money you’ve just received is reflected on the invoice. Or you may get a down payment on a product or service, or even an overpayment.
Let us help you when such situations occur. It’s much easier âand more economical for you â to spend some time with us before you record a puzzling payment than to have us track it down later on. We’ll help ensure that your money makes it to the right destination.
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and complying with accounting best practices, you’ll be more confident during the invoicing stage that what you’re owed will actually be in your bank account in a reasonable amount of time. Here are five things that we suggest.
Let customers pay invoices electronically
Figure 1: You’re likely to get paid faster if you let customers pay electronically when they receive an invoice. Go to Edit | Preferences | Payments | Company Preferences.A few years ago, this was a good idea. In 2014, when people have stopped carrying checkbooks and are accustomed to using their mobile devices to pay for merchandise, it’s become almost required. Whether or not you know it, you’re probably losing some business if you don’t have a merchant account that supports credit and debit card payments, and possibly e-checks.
If you have an online storefront, you’ve undoubtedly been accepting plastic for a long time now. Not many shoppers want to place an order on a website and hunt for envelopes and stamps and blank checks to complete it. If you invoice customers, it’s just as critical that you allow them to remit payment ASAP.
Not set up with a merchant account yet? We can help you get started with the Intuit Payment Network.
Keep a close watch on your A/R reports
Part of being proactive with your accounts receivable is being vigilant and informed. Create and customize A/R reports regularly. When you customize your A/R Aging Detail report, for example, in addition to the other columns that you include, be sure that Terms, Due Date, Bill Date, Aging and Open Balance are turned on (click Customize Report | Display and click in front of each column label).
You should also be looking at Open Invoices and Collections Report frequently, or assigning someone else to monitor them closely. We can help here by creating more complex financial reports periodically, like Statement of Cash Flows.
Send statements
Figure 2: In this window, QuickBooks wants you to create filters to identify customers who should receive statements. Here, everyone with transactions that are more than 30 days old will be included.Invoices are generally the preferred way to bill your customers, but you should consider sending statements in addition when customers have outstanding balances past a certain date. QuickBooks sometimes calls these reminder statements. You’re not providing the recipients with any new information; you’re simply sending a kind of report that lists all invoices sent, credit memos and payment received.
To generate statements, click Customers | Create Statements. You’ll see the window pictured above. You can send statements to everyone, a defined group or one customer, and you can define the past-due status that you want to target in addition to other options.
Send accurate invoices the first time
Few things will slow down your accounts receivable more than incorrect invoices. The customer can wait until payment is almost due to dispute the charges, which means that they’ll probably get another 15 or 30 days (or whatever their terms are) to pay the amended bill.
So whoever is responsible for creating invoices needs to be checking and re-checking them. If it’s logistically possible depending on your workflow, have them verified by a second employee.
Offer discounts for early payment and assess finance charges
Offering discounts is a balancing act. You’ll be getting less money for your sale–even 5 percent multiplied by many customers can add up–but it may make sense financially for you to take a small hit in return for being able to deposit the payment sooner. We can help you do the math here.
To offer this, you’ll have to set up your discount scenario as a Term option (Lists | Customer & Vendor Profile Lists | Terms List), as seen here:
Figure 3: This Standard discount term gives customers a 5 percent discount if their invoice is paid within 10 days.To make a customer eligible for the discount, open the Customer Center and double-click on a customer, then on Payment Settings | Payment Terms.
You might also want to be assessing finance charges. The revenue you bring in from finance charges will probably be negligible. But sometimes, just knowing that a late payment will be more costly may prompt your customers to settle up in a timely fashion.
Whatever approaches you choose to accelerate your receivables, be consistent. If any of your customers should compare notes, you want to be regarded as being firm but fair.
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Come spring time, most people are eager to throw open the doors and windows, and do some spring cleaning. It’s a good time to “spring clean” Quickbooks as well.
It’s not difficult to see when your home needs cleaning, but QuickBooks company file errors are harder to detect, including:
- Performance problems
- Inability to execute specific processes, like upgrading
- Occasional program crashes
- Missing data (accounts, names, etc.)
- Refusal to complete transactions, and
- Mistakes in reports.
Figure 1: If some transactions wonât go through when you click one of the Save buttons–or worse, QuickBooks shuts down–you may have a corrupted company file.Call for Help
The best thing you can do if you notice problems like this cropping up in QuickBooks–especially if you’re experiencing multiple ones–is to contact us. We understand the file structure of QuickBooks company data, and we have access to tools that you don’t. We can analyze your file and take steps to correct the problem(s).
One of the reasons QuickBooks files get corrupt is simply because they grow too big. That’ either a sign of your company’s success or of a lack of periodic maintenance that you can do yourself. QuickBooks contains some built-in tools that you can run occasionally to minimize your file size.
One thing you can do on your own is to rid QuickBooks of old, unneeded data. The software contains a Condense Data utility that can do this automatically. But just because QuickBooks offers a tool doesn’t mean that you should use it on your own.
Figure 2: Yes, QuickBooks allows you to use this tool on your own. But if you really want to preserve the integrity of your data, let us help.A Risky Utility
The program’s documentation for this utility contains a list of warnings and preparation steps a mile long.
We recommend that you don’t use this tool. Same goes for Verify Data and Rebuild DataUtilities menu. If you lose a significant amount of company data, you can also lose your company. It’s happened to numerous businesses.
Be Proactive
Instead, start practicing good preventive medicine to keep your QuickBooks company file healthy. Once a month or so, perhaps at the same time you reconcile your bank accounts, do a manual check of your major Lists.
Run the Account Listing report (Lists | Chart of Accounts | Reports | Account Listing). Are all of your bank accounts still active? Do you see accounts that you no longer used or which duplicate each other? Don’t try to “fix” the Chart of Accounts on your own. Let us help.
Figure 3: You might run this report periodically to see if it can be abbreviated.Be very careful here, but if there are Customers and Vendors that have been off your radar for a long time, consider removing them, but only once you’re sure that your interaction with them is history. Same goes for Items and Jobs. Go through the other lists in this menu with a critical but conservative eye. If there’s any doubt, leave them there.
A Few Alternatives
There are other options. Your copy of QuickBooks may be misbehaving because it’s unable to handle the depth and complexity of your company. It may be time to upgrade. If you’re using QuickBooks Pro, move up to Premier. And if Premier isn’t cutting it anymore, consider QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions.
There’s cost involved, of course, but you may already be losing money by losing time because of your version’s limitations. All editions of QuickBooks look and work similarly, so that your learning curve will be minimal.
Also, try to minimize the number of open windows that are active in QuickBooks. That will improve your performance. And what about your hardware? Is it getting a little long in the tooth? At least consider adding memory, but PCs are cheap these days. If you’re having problems with many of your applications, it may be time for an upgrade.
A Stitch in Time…
We’ve suggested many times here that you contact us for help with your spring cleanup. While that may seem self-serving, remember that it takes us a lot less time and money to take preventive steps with your QuickBooks company file than to troubleshoot a broken one.
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You send invoices because you sold products and/or services. Purchase orders go out when you’re running low on inventory, and there are always bills to pay, it seems like. All of this activity is, of course, important in itself, but all of your conscientious bookkeeping culminates in what’s probably the most critical element of QuickBooks: your reports.
Reports can tell you how many navy blue sweatshirts you sold in March, what you paid for health insurance premiums in the first quarter, and how much you bought from your favorite vendor last month. They’re very good at drilling down to get the precise set of numbers you need.
But carefully customized and properly analyzed reports can do more than tell you how many golf clubs to order and when it’s time to switch phone services. They can help you make the business decisions that will help you take your growing company to the next level. There are several that you should be looking at regularly, some of which you can interpret easily and use in your daily workflow. We’ll help you with the interpretation of the more complex financial reports.
Who Owes Money?
That’s probably a question you ask yourself every day. You don’t necessarily have to run the A/R Aging Detail report every day, but you’ll want to run it frequently. It tells you who owes you money and whether they’ve missed the due date (and by how many days).
Figure 1: By running the A/R Aging Detail report, you can see whether you need to follow up with customers who have past due invoices.As with any report, you can modify it to include the columns, data set and date range you want by clicking the Customize button. When you create a report in a format that you think you might want to run again, click the Memorize button. Enter a name that you’ll remember, and assign it to a Memorized Report Group.
Getting There
There are two ways to find the reports you want to see. You can open the Reports menu and move your cursor down to the category you want, like Customers & Receivables, which will open a slide-out menu of options there.
Or you can open the Report Center, which lets you explore reports in more depth. Each is represented by a small graphic with four icons under it. You can:
- Run the report with your own data in it
- Open a small informational window
- Designate it as a Favorite, and
- View QuickBooks help.
Figure 2: If you access QuickBooks reports through the Report Center, you’ll have several related options.Other accounts receivable reports that you should consult periodically include Open Invoices and Average Days to Pay.
Tracking What You Owe
Reports can also keep you up-to-date on money that you owe to other people and companies. An important one is Unpaid Bills Detail, accessible through the Vendors & Payables menu item. Though you can modify its columns, this report basically tells you who is expecting money from you, the date the bill was issued and its due date, any number assigned to it, the balance due, and relevant aging information.
Vendor Balance Detail is critical, too. This report displays every transaction (invoices, payments, etc.) that contribute to the balance you have with each vendor.
Standard Financial Reports
Figure 3: We hope you’ll let us help you by running and interpreting these standard financial reports.QuickBooks report categories include one labeled Company & Financial. These are reports that you can run yourself, but they’re critical for understanding your company’s financial status. We can customize and analyze these for you on a regular basis so you’ll know where you stand. They include:
- Balance Sheet. What is the value of your company? The balance sheet breaks out this information by account (under the umbrella of assets, liabilities and equity).
- Income Statement. Often referred to as Profit & Loss, this shows you how much money your business made or lost over a specific time period.
- Statement of Cash Flows. How much money came in and went out during a specified time range?
Reports can only generate information about what you’ve entered in QuickBooks and exactly where it’s been entered. So it’s crucial that you follow standard accounting practice as you proceed through your daily workflow. We’re always available to answer questions you have about QuickBooks’ structure and your activity there. Your reports–and your critical business decisions–depend on it.
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One of the reasons that QuickBooks appeals to millions of small businesses is because it offers multiple ways to complete the same tasks, which accommodates different work styles. Say, for example, you wanted to look up a specific invoice. You could:
- Go to the Customer Center and select the customer, and then scan through the list of transactions,
- Use the Find feature (Edit | Find), or
- Create a report.
There’s also another way you can get there if you have a recent version of QuickBooks: the Income Tracker. (Note: Only the Administrator or a staff member with the correct permissions can access this feature. Talk to us about whether to allow other employees to use it, and how to set that up.)
Figure 1: QuickBooks’ Income Tracker provides a visual overview of your company’s income.That’s the first thing you can do with QuickBooks’ Income Tracker. To get there, either click the link in the vertical navigation bar or go to Customers | Income Tracker.
Four colored bars across the top of the screen represent unbilled estimates, open invoices, overdue invoices, and invoices paid within the last 30 days. Each bar contains two numerical values: the number of transactions of that type and the dollar amount involved.
QuickBooks defaults to displaying all types of transactions, but when you click on a bar, the screen changes to show only that type of transaction.
You can also filter the table of transactions using the drop-down lists below the colored bars. Your choices here include Customer:Job, Type, Status (Open, Paid, etc.) and Date (range). Click the arrow to the right of each filter’s label to display your options.
The column labels below these lists will change depending on the transaction type that’s active.
More Functionality
The Income Tracker is great for simply viewing groups of transactions; double-clicking on one will open the original form. You can also open them by selecting an action to take. For example, open your estimates list and click on a transaction to highlight it. Then click the arrow next to Select in the Action column at the far right end of the row.
Figure 2: You can modify transactions like estimates from within the Income Tracker.If you choose the first option here, QuickBooks opens a small window that asks you whether you’d like to create an invoice for 100 percent of the estimate, a percentage of it, specific items, or percentages of each item. When you make your selection and click OK, a completed invoice form opens, which you can then check over and save.
As you can see above, you can also mark the estimate as inactive, print it, or email it.
Each transaction type supports a different set of actions. In the open invoice action column, as you’d expect, you can click the option to Receive Payment, which opens the Customer Payment window with the customer and amount due already filled in. This can be edited to reflect a different amount, or you can just accept it as is, then save it.
Flexible Forms
You can even create a new transaction within the Income Tracker. Click on the arrow next to Manage Transactions in the lower left corner of the screen and select the form you want.
Figure 3: You can open new transaction screens from within QuickBooks’ Income Tracker.The Income Tracker also provides one of the fastest ways to print multiple forms. Just select the transactions you want to print by clicking in the box in front of them, and then click the arrow next to Batch Actions in the lower left corner.
Finally, you can edit transactions from here, too. Either double-click on one or select it and click Edit Highlighted Row in the Manage Transactions menu.
QuickBooks’ Income Tracker doesn’t do anything that can’t be done another way in the program. But it provides an excellent one-glance view of the current state of your receivables movement.
If youâre consistently seeing patterns that you don’t like, call us. We can evaluate your receivables process and suggest ways to accelerate it. Even if your sales aren’t increasing, getting that “PAID” stamp on invoices quickly will improve your cash flow and strengthen your confidence as a business manager.
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If your small business sells products, you know how precisely you must track your starting stock numbers, ongoing inventory levels, and your reorder points. QuickBooks provides tools to help with this process, but human factors can sometimes throw off your careful counts.
Fortunately, QuickBooks is remarkably flexible when it comes to recording the time your employees spend on customers and jobs. You can enter information about a single activity — either billable or unbillable — and/or document hours in a timesheet. A built-in timer (the “Stopwatch”) helps you count the minutes automatically; you can also type them in manually.
One Work Session
All versions of desktop QuickBooks include dialog boxes designed to help you enter all the details related to a single timed activity. To get there, either open the Employees menu and select Enter Time | Time/Enter Single Activity or click the down arrow next to the Enter Time icon on the Home Page and choose Time/Enter Single Activity.
Figure 1: QuickBooks helps you create records for individual activities completed by employees, which can be either billable or unbillable.You fill out the fields in this window like you would any other in QuickBooks. Click the calendar icon in the DATE field to reflect the date the work was completed (not the current date), and click the down arrows in the fields that contain them to select options from a list. If you already know the duration of the activity, simply enter it in the field to the right of the clock icon. Otherwise, use the Start, Stop, and Pause buttons to let QuickBooks time it.
The Time/Enter Single Activity dialog box is designed to record one activity, not necessarily an entire workday, unless an employee only provides one service for one customer in a day. If he or she provides more than one service for one or more customers, you’ll need a fresh record for each.
Note: If the employee selected is timesheet-based, an additional field will appear above the CLASS field asking for the related PAYROLL ITEM. And if you’ve turned on workers’ compensation (and the employee is timesheet-based), a field titled WC CODE will drop into place below it. This must be done absolutely correctly, and it can get complicated. We can help you manage this feature.
A Comprehensive View
At the top of the Time/Enter Single Activity dialog box, you’ll see an icon labeled Timesheet. If you click on this with an employee’s name selected, his or her timesheet will open and display the hours already entered for that period. Or you can open a blank timesheet by opening the Employees menu and selecting Enter Time | Use Weekly Timesheet. You can also click the Enter Time icon on the Home Page.
Figure 2: You can access an employee’s timesheet from the Time/Enter Single Activity dialog box, from the Employees menu, or from the Home Page.If you’ve entered all of the hours individually for an employee in a given time period, the timesheet should be correct when you click through from the Time/Enter Single Activity box. If not, you can edit cells by clicking in them and changing the data. Be sure that the Billable box is checked or unchecked correctly.
You can also enter hours directly on a timesheet instead of recording individual activities. Just select the employee’s name by clicking on the arrow in the NAME field at the top of the Weekly Timesheet dialog box and fill in the boxes.
Note: Individual activities that you enter for employees are automatically transferred to the timesheet format and vice-versa.
Billing for Time
QuickBooks keeps track of all entered billable hours and reminds you of them when it’s time to invoice. If customers have outstanding time and/or costs, this dialog box will open the next time you start to create an invoice for them:
Figure 3: This dialog box is one of the ways QuickBooks helps you bill customers for everything they owe.QuickBooks also provides several reports related to billing for time. We’ll be happy to go over them and–as always–help with any other questions you might have.
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Satisfying though it may be to enter all of those customer payments manually on a paper deposit slip, it can also be tedious and time-consuming. The more successful in business you are, the more time and care it takes.
Whether you accept cash, checks, or credit/debit cards, QuickBooks has tools that help you streamline the process of moving the funds into your physical bank accounts. In fact, part of your job is done when you enter the payments on the Receive Payments or Sales Receipt screens.
An Important Decision
When you record a payment in QuickBooks, you can enter it in one of two ways. Ask us if youâre not certain which one best suits your business. Payments can be deposited:
- In a specific bank account. QuickBooks lets you specify an individual account for each transaction. If you select this option, a box labeled DEPOSIT TO will appear on the Sales Receipt and Receive Payment screens. Select an account from the drop-down list, and your payment will be automatically deposited into it.
Figure 1: You can choose to deposit customer payments to specific accounts.- In Undeposited Funds. This is an asset account that can hold multiple payments, but they are not automatically deposited.
If you decide to have all payments sent to the Undeposited Funds account, you can establish that as your default. Open the Edit menu and select Preferences | Payments | Company Preferences. Then make sure that the box in front of Use Undeposited Funds as a default deposit to account is checked.
Figure 2: Check the box on the right if you want payments sent to the Undeposited Funds asset account. You will make the actual deposits later. If this box is not checked, a DEPOSIT TO field will appear on the Sales Receipt and Receive Payments screens.Other Deposits
What about money you receive that is neither payment on an invoice you sent nor payment for an item or service received immediately? There are many situations where this might be the case, including:
- Vendor refunds, rebates, etc.,
- Unsolicited donations [for non-profits], or
- An ownerâs investment in the business.
To record incoming funds like these, open the Banking menu and select Make Deposits to open the Payments to Deposit window. Click OK to skip to the Make Deposits window.
Complete the Deposit To, Date, and Memo fields, then click in the table below them if you havenât already used the Tab key to get there. Use the drop-down lists to select (or add) the individual or company who submitted the payment, the account where it should be tracked, the payment method, and the amount. Enter any additional information needed, fill in the optional Cash back goes to fields, and then save the transaction.
Note: While youâre working in the Make Deposits window, you can click the Payments button at any time to open a new window containing customer payments that need to be deposited if you want to process them simultaneously.
You may also want to use the Attach tool for miscellaneous payments to store related documentation.
Depositing Undeposited Funds
You should process your Undeposited Funds on a regular basis, whether every day, every few days, or weekly, depending on your banking needs. To do this, go to Banking | Make Deposits.
Figure 3: You can either view all of the unprocessed payments in Undeposited Funds in a single list, or you can display them by type.The Payments to Deposit window will open if you have pending payments in your Undeposited Funds account. Put a check mark in front of all of the payments you want to deposit by clicking in the column to the left of the DATEcolumn.
Click OK, and the Make Deposits window will open, displaying the payments you just chose. As we instructed previously, select the account where you want the money deposited and the date, add a memo, and request cash back if desired. Save your work when youâre finished.
These are the steps youâll take to deposit payments by cash and check. If youâre planning to open a merchant account so you can accept debit and credit cards, the process is similar, but there are additional steps you must take to ensure that your books balance.
We can show you the ropes and answer any other questions you have about depositing payments. You work hard for your money, so make sure you see it in your bank accounts.
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There are numerous ways to prioritize your workday. Do the most difficult things first. Get important phone calls out of the way. Respond to customer emails.
But it’s likely that one activity takes precedence when you see that it needs to be done: recording payments. While you’re probably very careful with this process, it’s critical that your actions here are accurate. If they’re not, you could either lose money that you’ve earned or anger customers by requesting payments theyâve already made.
QuickBooks comes with some helpful pre-defined payment types; however, you also have the flexibility to edit that list and add new types. To see your list, open the Lists menu and select Customer & Vendor Profile Lists, then Payment Method List. This window opens:
Figure 1: QuickBooks lets you accept payments from customers in a variety of ways.To make changes to this list, click the down arrow to the right of Payment Method. By selecting items from this menu, you can add, edit, and delete payment methods. You can also make one temporarily inactive if for some reason you’re not going to support that option right now but donât want to delete it, either. Click in the box next to Include Inactive if you want it to remain on the list (an X will appear next to it). When you want to reinstate it, open the Payment Method menu again and select Make Payment Method Active.
To search for every transaction that used a specific payment method, highlight it in the list and select Find in Transactions. QuickBooks will open the Find window with that filter already applied.
When you’re done working with that window, click the x in the upper right to close it.
Applying the Funds
Ideally, you or someone on your staff will be working frequently with the Receive Payments screen frequently. To get there, open the Customers menu and select Receive Payments, or click Receive Payments on the home page. This is the screen you will work with if you’re recording a payment that is to be applied to an invoice that you sent.
Figure 2: The Receive Payments screen in QuickBooksFirst, select a customer by clicking on the down arrow in the field to the right of RECEIVED FROM. If there are outstanding invoices, they will appear in the table below. Enter the PAYMENT AMOUNT in the field below, and change the date if necessary. Click on the icon representing the payment method. If you don’t see it there, click the down arrow below MORE and add it or select it. Your chosen icon will turn green. Then:
- For cash or e-checks: Just enter any REFERENCE # needed.
- For checks: Enter the CHECK #.
- For credit/debit cards: If you’ve saved the customer’s preferred payment method in his or her record, the number will fill in automatically. If not, or you need to change it, enter it manually. As you know, you need a merchant account in order to accept credit/debit cards and e-checks. If you haven’t set one up and want to, let us help.
If the payment amount equals the total of all outstanding invoices, there will be a check mark in the first column of every line in the table. If the payment is for any less than the CUSTOMER BALANCE in the upper right, QuickBooks automatically pays the oldest invoice(s) first. You’ll also see an UNDERPAYMENT box in the lower left corner. Click the button in front of your preference here (leave as underpayment or write off the extra).
When you’re done, click one of the Save buttons.
Other Types of Payments
You’ll also use the Receive Payments window to record down payments and overpayments. And there are situations where you’ll have to complete other forms to document the incoming money. For example, if a customer makes a partial payment for products or services that haven’t yet been invoiced, you’d use a Payment Item. A customer who pays for a product at the time it is received would get a Sales Receipt.
Figure 3: Sales receipts go to customers who pay for products or services at the time they are received.This may all sound a little confusing. But it won’t be if you gain a thorough understanding of the right way to record different types of payments. We can go over all of this with you to ensure that your incoming money is documented correctly, which will take less time than trying to retrace your steps when a mistake has occurred.
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You’re meeting your sales goals. Keeping inventory balanced. Making sure that every billable hour gets invoiced. Taking advantage of vendor discounts. Basically, doing everything in your power to keep cash flow humming.
But you can’t control how quickly your customers pay you.
You can, though, use QuickBooks’ tools to:
- Make it easier for customers to remit their payments,
- Remind customers about unpaid balances, and
- Keep a close eye on unpaid invoices.
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Figure 1: QuickBooks lets you accept payments from customers in multiple forms. Accepting credit cards and e-checks is likely to speed up your receivables.Process Plastic
You can, of course, offer customers a discount for paying early. That may work in some cases. But accepting credit cards and e-checks is likely to be more effective. It also has other positive impacts on your business, including:
A more professional image. What do you think when you purchase goods or services from a business that doesn’t accept credit cards? In 2015, this is unusual. It may make customers wonder why. And you work too hard to preserve your reputation to give anyone reason to question your standing.
Time savings for you. How much time do you spend logging checks and running to the bank with deposits? It’s must faster to simply record a credit card payment.
Convenience and goodwill for customers. Your customers will appreciate the time that they’ll save, which translates to a feather in your cap.
There are extra costs associated with setting up what’s called a “merchant account.” And you’ll have to learn how to set up an account and process payments. But once you’ve done so, you’ll be able to invoice customers in QuickBooks and let them pay immediately by credit card. If you ever have occasion to accept payments out of the office, you’ll be able to use your smartphone or tablet to accept them.
We’d like to see you take this positive step for your business, so let us know when you’re ready. We’ll help with setup and implementation.
Send Statements
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Figure 2: You have a lot of options to choose from when you create statements in QuickBooks.This may be an area of QuickBooks you’ve never explored. Statements are just what they sound like: detailed summaries of what each customer owes over a period of time that you email or print and send by U.S. Mail.
QuickBooks makes this very easy. Start by either clicking the Statements icon on the home page or by opening the Customers menu and selecting Create Statements. The window above appears, laying out the three steps required:
- SELECT STATEMENT OPTIONS. Be sure that the Statement Date is correct. Then indicate whether you want your statements to include transactions within a specified date range or all transactions are past due by more than a specified number of days.
- SELECT CUSTOMERS. You can generate statements for one customer, all customers, or a designated group in between.
- SELECT ADDITIONAL OPTIONS. You’ll have several decisions to make here about your statements’ content and appearance. Let us know if you have questions about any of these.
Track Outstanding Receivables
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Figure 3: When you create the Open Invoices report, make sure that the Aging and Open Balancecolumns will display.As a small business owner and/or manager, there are certain QuickBooks reports that you should be looking at frequently. One of them, Open Invoices, gives you an instant status update on your outstanding receivables. But it’s important that you set up the report to give you the exact information you need.
Open the Reports menu and select Customers & Receivables | Open Invoices. If you need to change the date range, click the down arrow to the right of the Dates field in the upper left to display your options and choose and then click Customize Report above that. The window pictured above opens. Grab the scroll bar under COLUMNS and move it down until you see Aging and Open Balance. If there are no check marks in front of them, click in the column to create them.
There are other reports you’ll want to look at regularly as you try to accelerate incoming customer payments, like A/R Aging Summary and A/R Aging Detail. If we’re not already working with you on reports, creating and analyzing the critical financial reports that we should be generating monthly or quarterly, let’s set up a meeting.
Call the office today if your copy of QuickBooks needs a tune-up at the same time to ensure that you can keep accepting those payments accurately.
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These days, some of us find ourselves updating multiple calendars. There’s the Outlook calendar or other web-based solution for scheduling and task management. Or, maybe a smartphone app to track a “to-do” on the road with a paper calendar as backup.
But where do you keep track of your everyday financial tasks? Including these in your scheduling calendars and/or task lists will make for very crowded screens, not to mention how inconvenient it can be to keep switching between applications.
Consider adding one more tracking tool: the QuickBooks calendar. This graphical screen isn’t designed for data entry (except for the to-do list); rather, it’s designed to give you a quick overview of your financial activity, both historically and in the future.
Figure 1: The QuickBooks calendar consists of two parts. The graphical calendar itself displays one of three types of entries: Entered, Due, or To Do. The number in parentheses refers to the number of each type that occurred or will occur that day. Details of each entry appear below; double-clicking on one opens the original form.Calendar Setup
Before you start using the QuickBooks calendar, you should designate your display and content options. Open the Edit menu and select Preferences | Calendar. Make sure that the My Preferences tab is active.
Click on the arrows to the right of every field to open the menu that displays your choices. The first of these are:
- Calendar view. Daily? Weekly? Monthly? Or do you want QuickBooks to remember the last view that was open?
- Weekly view. Should the calendar only display the primary workdays or all seven?
- Show. What items would you like to have displayed on the calendar? It defaults to All Transactions, but you can filter it by transaction type.
You can also specify whether you want past due and upcoming entries to be included, and for how many days.
Tracking your “To-Do”
Figure 2: You can create to-do items and have them appear on the QuickBooks calendar.The QuickBooks calendar also offers tools for creating a to-do list of several types (call, fax, email, meeting, appointment, or task). These will appear on the calendar unless you filter them out.
Tip: The link that opens the to-do window is somewhat hard to find, but is located in the lower right corner of the graphical calendar.
Click on Add To Do to get started. The window pictured above opens. Click the arrow to the right of the field under TYPE and select the type of to-do that you want to define. You can also select a PRIORITY level if you’d like.
Below those two fields is a small box to the left of WITH. If you want to connect that activity to a customer, vendor, or employee, click in the box and select the type. Then click the arrow next to the field below it and choose the correct individual or company.
You aren’t required to create this link; you can simply designate your to-do type and enter a DATE, TIME, and DETAILS. The activity will still appear on your QuickBooks calendar. But if you do associate it with a specific entity, like a customer, it will appear in that customer’s record when you click on the To Do tab.
A Word About Reminders
Figure 3: You can get advance notice of scheduled financial activities by setting up Reminders. Go to Edit | Preferences | Reminders | Company Preferences.The QuickBooks calendar is not really a reminder tool. You’ll need to use QuickBooks’ Reminders to get help with advance notice of due dates.
But the calendar will display the actual due dates for transactions. If you’ve entered a bill that’s due on February 28, for example, the word Due will appear on that date in the graphical calendar; the number of transactions due will appear in parentheses after it. All entries for that day appear in a list below. To see the original form, you’d double-click on the one you want to see.
Using Reminders in conjunction with the QuickBooks calendar can help you stay current with sales and purchases – if you have you due dates established in a way that will be good for your cash flow. Call the office if you need help scheduling incoming and outgoing payments in a way that will work to your advantage.
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For the past year, you’ve been faithfully creating new records, entering transactions, and recording payments. You’ve run basic reports. You’ve done your collection duties. You may have even paid employees and submitted payroll taxes.
Now that another year has come and gone, if you haven’t done so, it’s time to wrap and review those work tasks that should have been completed by December 31. First up is your annual QuickBooks wrap-up.
Create and send year-end statements.
Figure 1: As your customers wrap up 2016, too, it’s good to send statements to past-due accounts.In an ideal world, all of the invoices that were due in December would be paid off by the end of the year. We all know that that’s not usually the reality. Two reports can help you here: the A/R Aging Summary and Open Invoices.
If you didn’t give everyone a chance to clear their accounts before December 31 by sending statements, do so now. Click Statements on the Home page (or Customers | Create Statements) to open the window pictured above.
You have multiple options here that are fairly self-explanatory. The screen above is set up to create statements for all customers who have an open balance as of the date you select, but not for inactive customers or those with a zero balance or no account activity.
That way, no one who’s paid in full to date will receive a statement. Of course, if you didn’t want statements created for anyone who’s less than 30 days past due, you’d click in the box in front of Include only transactions over and enter a “30” in the following field.
Tip: You can also find out who is overdue by clicking on the Customers tab in the left vertical pane to open the Customer Information screen. Click on the down arrow to the right of the field just below Customers & Jobs. QuickBooks provides several filters for your list.
Reduce your inventory.
Figure 2: Want to discount all or selected items in your inventory by the same percentage or amount? Open the Customers menu and click Change Item Prices.If you only sell a few products, you probably already know what didn’t sell well in 2016. If your stable of products is larger, you can run QuickBooks reports like Inventory Stock Status by Item and Sales by Item Detail to identify your slow-sellers and discount them now. You may need to filter your reports to see the right data. Please call to discuss customization options if you’re unsure of how to do this.
Clean up your contact lists.
If you don’t maintain your customer and vendor lists, you’ll eventually start wasting time scrolling through them when you enter transactions. So this would be a good time to designate those contacts that you’ve not dealt with in 2016 as Inactive (you can delete their records entirely, but we advise against that). Simply open a Customer record, for example, and click the small pencil icon in the upper right to edit it. Click on the box in front of Customer is inactive.
Send holiday greetings to customers and vendors.
If you didn’t get around to doing this last month, then consider sending a greeting in January (Best Wishes for a Successful 2017!) when your customers’ and vendors’ lives have slowed down a bit. You’re less likely to get lost in the crowd. If your lists are short enough, personalize these cards as much as possible. At least sign them by hand if you can.
Tip: You can print customer labels for your cards directly from QuickBooks. Open the File menu and then click Print Forms | Labels.
Run advanced reports.
Finally, if you’re not already using a QuickBooks professional to create and analyze advanced financial reports (found in the Accountant & Taxes submenu of Reports) monthly or quarterly, then you should be. They’re important, and they give you insight into your business financials that you can’t get on your own. Please call if you need assistance with this task.
Thank you for being a client in 2016 and best wishes for a successful 2017!
Setup & Customization Tips
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- Edit
- Preferences
- Desktop View
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- Click on Edit
- Click on Preference
- Click the picture of Reminders from the list that appears
- Make sure a check mark is in the box marked “Show Reminders list when opening a company file”
- Click the OK button
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To password protect your QuickBooks data file click on Company in the menu bar, then Set Up Users. From here, you can assign a password for the main (Administrator) account in QuickBooks. You can also set up user accounts, passwords, and different levels of access if you have multiple people using your QuickBooks file. Make sure you keep your newly created password in a safe place (just in case you forget it!)
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To allow the sharing of your QuickBooks file, your best option is to have a computer network in place. This network will provide the foundation for you to then share the file between two or more computers. You can have either a wired or wireless network within your office.
It is also possible to take a backup copy of the QuickBooks file from one computer and restore it to a second computer to allow sharing of the information. However, I don’t recommend this if both computers will be entering QuickBooks data. If you do this, you won’t know who has the most recent copy of the data file, and things can get messed up quite easily. Your best bet is to talk to a local computer consultant about a network for your home or office.
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The first thing you must do is tell QuickBooks that you will be issuing 1099s. Click on Edit (from the menu bar), then Preferences. Scroll down until you find the picture that says “Tax:1099” and click on it. On the Company Preferences tab, answer yes to the question about the issuance of 1099 forms, then follow the rest of the instructions on this screen.
Next, you’ll need to identify those vendors who are eligible to receive a 1099. Click on Vendors, then Vendor List. Double-click on the first vendor in the list, then the “Additional Info” tab. In the lower left hand corner, put a check mark in the box that says “vendor eligible for 1099” and enter their tax ID number they have provided. Repeat this process for any vendors that need to receive a 1099.
Finally, to run the 1099’s and related information, click on Reports, then Vendors, then either of the 1099 reports. Verify the data, correct if necessary, and print your 1099’s all within QuickBooks.
It’s important to review this topic with your accountant to ensure you are collecting the proper information and preparing the 1099 forms correctly for your business.
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One of the reasons the QuickBooks line of desktop products has been so successful is because of its clean, simple appearance and efficient navigational tools. But there’s room for improvement and personalization. Everyone uses QuickBooks just a little differently. You can create a desktop that meets your specific needs, while maintaining the program’s inherent usability. Every desktop version of QuickBooks (except for Simple Start) offers several tools to accommodate your preferences, so we’ll show you some of the best.
Establish Default Windows for Startup
QuickBooks automatically opens to its default desktop (the Home page), which displays a set of the most commonly used navigational icons, separated by type. You can change this behavior so that every time you launch the program, it opens to the screen(s) you want to see first.
You’ll have to tweak your Preferences to make this happen. Click Edit | Preferences. In the list on the left, click Desktop View. You’ll see a window that looks like Figure 1:
Figure 1:
In the Desktop View section of your Preferences window, you can choose to have one window or multiple windows open, and save a desktop configuration that will open when you launch QuickBooks.
Note: If you want be able to have multiple windows open simultaneously, be sure that option is checked.
There are three options for preserving your desktop layout. If you click Save when closing company, QuickBooks will open with the windows that were open when you last closed the company file. If you don’t want any windows to open, check Don’t save the desktop. And if you have a set of favorite windows that you want to open each time you launch QuickBooks, set up that configuration and click Save current desktop. Of course, you can simply choose to have the Home page display when you load QuickBooks.
There are other desktop-related options in this same window that have to do with QuickBooks’ help features. You may also want to adjust these if you commonly use those services.
Customize Your Icon Bar
This is probably the simplest thing you can do to improve navigation. QuickBooks comes with an icon bar pre-installed, a horizontal strip at the top of the screen whose icons take you to specific parts of the program. The default icon bar may serve your purposes well, but if not, you can easily modify it. Click View | Customize Icon Bar (or right-click directly on the icon bar). The window shown in Figure 2 opens.
Figure 2:
The Customize Icon Bar window contains all the tools you need to modify the navigational icons displayed in the QuickBooks icon bar.
To add, edit, or delete icons, simply click on the appropriate buttons. A new window opens containing self-explanatory tools to help you make your changes. You can also add separators (vertical lines) that can divide related groupings of icons.
Tracking Open Windows
If you’ve chosen to have multiple windows open simultaneously, you can easily keep track of what’s open-and navigate there quickly-by using the Open Windows list. To get there, click View | Open Window List. QuickBooks will open the sidebar shown in Figure 3. This list appears to the left of the main desktop or any open windows. To close it, simply click View, then uncheck Open Window List.
Figure 3:
You can use the Open Window List to keep track of which windows are open. Clicking on one takes you there.
Customizing the Home Page
QuickBooks’ Home page is one of the program’s best feature. It not only serves as a navigational tool-you can click on an icon labeled, for example, Enter Bills, and QuickBooks will take you to that page-but it also illustrates the workflow of some processes.
You have some control over what appears on the Home Page. To make changes, click Edit | Preferences, then Desktop View and then Company Preferences tab to display the window in Figure 4.
Figure 4:
In this window, you can turn on or off some of the icons that appear on the Home page.
Here, you can check or uncheck icons like Sales Receipts. But in order to show or hide icons, you’ll have to make sure that the actual features enabling them are active or inactive.
Your current preferences are displayed at the bottom of the window. You can easily alter them by clicking on one of the hyperlinks. So if Sales Tax is off, for example, click on it, and a window opens that lets you set up a sales tax item.
Finding Favorites
There’s yet another way to isolate the functions you use most often: the Favorites list. Click Favorites | Customize Favorites to access the list of options (like Chart of Accounts and Price Level List). Highlight one, then click Add.When you’re done with your list, click OK. Click the Favorites menu anytime you want to access these.
QuickBooks desktop is a powerful navigational tool, and provides simple maps to all of the program’s functions. Such versatility and customizability contribute to the program’s overall ease of use, and make it a pleasure to use.
Setting up Preferences correctly in QuickBooks-for elements like Items & Inventory and Payments-will make the program work the way you need it to. If you have any questions on how to do this, please call us.
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ooks’ most tax-specific tools. QuickBooks supports many business tax forms, including the 1040, 1120, and 1065, and the steps outlined here apply to all small business tax filers using QuickBooks Pro, Premier, and Enterprise.
If you haven’t already (and you should have), order your W-2 and 1099 Kits
These forms must be filed at the beginning of each year; they report employee wages and salaries to Federal, state, and local agencies. Data is printed directly from QuickBooks onto the correct line in the forms. You can purchase these kits (shown in Figure 1) directly from Intuit, and you must have a Standard Payroll or Enhanced Payroll subscription in a supported version to process them.
Figure 1: Intuit sells kits that help you print QuickBooks tax data directly on the correct forms.
Check the Company Information window to make sure it reflects the right tax form
This is crucial no matter who is preparing your taxes. You should have been thinking ahead to tax time when you set up your company in QuickBooks, but you can take this step prior to starting your prep.
Make sure you’ve specified the appropriate tax form for use in QuickBooks. Go to Company|Company Information, as shown in Figure 2. At the bottom of the window, find the Income Tax Form Used line, and make sure it’s set to the correct form.
Figure 2: On the Company Information window, be sure that the Income Tax Form Used line is pointing at the correct form.
In this same window, check the fiscal year dates to make sure they’re correct, and that other tax-related fields are filled out accurately.
Make sure your tax-related accounts are assigned to the correct tax line on the form
If you used the EasyStep interview for setup, QuickBooks automatically assigned some accounts to the correct tax line. You can change these at any time, and add your own accounts. This Tax-Line Mapping will be important down the road if you export data to an Intuit tax product and/or run tax reports.
Warning: Altering the Chart of Accounts is a precise operation, and affects many parts of QuickBooks. You may want to consult with an accounting professional.
Click Lists|Chart of Accounts. Select an account, like Interest Expense, and right-click on it. Click Edit Account, and the window shown in Figure 3 appears.
Figure 3: QuickBooks lets you do Tax-Line Mapping, which specifies the relationship between accounts and tax form lines.
If you want to change the tax line, click the arrow to the right of the current selection and choose the correct one from the drop-down list. To add an account, click Lists|Chart of Accounts. In the bottom left of the screen, click the arrow in the Account button. Click New, and follow the instructions in the wizard that opens.
Run tax-related reports
QuickBooks provides three reports that you’ll need whether you or your accountant is preparing your taxes. To find them, click Reports|Accountant & Taxes.
The first report is the Income Tax Preparation Report. This lays out a list of your accounts and the tax line each is assigned to. If any that need to be assigned are unassigned, double-click on them to get to the Tax-Line Mapping window, as shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4: The Tax Preparation Report illustrates how your accounts have been assigned to tax form line items.
Two other reports are available: Income Tax Summary and Income Tax Detail, which are just what they sound like. They provide detailed and summarized lists of transactions and their totals. You can drill down on these to see the underlying transactions.
Warning: When you run Income Tax Summary, look for a line that says Tax Line Unassigned (income/expense). Double-click on any total there to see accounts that need to be assigned to a tax line, as shown here in Figure 5.
Figure 5: You can quickly check your accounts in the Income Tax Summary.
QuickBooks lets you modify these reports to include additional columns, and memorize them for easy access later. Click the Modify Report and Memorize buttons in the upper left corner to do so.
You can’t avoid taxes, but you can sure take a lot of the pain out of their preparation by using QuickBooks throughout the year to get ready. And you may get a smile out of your accountant when you hand over your carefully created records.
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One of the many ways that QuickBooks makes your life easier is its ability to create business forms for all of the financial transactions your company produces. You simply fill in the blanks or choose data from drop-down lists, and QuickBooks generates a document you can e-mail or send. Only problem is, sometimes the pre-formatted default forms don’t include all the fields you need. Further, they look rather, well, plain. This being October, you might want to add a Halloween-centric logo, for example. Fortunately, QuickBooks is flexible. Using simple tools, you can modify the prefab forms that are included with the program to add a logo or other graphics and indicate which fields you would like to have appear.
Made To Order
To get started, click Lists/Templates. (In Simple Start, open a new invoice and click Customize/Manage Templates.) The window shown in Figure 1 opens. As you can see, QuickBooks already provides multiple versions of some forms. Take a look at these before you do any modifying to see if one will meet your needs.
Figure 1: The list of QuickBooks forms templates gives you many pre-formatted options.
Select a template you want to start from, like the Intuit Service Invoice. Click the arrow in the Templates box, and a list of command options drops down. Click on Edit Template. The Basic Customization window opens, as shown inFigure 2.
Figure 2: The Basic Customization window allows you to alter existing form designs.
Customizing Templates
Templates are designed for use with Intuit’s preprinted forms. So if you want to make additional changes, you’ll have to make a copy of the form before doing so (which may or may not work with Intuit’s forms). Click Manage Templates, and then click the Copy button. The program creates a modifiable copy of the template, which you can rename by replacing the text in the Template Name box. Click OK. As you make changes on the left side of the window, you’ll see those modification reflected in the graphical representation of your invoice on the right.
Make It Personal
Probably the easiest thing you can do to jazz up your invoice is to add a logo. This is simple. Click the box next to Use logo. The Select Image window opens. Browse to the image you want and select it, then click Open. The image appears with your contact information at the top of the page.
Add Interest With Color
Next up is your choice of color schemes, should you want to use one. Click the arrow below Select Color Scheme. You’ll see several options here. Select the one you want, and then click Apply Color Scheme. If you don’t like the fonts supplied with the template, you can easily change those, too. Under the Change Font For option, select the field type you want to modify and click Change Font. Select the desired font and any effects you want in the window that opens and click OK.
Further Customization Options
Additional changes can be tricky. To add your phone number, for example, click the box next to Phone Number. You’ll have to use the Layout Designer to make this modification. To do so, click the Layout Designer button. You’ll see a window similar to the one in Figure 3. If you’ve never used a layout design tool, you’ll have to work with this a bit. You’ll need to grab the phone number and position it where it should be. Then click Properties and Font (and/or Color). Make the necessary changes and click OK.
Figure 3: The Layout Designers allows you to make more complex adjustments to your forms.
Click the Add button to insert text boxes, data fields, and images, and Copy and Remove to use those functions. Click OK when you’re happy with your changes. This will take you back out to the Basic Customization window, where you can modify your invoice further. For example, you can click the Print Status Stamp box to have QuickBooks stamp your invoices with words like “PAID.” Click the Additional Customization button to make other changes, as shown in Figure 4. By checking and unchecking default boxes under each tab, you can continue to change the appearance of your invoice.
Figure 4: The Additional Customization window gives your finer control over the format of your forms.
Enhance Your Business With Custom Forms
You may be able to use QuickBooks invoices right out of the box. But even if you can, it’s a good idea to freshen up the boilerplate forms and add your company’s own personal touch to them. In these tight economic times, you should take any actions you can-small as they may be-to present a professional, personalized front to your customers. QuickBooks provides the tools to help you do just that.
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To get started, select Company > Planning & Budgeting > Use Business Plan Tool and you’ll see what’s displayed in Figure 1. QuickBooks’ business plan tool uses a convention that other Intuit products use frequently: a lengthy wizard that walks you through the entire process. This tool supplies information and asks questions about what’s needed on each screen. You fill in the answers (or select from options) and the business plan wizard works in the background to place the data in the correct place.
The first topic you’ll be asked about is your company. If you’re a new business, you’ll have to estimate in some areas, like the percentage of your sales that will come through credit. In other cases, you’ll be better able to answer in concrete terms. For example, what will your customer payment terms be? When do you want your business plan and financial projection to start?
Figure 1: QuickBooks walks you through the process of creating a business plan with an easy-to-use interface.
What’s Coming In?
Your income is up next, and this will take some figure-pulling (and maybe some hair-pulling). You can either fill in a spreadsheet manually, adding up to 20 categories, or use the Income Projection Wizard, as pictured in Figure 2. If you’ve already been working with your data in QuickBooks, the latter is certainly recommended. These numbers will be scrutinized very carefully, perhaps put under the microscope more than any other element of your business plan. Make sure you can back them up.
Figure 2: The QuickBooks Income Projection Wizard.
If you’re projecting manually, be prepared to calculate the Cost of Goods Sold (COGS). This number contains three pieces:
Material: What percentage of each dollar pays for the cost of product(s)? If you’re a service company, enter the associated materials costs.
Labor: What percentage of each dollar is tied to the employee costs associated with goods production?
Other: What percentage of each dollar goes into other costs?
Business Expenses and More
You have the same two choices when you’re entering your expenses. You can enter them manually or use the Expenses Projection Wizard. If you do the latter, your projections can be based on either the last 12 months of history or an average from the last 12 months.
In the Interview section, you’ll need to have numbers available, including:
Beginning account balances
Assets you own or need to buy
Cash available to invest (if applicable)
Amortization and depreciation
As in other areas of the business planning tool, existing data in QuickBooks will be automatically filled, such in Figure 3.
You’ll also answer questions here about inventory (i.e., fixed or variable, minimum balance), vendor financing, lines of credit, and your total credit limit.
Figure 3: The business planning tool pulls in existing data from QuickBooks.
Writing Your Plan
Now it’s time to write, but don’t panic thinking you’ll face a blank screen. The Plan section is divided into three sections, and you can toggle between them. You can view the actual plan outline tree, which is a window that provides tips and examples, as well as a text entry window, as shown in Figure 4.
Though this is primarily a text-based section including information about things like your company background, products and services, and the competition, you’ll supply some numbers, too, and the rationale for arriving at them.
Figure 4: The Plan section is divided into three main sections.
Once you’ve completed all of the sections, you simply preview and print your plan. QuickBooks assembles it with all of the text, tables, graphs, and charts in the right place, and presents you with a professional business plan that you can take to the bank, or simply revisit from time to time to make sure you’re on course.
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In these trying economic times it’s more important than ever to keep a close rein on your accounts receivable. Seemingly no one is immune to sudden changes in financial circumstances, so be sure to monitor your outstanding invoices closely. There’s an inverse relationship between the age of an invoice and your ability to collect on it, but fortunately QuickBooks can help you manage your credit risk:
1. Set Reminders
As shown in Figure 1, QuickBooks can display a reminder window when you open your QuickBooks company:
Choose Company, Reminders, and then click the Set Preferences button.
Choose the My Preferences tab, and then click the Show Reminders List When Opening a Company File on the My Preferences tab.
Click the Company Preferences tab, and choose Show List for Overdue Invoices. As shown in Figure 2, you can enter a negative number to be notified of overdue invoices before they reach their due date. Click OK to save your changes.
Figure 1: QuickBooks can show you a list of overdue invoices whenever you open your company.
Figure 2: Enter -3 in the Days after Due Date field to be notified when invoices are within 3 days of their due date or later.
2. Monitor Customer Balances
In addition to tracking overdue invoices, you should also stay abreast of how much credit you’ve extended to each of your customers. One way to do this is to use the Customer Center whenever you create new invoices:
Choose Customers, and then Customer Center (you can also click the Customer Center toolbar icon or press Ctrl-J).
As shown in Figure 3, the customer center lists the Balance total for each customer. You can use this information to determine whether you want to sell additional products or services. You can quickly create an invoice from the Customer Center: select a customer name, and then press Ctrl-I (as in I for invoice).
As also shown in Figure 3, you can add an Open Balance column to the transaction list. To do so, right-click on the transaction list, and then choose Customize Columns. Choose Open Balance from the Available Columns list, and then click the Add button.
Figure 3: The Customer Center makes it easy to monitor open invoices.
Expert trick: To sort customer open balances in descending order, click twice on the Balance Total column.
3. Create an Overdue Watermark
An attention getting messages, such as “OVERDUE!” or “PLEASE PAY!” can add impact to follow-up copies of invoices that you send out. It’s easy to add a watermark to your invoices:
Choose Customers, and then Create Invoices to display the Create Invoices window.
Click the Customize button on the toobar, and then click the Manage Templates button.
Select an existing invoice, such as Intuit Product Invoice, and then click the Copy button.
Use the Template name field shown in Figure 4 to assign a name like Overdue Intuit Product Invoice, instead of Copy of: Intuit Product Invoice.
Click OK to close the Manage Templates window, and then click the Layout Designer button in the Basic Customization window.
Click the Add button on the toolbar, and then choose Text Box.
Enter the message you want to add in the Text field, such as OVERDUE!
Click the Font button, and then make these changes:
- Set the Font Name to Arial Black
- Set the Font Style to Bold
- Set the Font Size to 60
- Change the Font Color to Silver
Once you’ve set the font settings, click OK to close the Font dialog box, and then click the Border tab. Unclick Top, Left, Right, and Bottom, and then click OK.
Resize and reposition the text box on your invoice, such as in the center of the body section, as shown in Figure 5.
Right-click on the text box and choose Order, and then Send Backward.
Figure 4: Assign a meaningful name to your new template.
Figure 5: You can add an OVERDUE! Watermark to a customized QuickBooks invoice template.
Going forward, you can choose this template from the list anytime you wish to follow-up on an overdue invoice.
4. Send E-mail Follow-ups
A friendly note can sometimes shake a payment loose on an overdue invoice. For instance, you can choose Reports, Customers & Receivables, and then A/R Aging Detail. Double-click on the invoice in question to display it onscreen, and then click the Send button on the toolbar, which looks like an envelope with a green arrow.
As shown in Figure 6, you can change customize the body of the e-mail to your liking. If you typically mail print copies of your original invoices, then consider changing the default text of the e-mail to make your collections easier.
To do so, click the Edit Default Text button and then make any changes that you like. Do note that these changes won’t appear in the Send Invoice window until you close it and click the Send button again. Click the Send Now button to e-mail the invoice copy to your customer.
Figure 6: Customize the default e-mail text to simplify invoice follow-ups.
5. Use Statements
QuickBooks makes it easy to send statements to one or more customers. Choose Customers, and then Create Statements. Set the desired options, including which customer or customers to contact, and then choose Print or Email to generate the statements.
6. Tweak the Collections Report
When calling on an overdue invoice, it’s helpful to make sure that your customer is aware of all pending invoices. You can easily tweak this report so that it lists all open invoices:
Choose Reports, Customers & Receivables, and then Collections Report.
Click the Modify Report button, and then click on the Filters tab.
As shown in Figure 7, click on the Date filter, and then choose Remove Selected Filter. Do the same for the Aging and Due Date filters, and then click OK.
As shown in Figure 8, the Collections Report now displays all open invoices. You can click the Memorize button to save this report for future use.
Figure 7: Modify the Collections Report filters to add helpful information to this report.
Figure 8: The resulting report shows all open invoices, as well as contact names and telephone numbers.
7. Accept Credit Cards
Many business owners avoid accepting credit cards due to the fees involved, which can top 3%. However, 97% of an overdue invoice is far better than 0%, or having to wait even longer to collect.
You can learn about QuickBooks Merchant Services by choosing Add Credit Card Processing on the Customers menu in QuickBooks. Or, consider a payment service like PayPal (www.paypal.com), which offers a free Request Money with QuickBooks wizard. Look under the Merchant Services section of your PayPal business account.
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If you’re like most QuickBooks users, you rely on the Profit & Loss Standard report to monitor how your business is doing. However, you may have overlooked an even more valuable report: the Statement of Cash Flows.
The Profit & Loss Standard (P&L) report is important in its own right, but it only provides partial insight into the health of your business. While the P&L shows what you earned and spent, the Statement of Cash Flows shows you where the cash came from and went to, also known as sources and uses.
As you’ll see in this article, you can use the Statement of Cash Flows to determine the how various activities increased or decreased your cash balance during a given report period.
Cash versus Accrual
Unlike some accounting packages, QuickBooks allows you to run most reports on either the cash or accrual basis.
Cash-basis means that transactions don’t appear on your Profit & Loss statement until either your customer pays their invoice or you pay a vendor (or employee). So, if you enter a bill in QuickBooks to be paid later, the expense won’t immediately appear on a cash-basis P&L.
Similarly, invoices that you send to customers won’t immediately appear on a cash-basis P&L. The expense appears when you write a check to the vendor, and the revenue appears when the customer honors their invoice. Accordingly, cash-basis reports don’t necessarily report a company’s true financial performance.
You could have a stellar looking Profit & Loss Report, but a list full of unpaid bills in QuickBooks. Accordingly, many accountants prefer that business owners use accrual-basis reports.
Accrual-basis reports recognize the effect of every transaction on your P&L immediately. Customer invoices appear on accrual-basis P&L reports as soon as you save the transaction, as do unpaid vendor bills. You can easily see the significance of these differences in Figures 1 and 2.
Figure 1: Cash-basis reports only reflect paid transactions.
Figure 2: Accrual-basis reports include all transactions – both paid and unpaid.
Accrual-basis reports provide a much better picture of where the business stands, but can make it harder to understand your current cash position. However, a cash-basis P&L isn’t a panacea for managing cash flow, as your business has many transactions that don’t affect the P&L.
For instance, loan payments, owner distributions, and owner contributions affect your balance sheet, which tracks assets, liabilities, and equity. Fortunately, the Statement of Cash Flows reflects these types of transactions and more, so it’s a great companion to both cash-basis and accrual-basis P&L reports.
Set Your Preference
You can instruct QuickBooks to always display your reports on either cash or accrual basis:
- Choose Edit, and then Preferences.
- Choose Reports & Graphs, and then Company Preferences.
As shown in Figure 3, specify either Cash or Accrual, and then click OK.
Figure 3: You can set either cash or accrual as your default report format.
Of course, at any time you can change a report to the other format. For instance, if your preference is set to accrual, but you may sometimes want to view a cash basis P&L:
- Choose Reports, Company & Financial, and then Profit & Loss Standard.
- Click the Modify Report button, and then choose Cash in the Report Basis section, as shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4: You can change the accounting method for your P&L on the fly.
NOTE: Most, but not all, reports in QuickBooks allow you to change between cash and accrual. When a report is onscreen, choose Modify Report.
If you don’t see the Report Basis section, shown in Figure 5, then you’ll know that you can’t toggle the report basis. Now that you understand the ins-and-outs of running cash and accrual basis reports, let’s explore the Statement of Cash Flows.
The Statement of Cash Flows
Let’s say that your cash balance at the beginning of your fiscal year was $100,000, and today it is $75,000. The net income figure on your P&L won’t give you the full details on why your cash balance decreased, but the Statement of Cash Flows will. To do so, choose Reports, Company & Financial, and then Statement of Cash Flows.
Report periods: As shown in Figure 5, this report automatically defaults to This Fiscal Year-To-Date, but you can choose another time period if you wish. To do so, make a choice from the Dates drop-down list, or modify the From and To dates, and then click the Refresh button.
Figure 5: The Statement of Cash Flows defaults to the current fiscal year.
Your Statement of Cash Flows report will include up to three major sections:
- Operating Activities
- Investing Activities
- Financing Activities
Don’t worry if your report only includes one or two of these sections – sections only appear when you had relevant transactions during the report period. Let’s explore each of these sections individually.
Operating Activities
The Operating Activities section of the Statement of Cash Flows recaps activities related to running your business. This section will always start with Net Income, followed by an adjustments section.
The adjustments reconcile your net income with the net cash provided by the operating activities. For instance, refer to Figure 5. Net income s $112,999 but the Net Cash Provided by Operating Activities is $42,584. Accordingly, the statement of cash flows identifies the $70,415 difference. Let’s investigate a couple of the items:
Accounts Receivable (-$71,759): During the report period we sent invoices to our customers, of which $31,503.08 remain unpaid. These unpaid invoices are reflected in the Net Income figure, so QuickBooks deducts these because we haven’t received this cash yet.
Inventory Asset (-$17,354): Amounts that we spend on inventory don’t become part of Net Income until we’ve sold the items. At that point QuickBooks posts the expense to cost of good sold, and reduces our inventory account accordingly. Purchasing inventory is a use of cash, so it appears as a negative amount on our Statement of Cash Flows.
Remember: The purpose of the Statement of Cash Flows is to reconcile our net income with the actual change in our cash account. Thus non-cash activities, such as unpaid customer invoices or amortized prepaid expenses get subtracted or added from Net Income, so that you can get a clear picture of where cash went during the report period.
Employee Advances (-$62): We paid $62 to an employee as an advance, which has not yet been repaid. This amount isn’t included in Net Income, but is a use of cash, so the amount is deducted. When our employee repays the advance, our Statement of Cash Flows will reflect a positive amount, since at that point we’ll have a $100 source of cash.
Prepaid Insurance ($893): During the report period we amortized, or used up, $893 of prepaid insurance. This expense is included in our Net Income figure, but we didn’t write a check for it during this report period, so QuickBooks adds this expense back.
Accounts Payable ($13,537): We’ve entered bills into QuickBooks totaling $13,537 that we haven’t paid yet. In effect, we’re temporarily borrowing this money from our vendors, so it’s a source of cash. Later, our Statement of Cash Flows will show a use of cash when we pay the vendor bills. This same treatment applies to credit cards and other liabilities.
As you look through the Statement of Cash Flows, you may also see Investing and Financing activities. Investing activities may include owner contributions as a source of cash, or in the case of the report in Figure 5, the purchase of $11,500 in furniture as a use of cash.
Financing activities will show borrowing on a line of credit or other loan as a source of cash, while loan repayments (net of interest) will appear as uses of cash. In the end, you’ll see exactly what caused your cash balance to increase or decrease during the report period.
Research: You can easily investigate why amounts appear on your Statement of Cash Flows. As shown in Figure 6, the QuickZoom icon appears when you hover over an amount. Double-click to display a detailed report, as shown in Figure 7.
Figure 6: The QuickZoom icon indicates that you can drill-down within a QuickBooks report.
Figure 7: A detailed report appears when you double-click on an amount within a QuickBooks report.
Organizing the Statement of Cash Flows
QuickBooks makes an educated guess at what accounts in your chart of accounts should appear on the Statement of Cash Flows. However, you may encounter instances where activities appear in the wrong section, or don’t appear at all on the report. You can easily remedy such situations:
- Choose Edit, and then Preferences.
- Choose Reports & Graphs, and then Company Preferences.
- Click the Classify Cash button, shown in Figure 3.
As shown in Figure 8, place a checkbox in the appropriate column. You cannot remove balance sheet accounts from the statement, but you can optionally include income and expense accounts. However, keep in mind that this is not a typical need, and you should only proceed under the guidance of your accountant or tax advisor.
Figure 8: QuickBooks allows you to classify accounts as operating, financing, or investing activities.
Did You Know?
QuickBooks has a Product Information window that can provide a dizzying array of information. Press Ctrl-1 to display the window shown in Figure 9. Some key elements on this screen include the product number shown at the top.
Each QuickBooks user in your office should have the same release number. The size and location of your QuickBooks file is shown in the File Information section, while you can use the List Information section to determine how many customers and vendors you have in QuickBooks.
Figure 9: Press Ctrl-1 to view the Product Information window.
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The price of gasoline is just one of many factors putting pressure on our economy as a whole. Now it’s more important than ever to keep a close eye on your company’s performance. Many business owners compare financial results to an annual budget. If you don’t have your budget in place yet, we’ll show you how to get started. Even if you have, we’ll show you how to use last year’s results as a measuring stick with comparative financial reports. Once you understand these techniques, we’ll explain why you should create a monthly appointment with yourself to ensure that your results continue to measure up-and take action if they don’t.
TIP: Keep in mind that tough financial years do have a silver lining-you’ll likely pay less in income taxes. If revenues are down or expenses are up, don’t forget to trim your withholding or estimated tax payments accordingly. Doing so enables you to boost your cash flow now, rather than waiting around on a tax refund next spring.
Budget Basics
The QuickBooks Planning & Budgeting menu gives you the ability to create budgets and forecasts. In reality, both features work the same way, so we’ll use creating a budget as our example. But which one should you use? You might find it helpful to use the Forecast feature as an alternate budget and as a best-case scenario, while the Budget feature offers a better expectation of reality. Either way, here’s how to create a budget in QuickBooks:
1. Choose Company, Planning & Budgeting, and then Set Up Budgets.
2. When the Set Up Budgets window appears, click the Create New Budget button in the upper right-hand corner.
3. Select the year that you’d like to create a budget for (such as 2010 or 2011), select Profit and Loss, and then click Next.
Balance sheet budgeting: QuickBooks offers the ability to create a budget for balance sheet accounts, such as planning for expected levels of cash, inventory, accounts receivable, liabilities, and so on. However, most small business owners find that just a Profit and Loss budget is sufficient for their needs.
4. Most users will choose No Additional Criteria on the next screen. However, QuickBooks does provide the option for a more granular budget that you break down to the customer, job, or class level. Click Next once you make a selection.
5. The next screen asks if you want to start with a blank budget from scratch or if you want to use last year’s actual data as a starting point. Most users will find it helpful to use the previous year as a starting point. Click Finish after you make a choice.
6. At this point you’re presented with a screen similar to Figure 1. You won’t see any numbers if you chose the From Scratch option in step 5.
Figure 1: Starting with prior-year actual numbers can jumpstart your budget process.
7. Proceed with entering or updating your budget. Click the Save button as needed to preserve your work as you go, and then click the OK button when you’re finished.
Budget Tips: The Copy Across button enables you to copy the same amount across all twelve months. As shown in Figure 2, the Adjust Row Amounts button provides a quick way to adjust existing numbers up or down by either a percentage or dollar amount. You can edit your budget at any time: choose Company, Planning & Budgeting, and then Set Up Budgets. Choose your budget from the Budget list, and then make changes as needed.
Figure 2: The Adjust Row button makes it easy to quickly increase or decrease budget figures by a dollar amount or percentage.
Budget Reports
QuickBooks offers four budget and two forecast reports. You’ll use these steps to run most of these reports:
1. Choose Reports, Budget & Forecasts, and then the report of your choice.
2. A three-screen wizard appears, asking you first which budget or forecast you wish to use. Once you’ve made a selection, click Next.
3. The next screen asks which report layout to use – you may only one choice, Account by Month – click Next after you confirm your choice.
4. Click Finish to display your report:
- Budget Overview – As shown in Figure 3, this report provides a twelve-month view of your budget.
- Budget vs. Actual – This 52 column report can be tricky to navigate, as the default format shows these columns for each month, as well as a 12-month total.
Figure 3: Budget overview gives you a birds-eye view of your 12-month budget.
Report Taming Tips: There are a couple of ways to bring this report down to size. First, most users can eliminate the % of Budget column. To do so, click the Modify Report button, and then deselect % of Budget in the Add Subcolumns For section. Next, you can shrink the width of the columns. To do so, drag the diamond between the first actual and budget columns to the left, as shown in Figure 4. When you release the left mouse button, choose Yes when asked if you want to resize all of the columns. Alternatively, click the Export button to send the report to Excel.
Figure 4: Narrow column widths can condense particularly wide reports.
- Profit & Loss Budget Performance This report compares your month and year-to-date actuals to the budgeted amounts, and also displays the 12-month budget. Although this report doesn’t display dollar or percentage variances, you can easily add these columns. Click the Modify Report button, and then select $ Difference and/or % Of Budget in the Add Subcolumns For section, as shown in Figure 5.
Figure 5: It’s easy to add or remove columns on any QuickBooks report.
- Budget vs. Actual Graph This report doesn’t enable you to choose a budget – the current year budget is displayed automatically. As shown in Figure 4, this report enables you to get a graphic view of how your results measure up to your budget. You can choose between different budget views:
- P&L By Accounts This view compares your Profit & Loss accounts, also known as income and expense, to the corresponding budgets. The report automatically sorts variances by difference, and you can view up to six accounts at a time.
- P&L By Accounts and Jobs This view compares your P&L accounts on a job-by-job basis. Jobs with the largest total variance from budget will be presented first, and as with accounts, you can view six at a time.
- P&L By Accounts and Classes This view compares your P&L accounts on a class basis. As with the other views, you can view up to six classes at a time. This button appears even if you haven’t set the Enable Class Tracking preference.
Class Tracking: Classes allow you to you track costs by department, project, or other categories. To enable class tracking, choose Edit, Preferences, and then Accounting. On the Company tab, select Enable Class Tracking.
Graph Printing limitation: You cannot print more than one page of the budget graphs at a time, so you’ll have to click Next Group and then click Print to create a hard copy of each report group. QuickBooks doesn’t provide a way to print all of the graphs in one fell swoop. You also can’t modify the graph format, other than to choose a different date range.
Comparative Reports
Regardless of whether you use budgets in QuickBooks or not, it’s always helpful to compare this year’s results to last year. Doing so enables you to see trends in your data, such as how automobile expenses have increased. Such a report is just a couple clicks away:
1. Choose Reports, Company and Financial, and then Profit & Loss Prev Year Comparison.
2. By default you’ll see this year compared to last year. However, you can easily create a multi-year comparison:
a. Click the Modify Report button.
b. In the Columns section, choose Year from the Display Columns By drop-down list, and then click OK.
c. On the report screen, choose a date range, such as 1/1/04 through 12/31/08, and then click the Refresh button. As shown in Figure 6, a multi-year comparison will appear onscreen. If you find this format helpful, click the Memorize button to save this report for later use.
Figure 6: You can convert the Profit & Loss Prev Year Comparison into a multi-year report.
Summary
In this article we discussed how you can use the budget and forecast feature in QuickBooks to plan the future of your business. As each month rolls by, you can compare your plan to actual results. In addition, you can compare this year’s results to last year, or even the last several years.
Did you know?
Did you know that an accountant’s copy of a QuickBooks file can be converted to a normal QuickBooks company, i.e. a .QBW file? There are limited circumstances where you’d want to do so, because it’s not possible to merge two .QBW data files together. However, let’s say that you lose access to your QuickBooks company because your hard drive crashes or someone steals your laptop. These are situations where a converted accountant’s copy would be better than starting from scratch. If you need to do this, ask your accountant to carry out these steps in their version of QuickBooks:
1. Choose File, Utilities, and then Convert Accountant’s Copy to Company File (QBW).
2. Choose the Accountant’s Copy to convert.
3. Click OK on the prompt shown in Figure 7.
4. Assign a name to the new company file, and then click Save.
A final warning prompt will appear to confirm that this copy will overwrite any existing client copy of the books.
Figure 7: Converting an accountant’s copy to a working QuickBooks company can serve as a disaster recovery method.
Of course, the best defense is to make frequent back-ups of your QuickBooks data on removable media, such as the USB flash drives that often cost less than $10. These easily allow you to carry your QuickBooks back-up offsite, such as in your purse or briefcase. But, it’s good to know that your accountant might be able to provide a working QuickBooks company – as long as you recently sent your accountant’s copy along to them.
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We know. When you first cracked your copy of QuickBooks, you wanted to dive in and start generating invoices. Fortunately, QuickBooks is intuitive enough that you were able to do just that. And its help system is so robust that you were able to get procedural questions answered quickly and easily.
But there’s a lot to be said for backing up a bit and taking advantage of the myriad educational tools that QuickBooks offers. Even if you’ve been using the program for months, you may want to explore them. You’ll not only save time with the help system, but you may find better ways of performing tasks.
Learn By Watching
The QuickBooks Learning Center, one of the first things you saw when you installed the program, is always available by clicking Help | Learning Center Tutorials. It consists of numerous multimedia tutorials and links to additional help. As shown in Figure 1, the tutorials are worth a look before you take on a thorny topic like Payroll.
Figure 1: QuickBooks’ myriad tutorials help you absorb the basics of processes like Payroll.
Though you can use QuickBooks’ functions entirely from the menus, the program’s home page is built to guide you through core accounting processes. If you’re very new to QuickBooks and/or accounting, you can use the Coach function to better understand the flow. Click on Show Coach Tips in the vertical pane to the right of the main screen.
As shown in Figure 2, you’ll see a small “i” next to some icons. Click on one, like the one next to Purchase Orders. Related icons light up, and numbers representing their logical order appear next to them. Mouse over one of the icons to read a brief description of the function. When you’re done, click Hide Coach Tips to make them disappear.
Figure 2: QuickBooks’ Coach tool lays out the workflow for primary accounting processes.
Other Support Options
No matter how much you study and prepare, you may still run into situations where you need an expert’s hand. We can be a real resource here as we have the expertise to walk you through installation and setup, processes that are critical to your effective ongoing relationship with QuickBooks. And we can also pitch in when you’re facing other daunting accounting hurdles.
Another option for expert help is Intuit. The company offers a support plan that may or may not be in your budget, but it’s certainly something to consider if you anticipate needing to have frequent questions answered. The best value is the Annual Support Plan ($349 for first year; $299 thereafter). You get 24×7 phone support, data backup and recovery services, and learning tools only available with the Support Plan.
Intuit also hosts an in-depth online support presence. Click Help | Support to get to the main page as shown in Figure 3. Installation, troubleshooting (with guides to error messages), company and data file management, general procedures–they’re all covered there. You can search the support database or browse by topic. These and other resources are available within QuickBooks’ embedded browser (you must have Internet access to reach it, as with many other features of the program — click Help | Internet Connection Setup if you’re not already set up).
Figure 3: Intuit’s online support for QuickBooks can help when you’re stumped.
Interactive Help
If you haven’t yet visited QuickBooks’ interactive forum, you should. Click on the Live Community tab at the top of the far right vertical pane if it’s not already displayed (the pane toggles between it and Help). As shown in Figure 4, you can enter questions here and get answers from other users and/or Intuit pros.
Figure 4: Intuit included interaction in its QuickBooks palette of help tools. Live Community features questions from users and accompanying answers from users and Intuit pros.
For the expanded Intuit community, click on the Visit the Intuit Community link at the bottom of the Live Community pane.
Of course, don’t forget the core of QuickBooks’ help scheme: the Help pane. You can get a lot of your questions answered here. This pane constantly changes to display content relative to the current screen. This content provides explanations of concepts as well as step-by-step instructions.
So don’t throw up your hands in defeat when what you’re attempting in QuickBooks isn’t working. Remember how much help is available from Intuit, QuickBooks itself, and experts like us. Some additional schooling may just be in order.
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There aren’t that many different types of forms to keep straight in QuickBooks, but you likely don’t use all of them. You probably use invoices and purchase orders frequently, and may fill out the occasional sales receipt, credit memo, or estimate.
But what about sales orders? You may find that they could make your bookkeeping more accurate and easier. There are only a few situations where they’re needed, but they’re the appropriate form to use at those times.
A Happy Problem
If you’re lucky (or a good businessperson), you have customers who place orders frequently. It’s not practical to invoice them every time they order, but you want to make sure everything is recorded. A sales order (which you’ll eventually turn into an invoice) is the correct choice for these customers.
Warning: You must use a sales order from the beginning of the selling process; you can’t switch gears partway through.
To get started, click Customers | Create Sales Orders. A blank form like this one will open:
Figure 1: To create a sales order, you simply fill in the blanks and select from drop-down lists, just as you would with an invoice.
Would you send a sales order out to a customer in a multi-order situation, or wait until you have enough sales to dispatch an invoice? That’s up to you. It’s a good idea if you want them to be aware of the costs that are piling up.
Looking Good
Before you begin entering data on the sales order form, check the fields to make sure they’re all needed, or if you’re missing any. The Template field in the upper right corner should display Custom Sales Order; change it if not. Should you want to add or delete fields, click the arrow next to Customize, then Customize Design and Layout.
If you’ve just been sending out the default forms that QuickBooks offers, you should consider adding some personalization. Click Create new design if you want to upload a logo and select fonts, colors, etc. Once you’ve decided on a theme, QuickBooks can apply it to all of your forms.
To add or delete fields, click Customize data layout. By checking and unchecking boxes, you can alter the content of your sales orders.
Figure 2: Just check or uncheck boxes to have field labels appear (or not) onscreen and in print. You can also change the label text, reorder columns, and designate text for a footer.
Halfway There
Another situation where you might want to send a sales order is when you’re doing partial invoicing; that is, when you don’t have enough items to fulfill the order as it came in.
In a case like this, go ahead and complete a sales order as if you had everything in stock. When you’re done, save the sales order, then find it and open it again. Click the arrow next to Create Invoice, then click Invoice. You’ll see this dialog box.
Figure 3: This dialog box lets you create an invoice for all items on a sales order or just a subset.
Click Create invoice for selected items, then OK. The Specify Invoice Quantities for Items on Sales Order(s) window opens. Items on the sales order you created are listed here, with additional columns for number available and number you ordered, number previously invoiced, and the unit of measured used (if applicable).
There’s a check box next to Show quantity available instead of quantity on hand. Here, you can opt to display the number of each item that’s truly available; that is, the number actually in inventory minus those reserved, either on other sales orders or for building inventory assembly items. Or you can request the number that’s physically in inventory.
Using this information about availability, you’ll enter the number of items you want to invoice from this sales order in the To Invoice column. It would look something like this:
Figure 4: When you convert a sales order into an invoice, you can select which items should be included.
Click OK, and your invoice appears. Do any editing necessary, and dispatch the invoice.
Tip: You can choose whether to have the items with a quantity of zero display on your invoice by going to Edit | Preferences and clicking on the Sales & Customers tab.
Tracking It All
There are several places in QuickBooks where you can view your sales orders. The best way to keep track of those partially filled is through two reports, Open Sales Orders by Customer and Open Sales Orders by Item. You can also see them, of course, in the Customer Center, and in the balance and transaction history found next to transaction forms.
Sales orders can help you better track sales, speed up receivables with partial invoices, and maintain communications with frequent buyers. But partial invoices require extra attention to inventory. Before working with them, it’d be best to schedule a session with us; we can help you keep things straight.
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Next to payroll, paying bills is probably your least favorite task in QuickBooks. You don’t have to use this feature you can keep stacking bills on your desk, scrawling the due dates on a paper calendar, and writing checks.
If you’re still operating this way, though, you’re missing out on the numerous tools that QuickBooks offers to track your accounts payable, including the ability to:
- Enter bills as they come in
- Set reminders for bills due
- Pay bills easily
- Locate a bill or payment quickly
- Enter bills as (or after) you receive items
- Link bills to purchase orders
- Have instant access to a bill’s status
Receiving the goods
When an expense bill comes in (from a utility company, for example), click the Enter Bills icon on the home page, or Vendors | Enter Bills. A window like the one displayed above opens. Select the vendor and fill in the blanks. Make sure that the Expenses tab below is selected and the appropriate account number and amount fields are completed. If it’s a bill for an item that already has a related Item Receipt (the shipment preceded the bill), QuickBooks instructs you to use Vendor | Enter Bill for Received Items. Follow the prompts.Note: Dealing with incoming inventory is complex. Consult with us if you plan to use this feature.If the bill came simultaneously with items, click Vendors | Receive Items and Enter Bill. When you select the vendor from the list, this box opens (if you have sent a purchase order):
Figure 2: QuickBooks is telling you that you have open orders with this vendor.Click Yes. The Open Purchase Orders box opens, containing a list of open POs. Select the one(s) you want and click OK. The bill form opens, containing the details of that purchase order. Change quantities if they don’t match the shipment, and edit other fields as necessary. Save the bill.
Settling your debts
It’s good to set reminders for bills. Go to Edit | Preferences and click Reminders. Make sure that that Show Reminders List…box is checked, then click Company Preferences. Find the Bills to Pay row and enter the advance notice you’d like. Indicate whether you want to see a list or a summary, then click OK.When bills are due, click the Pay Bills icon or select Vendors | Pay Bills. A window opens displaying all outstanding bills. You can pare this down by selecting a date in the Due on or before field and filtering by vendors. �The screen will look something like this:
Figure 3: You can easily select the bills you want to pay.
Enter a check mark next to the bills you’re paying, and change the amount in the Amt. To Pay field at the end of the row if necessary. At the bottom of the screen, you can set the payment date and type, use any discounts or credits, and make sure the correct payment account is selected. When you’re done, click Pay Selected Bills.Tip: You can have credits and discounts automatically applied by going to Edit | Preferences | Bills.After You’ve Paid Up
There are a number of places where your bills appear in QuickBooks, including:
- The Unpaid Bills Detail report
- The A/P Aging Detail report
- The Vendor Center
- QuickReports
- In the Recent Transactions pane of some forms
- On the bills themselves
Figure 4: QuickBooks displays the Paid status of bills.QuickBooks also lets you void and delete bills, and copy and memorize them. Check with us before voiding and deleting, as this can make some complicated changes in your accounts.
You can just pay bills by using Banking | Write Checks or Enter Credit Card Charges. But the payoff for tracking bills is instant access to your accounts payable status, better relations with vendors, and a more insightful accounting of your company’s cash flow.
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QuickBooks’ standard reports are critical to understanding your company’s past, present, and future. But the program also offers innovative tools that can make them significantly more insightful and comprehensive. QuickBooks offers two simple conventions that let you identify related data: classes and types. Classes are used in transactions. Types are assigned to individual customers, vendors, and jobs. You might use classes to, for example, separate transactions that relate to different departments or locations or types of business. A construction company might want to track classes using New Construction, Remodel, and Overhead. Your customer types might help you isolate groups by characteristics like Industry or Geographical Location.
Creating Classes
First, make sure that QuickBooks is set up to use classes. Go to Edit | Preferences | Accounting | Company Preferences. Make sure that Use class tracking is checked. If you want to be prompted for a class designation in transactions, check that box, too. QuickBooks already contains a Type field in customer, vendor, and job records. It’s easy to build lists of options for both. To define classes, go to Lists | Class List. In the bottom left corner of the screen, click on Class, then select New from the menu. To create a class, just give it a name and click OK. Let’s say that you’re a contractor and you want to separate remodeling jobs into room types, like Bathroom or Kitchen. Go through the above steps again. Enter “Bathroom” in the Class Name field and click the box next to Subclass of. Open the list and choose “Remodel.” Click OK. Tip: If your class list grows lengthy and you want to tidy it up, you can make classes that you’re not currently using inactive by checking the box in this window. It will remain in your QuickBooks records and can be reactivated again.
Putting Classes to Work
Now you can use classes in transactions. Open a blank invoice and select a customer. The Class field will be next to the customer name. If the entire invoice will be assigned to the same class, click the drop-down list and select it. You can also assign separate classes to individual line items: You can assign different classes to individual line items in transactions. Not all invoice templates include a column for classes. You can add this by selecting the invoice form you want to modify and clicking Customize in the toolbar. QuickBooks comes with two reports specially designed for tracking class-based transactions: Profit & Loss by Class and Balance Sheet by Class (both can be found in the Reports menu, under Company & Financial). Of course, you can filter other reports to include a class column. You can also create a QuickReport for individual classes. Go to Lists | Class List and select a report or graph. You can filter by class in QuickBooks reports. Warning! The Balance Sheet by Class report is complicated and may produce unexpected results. Let your ProAdvisor help you work with this one. They can also help you set up a solid class structure.
A Simpler Assignment
Customer, vendor, and job types are a bit less complicated. Job types are especially useful; you can track, for example, profitability and time spent on individual projects. Customer and vendor types can produce output for things like targeted mailings and reports. Creating types is very similar to creating classes. Go to Lists | Customer & Vendor Profile Lists, and select the type you want to work with. You’ll follow the same instructions here as you did for classes. Types do not appear on transactions; they’re designed for your own internal use, and they’re stored in records. Figure 4: Customer, vendor, and job types are specified in their records. Classes and types can be used very effectively in your bookkeeping, but they require a good deal of thought and planning upfront to get accurate, meaningful reports. Let your ProAdvisor know if he/she can assist as you attempt to use these powerful forms of classification.
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End of the year. QuickBooks has been hard at work for the past 11+ months, recording and tracking and storing all of that financial data that you’ve entered so faithfully.
But when you turn the calendar page and make a new start January 1, your accounting software could use some closure on the year that’s just passed. Here are some actions you can take to ring out the old and ring in the new. There’s more you can do (we can help you with the advanced activities) but we’ll just hit the highlights here.
- Reconcile, reconcile, reconcile. Yes, we know it’s not one of your favorite chores, but we really like to see all bank and credit card accounts reconciled by the end of the year if at all possible. Void all checks necessary and enter missing transactions.
Figure 1: You can make yourself crazy looking for a nickel when you’re reconciling, but it’s a critical function.- Make accrual adjustments. This is complicated, and it only applies if you accrue payroll and liabilities or prepay expenses that are then carried as assets. We’ll need to create journal entries for you.
- Close your books. This is totally optional. It depends on whether you want to lock 2012 data to everyone except those who have the password and permissions. If you don’t close them, you’ll have easier access to last year’s transaction details. Regardless of what you choose, QuickBooks will automatically make some year-end adjustments.
- Do a physical inventory. Then compare this with what QuickBooks says. Reports | Inventory | Physical Inventory Worksheet.
Figure 2: It’s good to match up your physical inventory count with QuickBooks occasionally, and the end of the year is as good a time as any.- Run income tax reports. As you know, QuickBooks lets you assign tax lines to tax-related transactions. Use the Income Tax Preparation Report and the Income Tax Summary Report. Let us know about any errors or omissions.
- Check W-2 and 1099 data. You can’t create these forms, of course, until after your final 2012 payroll, but you can get a head start. Ask employees to verify their names, addresses and Social Security numbers for accuracy. Also, make sure that your EIN and SEIN are correct, as well as the company address.
- Clean up, back up. We can monitor the health of your QuickBooks data file anytime. But year-end is a good time to scrutinize your software’s performance. Has it slowed down, started crashing or returning error messages? We can troubleshoot to find the problem and clean it up. We’re sure you’ve been backing up your file faithfully, but archive all of 2012 and store it in a very safe offsite location — or use Intuit Data Protect for online storage.
Figure 3: Frequent backups are critical, but you should be sure to have a copy of your entire 2012 data file stored somewhere safe.- Double-check tax liabilities. If you’re handling your own payroll, look back to see whether all of your payments and filings have been completed.
Again, these are suggestions. QuickBooks does not require you to do any of them. There’s more you can do, and you will need assistance with some of these. So let’s set up a December or early January meeting to get you started right in 2013.
We want to take this opportunity to thank you for letting us serve your company in 2012. We certainly appreciate your business, and we’re happy to do what we can to help your business prosper in the coming year.
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Part of the reason for QuickBooks’ success is its exceptional flexibility. By allowing users to turn features and preferences on and off, the same software can be used by a wide variety of business types and sizes.
In some cases, the default settings that QuickBooks supplies will work fine for your company. This is not necessarily true in the case of purchase orders, since the whole inventory procurement process is so complex, and users can have such a diverse range of needs.
Figure 1: QuickBooks 2013’s default Create Purchase Orders screen. You can see that formatting options are available when you click the Formatting tab.So before you order your first widget, make sure that your purchase order form is designed to accommodate all of the information you want to record and track, with no unnecessary data fields to confuse staff.
Working with Templates
There aren’t many program preferences to check. If you can open a purchase order, you’re set. If not, go to Edit | Preferences | Items & Inventory and be sure that the box next to Inventory and purchase orders are active is checked.
What you want to find first is the Additional Customization screen for the Custom Purchase Order Template. This is easily accessed from the Create Purchase Order screen itself in QuickBooks 2013, but if you’re using an earlier edition, go to Lists | Templates | Custom Purchase Order Template. Double-click on it to open the Basic Customization page. Here, you can add a logo, change fonts and colors, etc. But go ahead and click on the Additional Customization button at the bottom of the screen. This window opens:
Figure 2: The left pane of the Additional Customization window contains additional fields that you might want on your purchase orders, like Ship Via and Terms.(Tip: If you want to design multiple purchase order templates, click Manage Templates on the Basic Customization screen, then Copy on the Manage Templates page. Rename the form and make your modifications. This version will always be available as an option when you create purchase orders.)
Making It Yours
Each of this window’s four tabs opens a new screen that gives you customization control over a different element of the purchase order form: the top, bottom and midsection, and printing options. You simply check the boxes next to the fields that you want to add to the current form (be sure to check both columns if you want the fields to appear both onscreen and in your printed versions; sometimes, one is not an option) and uncheck any you want to delete.
In the right pane of this window, a dynamic preview changes to reflect each addition or deletion. And when you’ve finished altering the set of fields, you can see an actual print preview. Close that and keep clicking OK until you get back to the Templates window.
This simplicity and ease carries over into the more cosmetic elements of your purchase order. Make sure the template you want to redesign is highlighted and click Templates | Create Form Design. QuickBooks walks you through the process of adding a logo and background, colors and fonts, and a grid style, and it lets you apply this same theme automatically to all of your forms. (You can modify your design similarly on the Basic Customization page, minus the wizard-like approach and the background options.)
Simple but Complicated
One more comment about the QuickBooks 2013 purchase order screen. Beyond making your formatting options available in the ribbon,� it also moves you through purchasing to the receiving process. With the appropriate purchase order open, click ,b>Create Item Receipts in the ribbon. This window opens, with the correct vendor name selected. When you click in the Item field, this small window appears:
Figure 3: Click Yes here and select the correct PO, and QuickBooks fills in the data. If you check the Bill Received box, the Enter Bills window opens.QuickBooks’ purchasing and receiving tools makes your inventory-tracking job easier, but you still need to understand the workflow. We encourage you to let us work with you as you begin managing inventory ‘ or to contact us if you’re tangled up in what can be a very challenging element of QuickBooks.
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The U.S. economy may be picking up, but your customers are probably still being very careful with expenditures. If your company’s finances will allow it, you can help them out on sizable jobs by using progress invoicing, also known as partial billing or progress billing.
You could, of course, simply create invoices for smaller chunks of the job as they come. A smarter way is to build estimates for the entire job or sequential phases so your customer can see the big picture. You can still use progress invoicing to start collecting funds one segment at a time.
How to Proceed
First, be sure you have progress invoicing turned on. Go to Edit | Preferences | Jobs & Estimates | Company Preferences and make sure the Yes button is filled in next to the questions about estimates and progress invoicing.
Now create your estimate (these instructions are for QuickBooks Premier 2013; your steps may vary slightly). Go to Customers | Create Estimates. When you’ve entered all of the items you want to include in this phase of your project, click the ,b>Create Invoice button. This window will open:
Figure 1: You can decide how many of your estimate items will be included on your progress invoice.By clicking one of these buttons, you can bill the customer 100 percent of what’s due on the invoice or just a percentage. But let’s say you and your customer have agreed that payment will be due in pre-defined stages, so click the third button and select one or more of the line items. Click OK. QuickBooks will display a new window that lets you select items and/or percentages of amounts due.
In our example here, we’re going to invoice the customer for two items, the blueprints and floor plans. So we selected the button next to Show Quantity and Rate and entered the full estimated quantity for each item in the QTY columns (if you chose Show Percentage, new columns would appear). It would look like this:
Figure 2: You can select specific items or percentages for your progress invoice.Click OK. QuickBooks will return to your progress invoice, which you can save and print or email to your customer. Your original estimate will remain unchanged.
Tip: If you don’t want any of the zero amounts to appear on the progress invoice, go to Edit | Preferences | Jobs & Estimates | Company Preferences and make sure there’s a check mark in the box next to Don’t print items that have zero amount.
Following Up
When you want to bill for another set of items on this estimate, simply repeat these steps.
Here’s an easy way to determine how much (if any) of the estimate has been invoiced. Go to the Customer Center and select the customer. Click the arrow next to the Show field and select Estimates. Any estimate that has a zero in the OPEN BALANCE column has been completely billed.
QuickBooks provides a report that tells you where you are with all of your progress invoices. Go to Reports | Jobs, Time & Mileage | Job Progress Invoices vs. Estimates. Your report will include the progress invoice you just created:
Figure 3: You can see what percentage of each estimate has been included on a progress invoice in this report.More Options
What if you determine that you won’t have one or more of the items on the estimate? QuickBooks lets you quickly generate a purchase order. With your estimate open, click Create Purchase Order to select the item(s) needed and generate the form. You can also click Create Sales Order if one is necessary.
Estimates provide a useful way to fine-tune your bookkeeping and inform your customers about impending costs. They can also be confusing if you don’t keep up with them. We can help you determine when they’re a good idea and how to keep them organized. QuickBooks provides good tools here, but they do require some administrative control.
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You’re probably happy to see couriers delivering inventory items you’ve ordered since it means you can ship to customers, but recording the new stock means yet
QuickBooks’ tools can help with this, but you need to be sure you’re using the right forms. There are two different ones that you’ll use, depending on whether or not you’ve received a bill.
Bill in Hand
Either way, you’ll get started by opening the Vendors menu (or clicking the arrow next to Receive Inventory on the home page). If you do have a bill, select Receive Items and Enter Bill (Receive Inventory with Bill on the home page). The Enter Bills screen opens; select your vendor from the drop-down list. If you had entered a purchase order, you’ll see something like this:
Figure 1: If any purchase orders exist for that vendor in QuickBooks, you’ll see this message.Click Yes. The Open Purchase Orders window will open displaying a list. Select the PO(s) for the items received by placing a check mark in front of it/them and click OK.
Tip: If you accidentally click No, the vendor’s information will be filled in on the Enter Bills screen, and you can click the Select PO icon in the toolbar.
Now the PO item information has been entered in the window. Check the form for accuracy, then save it.
Of course, if there was no purchase order, you’ll enter the information about the items you received (descriptions, prices, etc.) in the Enter Bills screen.
Delayed Billing
If you receive items without a bill, you still need to document the shipment. Open the Vendors menu and select Receive Items (or click the arrow next to the Receive Inventory icon on the home page and select Receive Inventory without Bill).
The Create Item Receipts window opens. Select the vendor by clicking the down arrow next to that field. If a message about existing purchase orders for that vendor appears, click Yes or No, and either select the appropriate POs or enter the information about what you received.
If the items were already earmarked for a specific customer on the purchase order, the Customer column will have an entry in it, and there will be a check mark in the Billable column. If there was no purchase order and you’re entering the information, you can complete those two fields manually.
Figure 2: If a purchase order was already assigned to a customer and is billable, that information should appear in this window.Enter a reference number if you’d like. The Memo field should already be filled in with Received items (bill to follow), and the Bill Received box should not be checked.
Warning: Be sure that the Items tab is highlighted when you’re recording physical inventory. If there are related costs like freight charges or sales tax, click the Expenses tab and enter them there.
Paying Up
When the bill comes in for merchandise that you’ve already recorded on an Item Receipt, you’ll use this procedure to pay it:
- Click Vendors | Enter Bill for Received Items, which opens the Select Item Receipt window.
- Select the vendor, then the correct Item Receipt.
Note: If the bill corresponds to more than one Item Receipt, you’ll need to convert each into a bill separately. You can create a new bill if some items received were not accounted for on Item Receipts.
- Click the box next to Use the item receipt date for the bill date if you want to match it to the inventory availability date.
Figure 3: You’ll select purchase orders that you want to create bills for in this window.- Click OK. The Enter Bill screen opens, which can be processed like you’d handle any bill.
Though it may seem like extra work, this last procedure is important, since it prevents you from recording the same inventory items twice.
It’s easy to get tangled up on these procedures. We hope you’ll consult us when you begin implementing inventory management in QuickBooks, or when you’re taking on a new task there. It’s a lot easier to prevent errors than to go back and fix them.
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The beauty of QuickBooks is that it can be used for so many different kinds of businesses. Its smart design lets realtors and retail shops, plumbers and plastic surgeons use it to track income and expenses, pay bills and invoice customers, and to run those all-important reports.
But Intuit knows that QuickBooks can’t — and shouldn’t — tailor itself to individual business types (except in the industry-specific versions). So its structure and tools are somewhat generic and as universal as possible.
That’s where custom fields come in. You can simply use them for your own informational purposes, but QuickBooks also lets you create and add fields to your existing customer, vendor, employee and item records and forms, and use them as filters in reports.
A Common Application
Let’s say you want to search for your best customers to create a targeted marketing mailing.
Start by opening the Customer Center and opening any customer’s record there. Click on the Additional Info tab. In the lower right corner of this dialog box, click on Define Fields. This box (with some fields already defined in this example) opens:
Figure 1: You can create custom fields for your lists of names in this dialog box.You want to send mailings to customers who order frequently, or who regularly purchase big-ticket items. You can call them your High-Value Customers.� Click in the first field that’s available in the Label column and type that phrase, then tab over to the Cust column and click in it to enter a checkmark. Click OK. The Edit Customer dialog box opens with the new custom field included.
This field will now appear in all of your existing customer records as well as any new ones you create. You’ll need to open the record for each High-Value Customer, click on the
Additional Info
tab and enter Yes� on the corresponding line.
Figure 2: Custom fields appear in this box in your customer records.Using Custom Fields in Items
If you sell physical inventory, custom fields will probably be needed in your item records. You might want to use them for t-shirt colors or sizes, for example, or to store serial or model numbers. They can be employed for all items types except subtotals, sales tax items and sales tax group items.
The process is similar to the one you used to define custom fields in your contact records. Open the Lists menu and select Item List (or Fixed Asset Item List where appropriate). Click Custom Fields in the dialog box that opens.
Tip: The Custom Fields tool is also available in the New Item dialog box. So you can move directly to that step as you create an item record if you’d like.
Click Define Fields and add your field(s). Be sure to put a checkmark in the Use column, and click OK.
Figure 3: QuickBooks also lets you define and use custom fields in your item records.Reports and Forms
Custom fields can be invaluable when it comes to using them in forms and reports. Your fields will automatically appear at the bottom of the Filter list within your reports’ customization tools, but you’ll have to add them manually to any forms where they should appear.
Warning: You should probably enlist our help before you customize forms. QuickBooks provides tools to help you through this process, but you will encounter some potentially confusing messages as you add fields to forms, and you may have to use the Layout Designer, which can present quite a challenge.
Let’s say you wanted to find out how many blue coffee mugs Suzanne Jenkins sold in November. You’d proceed like you normally do when you’re customizing a report, but you’d have to scroll down to the end of the Filter list to find the Color custom field that you created. You’d enter the word Blue� in the field supplied. Your Sales by Item Summary report setup would look something like this:
Figure 4: Filtering a report using a custom field.This report will only run properly if you’ve added your Color field to your sales forms. Again, we’d be happy to help you with this, and to explore other uses for QuickBooks custom fields.
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If QuickBooks were just one product, its appeal would be more limited than it is. Because there’s an entire family of Windows desktop software applications (as well as five online versions and a Mac edition), the QuickBooks family has found a home in millions of small businesses, and it remains the market leader.
Though QuickBooks versions themselves are not scalable (able to expand as your business grows), you can move up to a more sophisticated edition when you outgrow your current version.
But how do you know whether it’s time to upgrade or whether you’re just not stretching your current version to its fullest capabilities? We can help you determine that, and we’ll help you move into a more appropriate edition when/if that occurs.
Desktop Differences
There are three Windows-based versions of QuickBooks: Pro, Premier and Enterprise Solutions. They all let you:
- Import and export data
Figure 1: All desktop versions of QuickBooks let you import and export data.- Track income and expenses
- Build and maintain records for customers, vendors, employees and items
- Create and send transaction forms like invoices, estimates and purchase orders
- Download bank and credit card transactions, and pay bills online
- Customize and run dozens of reports
- Keep track of your inventory of items, and
- Add a payroll-processing service.
All three versions share a similar user interface and navigational scheme, so when you move up to the next level, you only need to learn the new features. The 2013 offerings make it even easier to learn and use QuickBooks, since Intuit completely revamped the look and feel for those most current editions.
QuickBooks Pro is the base desktop product, offering everything in the above list and more. But would you rather have access to 150+ reports instead of 100, including some that are industry-specific? QuickBooks Premier can provide that, in addition to charts of accounts, sample files and menus tailored to your company’s industry. It also offers a business plan builder and the ability to forecast sales and expenses.
Figure 2: QuickBooks Premier helps you create a business plan.The biggest jump in functionality, though, occurs when you move up to QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions. You may want to consider this upgrade when you find that, for example:
- Your system keeps slowing down and experiencing errors because your customer, vendor, item and employee databases have grown too large
- You need to have more than five people accessing QuickBooks simultaneously
- You’ve launched a second company, and/or
- Your item catalog has grown to the point where you’re having trouble managing your multi-location inventory.
Robust Accounting
QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions is well-suited to complex small businesses, and sometimes even larger companies, depending on their structure and needs. It solves the data management problems that Pro and Premier users can experience, thanks to its 100,000+ record and account capacity.
Up to 30 individuals can use the software at the same time, and they have more flexibility than is offered in Pro and Premier. Multiple users can be on the system and still complete tasks like adjusting inventory and changing sales tax rates.
You can manage more than one business using QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions, even working in two company files at the same time and combining reports. Reporting capabilities themselves are much more sophisticated: The Intuit Statement Writer helps you create professional financial statements, and you have much more control over customization of your output.
Figure 3: QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions offers more sophisticated inventory management tools than Pro or Premier.Inventory management goes many steps further in this sophisticated software. It supports management of multiple warehouse and trucks, and allows transfers among them. Finding specific items is much easier because you can track down to the bin level. FIFO costing is offered as an alternative to average costing, and you can scan items and serial numbers directly into QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions, which tracks both serial and lot numbers.
More Power, More Support
There are many smaller features that make this application far more powerful than QuickBooks Pro and Premier ‘ and also a little more difficult to master. When you think the time is right, we can help you move your current data file into QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions and provide training.
It’s important that you have the right fit when it comes to your accounting software. So consider your current setup carefully before you decide to move up.
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We know that you’re in some stage of preparation for your 2013 income taxes. It may seem odd to start thinking about 2014 taxes just now, but actually, this is the ideal time to start planning and making business decisions with their tax implications always in the back of your mind.
As you look at the data that will be entered in your 2013 tax forms, you’re likely to come across some expenses that you might have handled differently, or some income that should have been deferred. If you begin your planning process for 2014 while 2013 is still in the works, you can start making smarter, more tax-advantageous business decisions now, instead of late in the year when everyone is rushing to take actions necessary to lower their tax obligation.
Here’s how QuickBooks can help you with this new approach.
Overhaul your Chart of Accounts. The mechanics of doing this in QuickBooks are fairly uncomplicated, but changing this critical list–the backbone of your company file–requires solid knowledge of which accounts should be added, deleted or changed. You also need to know which accounts and subaccounts will have impact on your income taxes. They must be structured accordingly.
Figure 1: QuickBooksâ default Chart of Accounts can be easily modified to meet your companyâs unique needs. But let us help you with this task.For these reasons, we ask that you consult with us if you think your Chart of Accounts could use an overhaul. Our early involvement will be much more economical for you than if we have to come in down the road when your accounts have become dangerously tangled.
Devise an effective system for estimated taxes. As you well know, there’s no magical formula for estimating how much income tax you’ll owe when all of your income and expenses have been tallied. We can make this an ongoing task by creating monthly or quarterly financial reports for your business and working from those.
If you’re self-employed, you might want to open a low-fee checking account that will serve solely as your tax fund. Because you have no employer to pay a portion of your Social Security and Medicare obligations, it’s critical that you’re putting enough away. Consider putting one-third of your taxable income into that account and see how it goes. You may get a pleasant surprise at tax prep time, or you may have to dip into other savings to be compliant.
Figure 2: You may want to set up a separate bank account to park estimated tax funds, so you know theyâre committed. Ask us about numbering new accounts.You can submit federal payments online on the Electronic Federal Tax Payment System site. Check with us to see if your state has an electronic system. Of course, the IRS will accept a check.
Run reports on everything. And keep running them. We’ve already mentioned that we’re happy to create and analyze your most critical financial reports on a regular basis. You may have tried to understand the Trial Balance, Statement of Cash Flows, etc. in QuickBooks and been puzzled. Don’t feel incompetent because of that: It often takes an accountant-level individual to understand what they mean for your business.
You can define and build your own reports using QuickBooks’ customization tools. If you have employees who travel, consider bringing in an automated expense report application (we can help you find one and implement it). Stress the importance of adhering to IRS rules about travel. Same goes for your local salesforce, off-site technicians and other service providers, etc.
Figure 3: Help your staff help you by involving them in budgeting and expense management.For employees who come into the office every day or are telecommuting, you can give them some ownership of their contribution to expenses by bringing them into the budget process and/or requesting that they submit their own monthly mini-reports on any company funds they spend. The more employees are aware of and accountable for expenses, the easier it will be for you to work toward minimizing your tax obligation. And having some information about the considerable sum you pay in taxes may help staff understand your tightening of the purse strings.
Consider retraining accounting staff if necessary. You may be paying a portion of your taxes unnecessarily, simply because your companyâs bookkeeping is less than precise. Nip that in the bud.
The more you micro-manage your reporting, stay aware of the consequences of every expenditure and bring employees into the process, the more prepared you’ll be for 2014 taxes.
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After this ridiculously long winter, youâll probably hear few complaints about things like puddles in the street, summer heat and spring cleaning. Most people are eager to throw open the doors and windows, and attack the dirt that the season left behind, both inside and outside of the house.
Itâs not hard to see when your home is dirty. QuickBooks company file errors are harder to detect, but theyâre there, including:
- Performance problems
- Inability to execute specific processes, like upgrading
- Occasional program crashes
- Missing data (accounts, names, etc.)
- Refusal to complete transactions, and
- Mistakes in reports.
Figure 1: If some transactions wonât go through when you click one of the Save buttons â or worse, QuickBooks shuts down — you may have a corrupted company file.Call for Help
The best thing you can do if you notice problems like this cropping up in QuickBooks â especially if youâre experiencing multiple ones â is to contact us. We understand the file structure of QuickBooks company data, and we have access to tools that you donât. We can analyze your file and take steps to correct the problem(s).
One of the reasons QuickBooks files get corrupt is simply because they grow too big. Thatâs either a sign of your companyâs success or of a lack of periodic maintenance that you can do yourself. QuickBooks contains some built-in tools that you can run occasionally to minimize your file size.
One thing you can do on your own is to rid QuickBooks of old, unneeded data. The software contains a Condense Data utility that can do this automatically. But just because QuickBooks offers a tool doesnât mean that you should use it on your own.
Figure 2: Yes, QuickBooks allows you to use this tool on your own. But if you really want to preserve the integrity of your data, let us help.A Risky Utility
The programâs documentation for this utility contains a list of warnings and preparation steps a mile long.
We recommend that you donât use this tool. Same goes for Verify Data and Rebuild DataUtilities menu. If you lose a significant amount of company data, you can also lose your company. Itâs happened to numerous businesses.
Be Proactive
Instead, start practicing good preventive medicine to keep your QuickBooks company file healthy. Once a month or so, perhaps at the same time you reconcile your bank accounts, do a manual check of your major Lists.
Run the Account Listing report (Lists | Chart of Accounts | Reports | Account Listing). Are all of your bank accounts still active? Do you see accounts that you no longer used or which duplicate each other? Donât try to âfixâ the Chart of Accounts on your own. Let us help.
Figure 3: You might run this report periodically to see if it can be abbreviated.Be very careful here, but if there are Customers and Vendors that have been off your radar for a long time, consider removing them â once youâre sure your interaction with them is history. Same goes for Items and Jobs. Go through the other lists in this menu with a critical but conservative eye. If thereâs any doubt, leave them there.
A Few Alternatives
There are other options. Your copy of QuickBooks may be misbehaving because itâs unable to handle the depth and complexity of your company. It may be time to upgrade. If youâre using QuickBooks Pro, move up to Premier. And if Premier isnât cutting it anymore, consider QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions.
Thereâs cost involved, of course, but you may already be losing money by losing time because of your versionâs limitations. All editions of QuickBooks look and work similarly, so that your learning curve will be minimal.
Also, try to minimize the number of open windows that are active in QuickBooks. That will improve your performance. And what about your hardware? Is it getting a little long in the tooth? At least consider adding memory, but PCs are cheap these days. If youâre having problems with many of your applications, it may be time for an upgrade.
A Stitch in Timeâ¦
Weâve suggested many times here that you contact us for help with your spring cleanup. While that may seem self-serving, remember that it takes us a lot less time and money to take preventive steps with your QuickBooks company file than to troubleshoot a broken one.
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Do you remember why you started using QuickBooks? You may have simply wanted to produce sales forms and record payments electronically. Gradually, you expanded your use of the software, perhaps paying and tracking bills through it and keeping an eagle eye on your inventory levels. Certainly, you’ve run at least some of the pre-built report templates offered by all versions of QuickBooks since their inception.
QuickBooks’ automation of your daily bookkeeping tasks has undoubtedly served you well. But that’s merely limited use; now it’s time to take advantage of QuickBooks’ greatest strength: customizable reports.
One of the rewards for diligently entering all of your accounting information is a better grasp of your company’s financial performance to date. That insight ultimately leads to better business decisions that can contribute to your future growth and success.
Figure 1: QuickBooks’ Report Center can help you learn about what each report is designed to tell you. But smart customization requires deeper insight.Making Reports Meaningful
Like many other tasks in QuickBooks, report customization tools aren’t that difficult to master. What’s challenging is:
- Understanding what each report is designed to tell you
- Determining which reports are most relevant to your business information needs, and
- Designing each to produce the critical insight you need in order to move forward.
The first of these is fairly clear. You can understand what many reports do by their titles, their content, and the descriptions QuickBooks offers. We recommend that you spend some time looking at the Report Center in QuickBooks to familiarize yourself with your options.
The second two challenges are a bit more formidable. It’s our job to assist you in establishing a workflow in QuickBooks to keep accurate records and produce necessary transactions. But we want you to do more than just maintain the status quo. When you analyze and interpret what your reports are telling you, you can make smart business decisions.
So if we haven’t gone over this with you already, we encourage you to schedule some time with us so you can get the maximum benefit from your QuickBooks reports.
Figure 2: You canât miss QuickBooksâ customization link when you open a report. But the trick is knowing how to best use its options for your business.A Simple Set of Steps
Let’s take a look at a report you may already be generate: Sales by Customer Detail (Reports | Sales | Sales by Customer Detail). QuickBooks comes with a commonly-used set of default columns in its reports. This particular report contains column labels like Type (invoice, sales receipt, etc.), Item and Quantity, and Sales Price. You can easily change the date range that’s offered as a default up below the toolbar. But to get to QuickBooks’ powerful customization tools, click Customize Report. A window with four tabs opens. They are: Display. Options in this window help you specify the columns you want to appear in your report. In the lower left corner, there’s a list titled Columns that contains every possible column label for that report. If you scroll down, you’ll see a check mark in front of the default columns. Click on any of those to uncheck them, and click in front of any that you’d like to add. Other options here include how your data should be totaled and sorted. Some reports let you choose between cash and accrual basis. Filters. This is the difficult one–and the tool that will provide the most insight. Filters determine which subsets of related data you’ll see (accounts, items, customer types, zip codes, etc.) by including only those that meet certain conditions. Here’s where we can really help you answer critical business questions that will lead you to smart decisions.
Figure 3: In this example, you’ve created a filter that will find all commercial drywall jobs that have been invoiced in the current fiscal quarter. You could narrow this report further by, for example, class, state, and paid status.Header/Footer and Fonts & Numbers. You can tailor the design and layout of your reports here.
Well-formulated reports can help you spot cash flow problems, maintain the right inventory levels, see which jobs are the most profitable, and compare your estimates to actual costs. You’ll also be able to identify your best customers, your most sought-after items, and your most successful sales reps. Careful customization of your reports–and thorough analysis of their data–will make the answers to your constant questions about your company’s future direction much clearer. We can help you take full advantage of these powerful tools.
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Sending invoices to your customers to bill for products and/or services is probably one of the more enjoyable parts of your job â second only to recording payments received. And thanks to the company file you’ve built in QuickBooks, creating invoices is generally a very simple process that requires no duplicate data entry.
Figure 1: You probably use QuickBooks’ invoice forms frequently, so you know how much easier it is to fill them out than to create paper bills.QuickBooks also includes easy-to-use templates for another kind of customer form: the statement. These forms are generally not used nearly as frequently as invoices. However, you may find them more appropriate if you:
- Want to create a form that lists all of a customer’s open charges
- Have a customer who accrues multiple charges before being billed
- Receive advance â or regular — payments, or
- Need a historical accounting of a customerâs activity, including charges, payments, and balance.
Limitations of Statements
QuickBooks places some restrictions on statements. For example if you have a number of related charges for which you want to create a subtotal for, you’ll have to use an invoice. Statements also cannot include sales tax, percentage discounts, or payment items. Products or services requiring descriptions that run more than a paragraph can’t go on a statement. Customization options, too, are limited: you can’t add custom fields to the statement form, nor can you include a message to your customers, like, “We appreciate your business.”
The “Reminder Statement”
There may be occasions when you want to create a form that lists invoices received, payments made, and any credits given for one or more customers. This may be necessary when, for example, a customer disputes a charge. You may also want to send out these statements to remind customers of delinquent payments.
You do not have to enter any new data for these statements. Instead QuickBooks will pull the existing activity that you ask for in the Create Statements window, shown below. To get there, either click on the Statements icon on the home page, or open the Customers menu and select Create Statements.
Figure 2: The Create Statements window in QuickBooks offers multiple options for defining the statements you want to send to customers.As you can see, QuickBooks offers a lot of flexibility in the creation of statements. You can specify:
- The active date range. Under SELECT STATEMENT OPTIONS, you can either enter a date range or request a statement for every customer who has open transactions as of the Statement Date (be sure that this date is correct before proceeding). You can also ask to include only transactions that are past due by a specified number of days.
- The customers to include. Do you want to use the conditions you just outlined to apply to All Customers? If so, click on the button in front of that options. If you choose Multiple Customers, a small button labeled Choose⦠will appear. Click on it, and a window displaying your customer list opens. One Customer also opens your list of customers. If youâve assigned types to your customers and want to include only those in one category (like Residential or Commercial), click Customers of Type. And Preferred Send Method lets you limit your statement output to customers who receive either emailed or printed forms.
- The template to use. Click the down arrow to see the statement templates available. If you have not customized QuickBooks’ standard form and want to do so, let us help.
- Whether QuickBooks prepares one statement per customer or per job. This is a very important distinction, so choose carefully.
- Miscellaneous attributes of your statement run. Click on the box in front of any that should apply.
If you assess finance charges, you can do so here. This is an advanced activity in QuickBooks, and we’d be happy to provide guidance in this area.
When you’re done, you can Preview your statements, Print, or E-Mail them by clicking those buttons.
Entering Individual Charges
If you need to enter individual charges, you’ll have to work with QuickBooks’ customer registers. You’ll find these by either opening the Customers menu and selecting Enter Statement Charges or highlighting a customer in the Customer Center, then clicking the down arrow next to New Transactions and selecting Statement Charges.
Figure 3: A Statement Charge in the customer register.We highly recommend that you let us help you get started if individual charges are necessary. Like many of QuickBooks’ functions, this isn’t a difficult activity once you understand it. But it’s much easier and economical for you to get upfront guidance than for us to come in and untangle your company file.
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Whether you’re selling one-of-a-kind items or stocking dozens of the same kinds of products, you need to create records for each. When it comes time to create invoices or sales receipts, your careful work defining each type of item will:
- Ensure that your customers receive correct descriptions and pricing,
- Provide the information you must know about your inventory levels, and,
- Help you make smart decisions about reordering.
You’ll start this process by making sure that your QuickBooks file is set up to track inventory. Open the Edit menu and select Preferences, then Items & Inventory. Click the Company Preferences tab and click in the box in front of Inventory and purchase orders are activated if there isn’t a check in the box already. Here, too, you can ask that QuickBooks warn you when there isn’t enough inventory to sell. Click OK when you’re finished.
Figure 1: You need to be sure that QuickBooks knows you’ll be tracking inventory before you start making sales.To create your first item, open the Lists menu and select Item List. Click the down arrow next to Item in the lower left corner of the window that opens and select New. The New Item window opens.
Warning: You must be very precise when you’re creating item records in order to avoid confusing your customers and creating problems with your accounting down the road. Please call us if you want us to walk you through the first few items.
QuickBooks should display the list of options below TYPE. Since you’re going to be tracking inventory that you buy and sell, select Inventory Part. Enter a name and/or item number in the next field. This is not the text that will appear on transactions; it’s simply for you to be able to recognize each item in your own bookkeeping.
Figure 2: Let us work with you if you have any doubts about the data that needs to be entered in the New Item window. It must be 100 percent accurate.In the example above, the box next to Subitem of has a check mark in it because “Light Pine” is only one of the cabinet types you sell (you can check this box and select if you want to create a new “parent” item on the fly). Leave the next field blank if your item doesn’t have a Part Number, and disregard UNIT OF MEASURE unless you’re using QuickBooks Premier or above.
Fill in the PURCHASE INFORMATION and SALES INFORMATION fields (or select from the lists of options). Keep in mind that the descriptive text you enter here will appear on transaction forms, though customers will never see what you’ve actually paid for items, of course (your Cost, as opposed to the Sales Price).
QuickBooks should have automatically selected the COGS Account (Cost of Goods Sold), but you’ll need to specify an Income Account. Please ask us if you’re not sure, as this is a critical designation. The Preferred Vendor and Tax Code fields will display lists if you’ve already set these up.
QuickBooks should have pre-selected your Asset Account. If you want to be alerted when your inventory level for this item has fallen to a specific number (Min) so you can reorder up to the point you specify in the Max field, enter those numbers there (the Inventory to Reorder option must be turned on in Edit | Preferences | Reminders).
If you already have this item in stock, enter the number under On Hand. QuickBooks will automatically calculate Average Cost and On P.O. (Purchase Order).
Click OK when you’ve completed all of the fields. This item will now appear in your Item List, and will be available to use in transactions. When you want to create, edit, delete, etc. any of your items, simply open the same menu you opened in the first step here (Lists | Item List | Item).
Figure 3: The Item menu, found in the lower left corner of the Item List.Precisely created Inventory Part records are critical to accurate sales and purchase transactions. So use exceptional care in building them.
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One of the reasons you started using accounting software, among many others, was to save time. And QuickBooks has complied. Once you create a record for a customer, vendor, item, etc., you rarely â if ever â have to enter that information again; you simply choose it from a list.
You no longer waste time searching through endless piles of papers to find the one you need; you just do a search. And when you need a report on your monthly sales or inventory purchases or your payroll liabilities, you don’t have to wrestle with Excel or locate the right paper records; you just click a few times.
Memorized transactions can be another major time saver. You might use them when you, for example:
- Provide the same service for a customer on a regular basis,
- Charge a monthly fee for rentals, maintenance, membership, etc.,
- Pay a bill to the same company regularly or
- Have a standing order with a vendor for a similar set of items.
It’s easy to create memorized transactions. QuickBooks provides an icon for them in the toolbar of every transaction form that’s supported, like invoices, bills, and purchase orders.
Figure 1: When you see the Memorize icon in the toolbar of a transaction form, you know that you can create a template to use over and over.To get started, create a transaction that you know will be repeated – even if the amount will be different every time (you’ll still save time because you won’t have to fill in or select absolutely every detail). Let’s say you’re doing some social media consulting for a customer, and you’ve contracted for eight hours every month. Create the invoice for that billing. Then click the Memorize icon. This window opens:
Figure 2: In the Memorize Transaction window, you’ll tell QuickBooks how often the transaction will be created, in addition to providing other information.Your customer will already appear in the Name field. You’ll have to choose from among three options so that QuickBooks knows how to handle this recurring form:
Add to my Reminders List. If you choose this by clicking on the button in front of the option, QuickBooks will add this transaction to your existing Reminders List.
Note: Confused about how you get QuickBooks to remind you about actions you have to take? Help is just a phone call away.
Do Not Remind Me. We don’t recommend this option unless you have an exceptionally good memory, few memorized transactions, or a tickler file in another application. Even then, reminders are a good idea.
Automatic Transaction Entry. This absolutely saves the most time. It’s also the riskiest option. If you select this, QuickBooks will send the transaction through at the intervals you’ve defined. You’ll have to enter a number that indicates how many times you want the form sent and how many days in advance it should be entered.
Next, you’ll tell QuickBooks how often this transaction needs to be created by clicking on the down arrow to the right of How Often. Click on the calendar icon in the Next Date field to select the exact day this should occur next (you’ll have an opportunity when you work with the Reminders List to specify how much advance warning you want).
When you’re done, click OK.
Once you start memorizing transactions, QuickBooks will store them in a list. When you get a reminder that one is due soon, open the Lists menu and select Memorized Transaction List. You’ll see this screen, populated with your own work:
Figure 3: You’ll open the Memorized Transaction List to enter one or to work with one you’ve already created.Highlight a transaction in the list and click the down arrow next to Memorized Transaction in the lower left corner to see your options here. You can also click Enter Transaction, and your original form will appear. If you’ve saved it with a permanent amount, you can just save and dispatch it. Otherwise, enter the correct amount before you proceed.
If you’re fairly new to QuickBooks and don’t feel like you’re well acquainted with its time-saving features, please call to set up a time for some training. Better to do that up front than to have to untangle a jumbled company file.
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Thanks to the internet, privacy has been on the wane over the last few years. We assume that our addresses and phone numbers are public information, thanks to sites like Switchboard and 411.com. We hope that our dates of birth are private (though the number of birthday wishes on Facebook makes that doubtful), and we assume that our Social Security numbers are hard to get.
Your customers trust you enough to provide you with additional private information, like credit card numbers. And you’ve seen what an uproar occurs when major corporate entities like Target and Home Depot get hacked.
Your small business may not have hundreds of thousands of customer information files, but you can still be targeted by external hackers and even your own employees. Are you taking measures to ensure the security of that data stored on your hard drive and/or in the cloud?
Your Inner Circle
The last thing you want to imagine is that one of your own employees has been tampering with your QuickBooks company data. It happens, though, and you need to protect yourself from potential internal attacks.
One of your internal controls, then, should include the establishment of boundaries for every employee who has access to QuickBooks. You can restrict each staff member to specific areas of the program instead of sharing a master password and giving everyone free rein. Go to Company | Set Up Users and Passwords | Set Up Users to do this.
Figure 1: If you click on Selective Access in this window, you can restrict your employees’ activities to specific areas and actions.The User List window opens, which will display all users who have been set up already, including you as the Admin. Click Add User and enter a name and password. Click the box in front of Add this user to my QuickBooks license, then click Next. Click on the button in front of Selected areas of QuickBooks. Click Next.
The next 10 screens break QuickBooks down into separate activities and activity areas, like Sales and Accounts Receivable, Checking and Credit Cards, and Sensitive Accounting Activities. On each screen, click on the button in front of the correct option:
- No Access
- Full Access
- Selective Access (lets you specify what areas and actions will be allowed for that employee)
Other Internal Controls
QuickBooks’ Audit Trail is your friend. It records everything that is entered or changed in the software, by whom, and precisely when. To view it, open the Reports menu, then click on Accountant & Taxes, then Audit Trail. Like all QuickBooks reports, it can be customized to display the entries you need to see.
Figure 2: QuickBooks’ Audit Trail provides a detailed history of all activity in the software.There are other reports that you should review frequently, and some that we should create and analyze for you at least every quarter, if not monthly. We can suggest reports that would help you look for fraud, and tell you what to look for.
Common Sense Practices
⢠It goes without saying that protecting your entire hardware/software/cloud configuration will help keep your QuickBooks company file safe from external marauders. You must employ state-of-the-art antivirus and anti-malware applications and keep them updated. Talk to us if you need recommendations and/or help implementing them. ⢠If you’re a sole proprietor or you work from your home, restrict the computer where QuickBooks resides to business software and websites only. Never let anyone install applications, play interactive games, etc. on it. ⢠Change your own QuickBooks password at least every 90 days, and do backups to secure drives or websites. ⢠When you run into problems with QuickBooks’ functioning, please let us help. Even a computer troubleshooting specialist will not understand the program well enough to solve problems, and he or she may compromise your data file further.
As security software and systems get smarter, so do the hackers. Don’t let your company and its customers be victims of data theft.
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In days gone by, running a company was a 40-hour per week proposition. You might have taken work home some evenings or gone into the office on weekends.
Those days are over, thanks to the internet and mobile technology. This fundamental change in the way we do business means that it’s now hard to get away from work. Your smartphone and tablet are usually within easy reach, and they’re always tempting you to check in.
On the flip side, that kind of 24/7/365 accessibility has numerous benefits. There are, for example, apps that can be integrated with your desktop QuickBooks company file, which enable you to:
- Make sales wherever you are,
- Document expenses as they’re incurred, and
- Monitor employee time for payroll purposes.
Let’s take a look at these in more detail.
Mobile Sales
Figure 1: One of the oldest apps that integrates with QuickBooks is GoPayment. You can process transactions on your smartphone or tablet from anywhere.Payment-processing on smartphones has become commonplace these days. You’ve probably seen merchants accepting credit cards on mobile phones in one of two ways: by swiping the card on a small card reader that attach to their device or by entering bank cards numbers directly.
Intuit’s GoPayment lets you do either. You can download the free app and process a customer’s payment on your smartphone. However, you still have to download it into QuickBooks and either create a sales receipt or match it to an open invoice. This isn’t a difficult process once you understand it, but you must be sure to do it correctly from the start. We can do some practice runs with you.
Benefit: Improved sales that aren’t dependent on location.
Travel Expenses On-the-Go
One of the smartest, most useful apps that has ever been created is the expense reporter â particularly when used by your road warriors for on-the-go expenses. There are a handful of these. Travelers can record expenses in two ways: they can either enter the information directly or snap a picture of a receipt with a smartphone. When your employees get back to the office, theyâre able to prepare complete expense reports, whose approved data can be transferred into QuickBooks.
Concur is one of these apps. When you set it up, it imports Account Codes, Customers, Jobs and Classes, and Vendor and Employee Records from QuickBooks so that these can be assigned for each expense entry. Credit card transactions can be imported directly. When an expense report is completed, it can be sent to a manager for approval, and reimbursement is then deposited in the employee’s bank account.
Figure 2: Intuit’s App Center is home to hundreds of add-on applications for QuickBooks.Tallie works similarly. It can automatically categorize expenses and alert approvers to expense policy violations. Used in conjunction with Bill.com and SmartVault, it can accommodate a sophisticated, seamless accounting workflow. We’ll see more multi-app integration as cloud-based financial solutions mature, but if you’re going to attempt such a setup, let us help you with the initial mechanics.
Benefit: More accurate, policy-compliant expense reports.
Time-Tracking and Timesheets
If all of your employees walk through the office door every morning and stay there, you don’t need a mobile app for time-tracking. But for businesses whose cash flow depends on recovering and recording every minute of billable time, a smartphone time-tracker is ideal.
TSheets Time Tracker can help improve your bottom line in numerous ways. This particular app:
- Accommodates real-time mobile data entry,
- Tracks employee locations using GPS, and
- Creates timesheets that can be synchronized with QuickBooks, tracking billable time by customer, job, employee, etc.
Benefits: Employee accountability; recovery and correct classification of all billable hours; and less time required to create timesheets.
Moving Toward Integration
Given the size limitations of smartphones, some mobile apps contain only a subset of the features found in their desktop counterparts. But that subset is chosen based on the needs of mobile users.
Fewer features mean that your learning time for the mobile apps that integrate with QuickBooks will be minimal. But the steps to sync with QuickBooks must be followed to the letter, and you may not be familiar with such a process. We want you to experience the benefits that these smartphone solutions can offer without compromising the integrity of your QuickBooks company file. Let us introduce you to these forward-looking, beneficial tools.
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You probably don’t get as many paper forms in the U.S. Mail as you used to. But when you do, do you draw conclusions about the business that sent them based on what their forms look like?
Whether or not you think you do, most people make judgements on businesses based on collateral materials. You might notice that there’s no company logo, or that there are unnecessary blank fields. Maybe the print is very light or blurry, and there’s no message at the bottom thanking you for your business and your payment.
How you present yourself on paper does matter. There’s a lot of competition out there, and you need to use all of the tools available to you to stand out. QuickBooks provides one way to do so with its simple forms customization features.
Getting Started
To see what forms are available for customization, open the Lists menu and select Templates to open this window:
Figure 1: QuickBooks’ Templates window shows you what forms can be customized and provides tools for working with them.Before you try your hand at customizing a form, make a copy to work with first. Highlight Intuit Product Invoice. Click the down arrow next to Templates in the lower left, and select Duplicate. A small window will open, displaying your options. Select Invoice and click OK.
QuickBooks will then take you back to the Templates window, and you’ll see a new entry labeled Copy of: Intuit Product Invoice. Right-click on it and select Edit Template from the menu that opens. This will open the Basic Customization window.
There are two parts to this screen. The editing options for the template you selected will appear on the left, and a preview of your invoice will display on the right. As you make modifications to the template, the preview will change to reflect them.
The best, most noticeable thing you can do to customize your invoice is to add a logo. Click the box in front of Use logo, and locate the file in the computer directory that opens. Double-click it. You logo will appear to the left of your company name and address in the upper left corner of the preview.
Figure 2: The Basic Customization window displays options for modifying your copy of the Intuit Product Invoice template.You can make numerous changes to your template in this window, like:
- Selecting a new color scheme,
- Changing fonts,
- Deciding how much of your contact information should appear, and
- Indicating whether the Print Status Stamp (PAID, PENDING, etc.) should appear where appropriate on your invoices.
Note: You can choose to use the same modified design on multiple types of forms. This is a little complicated; let us help you.
More Customizing Options
The changes you just made were fairly superficial. However, QuickBooks offers tools that let you go much further, modifying the actual content of the invoice itself, its columns, and its fields. To get started on this, click the Additional Customization button at the bottom of the screen. The window that opens displays a preview of your invoice on the right side, just like in the previous window.
Your customization options appear on the left side, divided into five different sections. You’ll work primarily with three of them for your invoice:
Header. This includes all of the information that appears on about the top third of the form, like Bill To, Terms, Due Date, and Project/Job.
Columns. What are you billing the customer for? Item, Description, Quantity, Rate, etc.
Footer. What information will you want to enter after you’ve completed the invoice’s product or service content? You’ll likely want fields like Total, Balance Due, and Payments/Credits, perhaps a Message.
Figure 3: QuickBooks gives you tremendous control over the content in your forms.As you can see in the above image, QuickBooks lets you choose whether specific fields and columns will appear on your invoices onscreen and/or in print. You can also change field labels if you’d like. And if you have overlapping fields or want to further modify the appearance of the invoice, you can use the Layout Designer. It’s a simple tool, but it requires some design skills.
Of course, you may not be printing many invoices at all if you’re set up to email them and accept payments online. But your customers, of course, will still see how carefully you’ve crafted your forms, which will feed into their overall perception of you. Let this impression be a good one.
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e look forward to achieving even more in the next 12.
But sometimes we have a nagging feeling that we forgot something. And it often has to do with our finances, both personal and professional.
You can take steps now to make the new year less worrisome. Doing some extra work in QuickBooks now will ensure that you start the new year ready to move ahead, rather than scrambling to see what you missed on come January.
Thinking Ahead
Where to start? Depending on how conscientiously you entered transactions and ran reports, you might need to set some extra time aside in the midst of your other year-end and holiday-related commitments.
For example, did you instruct QuickBooks to “close your books” at the end of the year? QuickBooks will automatically make year-end adjustments if you entered December 31 as a closing date in Preferences. However, it is not required, and there are both advantages and disadvantages to doing so. We can help you decide if this is the best decision for your company.
Figure 1: If you set a closing date of December 31 in QuickBooks’ Preferences, you need to prepare your company file for this deadline in advance.Prior to this, though, there’s another important task you should complete before the end of the year. It is common sense, but not everyone thinks of it during the December rush: Make sure you have entered all transactions and payments that should be included in your QuickBooks file for 2015
If anyone else on your staff works in QuickBooks, make sure they know that you are trying to wrap up the year. If they are holding anything back because of questions and comments, now is the time to confer with you.
Taxes and Accounts
You may already be working with us on tax planning, but if you are not, then it is never too early to project your incoming and outgoing funds for the new year.
Figure 2: Use QuickBooks to make decisions about income and/or expenses to reduce your tax obligation next year.Talk to us about your tax situation if you think this may be necessary. We may not be able to prepare your taxes just yet, but we can create financial reports and projections that help you prepare for filing.
Odds and Ends
How do you back up your QuickBooks company file? Is it on a local drive or in the cloud? How often do you do this? Archiving your data is critical. Think about what would happen if you lost your customer records or a month’s worth of transactions or multiple payments. This is an area where we can provide guidance. Is there a better, safer way to ensure data security? Are there special backup activities you should do at year’s end?
Some companies wait until the end of January to do a physical inventory count. Rather than being surprised, you may want to consider doing this now if it is feasible.
And when you think you have entered everything but payments or transactions that may come in at the end of the year, all accounts should be reconciled
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Figure 3: By late December or early January, you should do a final reconciliation of all accounts for the previous year.QuickBooks makes it easy to do this regularly, but if you need assistance, we can help you ring in the New Year on a more confident note.
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If you’re using QuickBooks, you probably know that you’re complying with the rules of double-entry accounting. The software is designed such that you can be compliant with these requirements without even being aware of it. You’re dealing with invoices and purchase orders, bank account reconciliation and bill-paying and payroll, not debits and credits and journal entries. QuickBooks does the double-entry part in the background.
While every business that uses QuickBooks is following those same rules, each has its own unique structure and its own need to modify some elements of the program to do certain tasks. For example:
- Store more specific information about customers, vendors, and employees in their records,
- Differentiate between variations of similar inventory items, and
- Create more targeted reports.
This is where custom fields come in.
Defining Custom Fields
Figure 1: QuickBooks comes with pre-designed form and record templates.One of the ways that QuickBooks simplifies your life as your company’s accounting manager is by providing pre-designed record and form templates. Need to create an invoice? There’s a form that already contains the most commonly-used data fields; you just fill in the blanks or select from drop-down lists. Want to store information about your customers and about the items you sell? Ditto.
However, if you need more fields than QuickBooks offers on a record or form, you can easily add your own. The software lets you add 15 fields total to customers and jobs, vendors, and employees, and you’re limited to seven for any one record type (if you want to use the same field in two of these, it will only count as one). And you’re allowed to define up to five fields for your item records.
This type of modification is easy to do, but it’s critical that you think carefully about what fields you should add. You don’t want to learn three or six months down the road that one isn’t really necessary and two more are needed, for example. This is especially important when youâre creating records for inventory items.
You may want to schedule some time with us to go over this (and to explore QuickBooks’ item-tracking features if you’re new to managing inventory). You can change custom field names, but you need to understand how this will affect your data if you do this.
Figure 2: It’s easy to add custom fields to records, but be sure you give a lot of thought to what will be needed.Let’s say you want to add some custom fields to your customer records. Open the Customer Center by clicking the tab in the left vertical pane or opening the Customers menu and clicking on Customer Center. Double-click on a customer or click on the small pencil icon in the upper right. The Edit Customer window opens.
Click on the Additional Info tab on the left and then on the Define Fields button in the lower right. The Set up Custom Fields for Names window opens, as pictured above.
Click in the first column, under Label. Enter the name of the field as you would like it to appear in records and reports. Then click in the box or boxes below Cust, Vend, or Empl. If you want to use the same field in more than one record type, enter a check mark in both. Continue to enter field names until you’re done, then click OK.
Now when you create a customer record, you can fill in the blanks. And your new fields will appear as filters in some reports.
Figure 3: Custom fields can sometimes be used in reports.You’ll follow a similar set of steps when you create custom fields for items in QuickBooks. Open the Lists menu and select Item List. Double-click on any item to open the Edit Item window. Click the Custom Fields bar on the right, then Custom Fields and Define Fields. If your company sells a lot of products with multiple variations, call the office before you attempt this.
Personalizing your copy of QuickBooks by adding custom fields has a lot of benefits. But this major structural change requires a lot of thought and planning up front to make sure that this feature is a plus for your business.
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If you’re using QuickBooks, you probably know that you’re complying with the rules of double-entry accounting. The software is designed such that you can be compliant with these requirements without even being aware of it. You’re dealing with invoices and purchase orders, bank account reconciliation and bill-paying and payroll, not debits and credits and journal entries. QuickBooks does the double-entry part in the background.
While every business that uses QuickBooks is following those same rules, each has its own unique structure and its own need to modify some elements of the program to do certain tasks. For example:
- Store more specific information about customers, vendors, and employees in their records,
- Differentiate between variations of similar inventory items, and
- Create more targeted reports.
This is where custom fields come in.
Defining Custom Fields
Figure 1: QuickBooks comes with pre-designed form and record templates.One of the ways that QuickBooks simplifies your life as your company’s accounting manager is by providing pre-designed record and form templates. Need to create an invoice? There’s a form that already contains the most commonly-used data fields; you just fill in the blanks or select from drop-down lists. Want to store information about your customers and about the items you sell? Ditto.
However, if you need more fields than QuickBooks offers on a record or form, you can easily add your own. The software lets you add 15 fields total to customers and jobs, vendors, and employees, and you’re limited to seven for any one record type (if you want to use the same field in two of these, it will only count as one). And you’re allowed to define up to five fields for your item records.
This type of modification is easy to do, but it’s critical that you think carefully about what fields you should add. You don’t want to learn three or six months down the road that one isn’t really necessary and two more are needed, for example. This is especially important when you’re creating records for inventory items.
You may want to schedule some time with us to go over this (and to explore QuickBooks’ item-tracking features if you’re new to managing inventory). You can change custom field names, but you need to understand how this will affect your data if you do this.
Figure 2: It’s easy to add custom fields to records, but be sure you give a lot of thought to what will be needed.Let’s say you want to add some custom fields to your customer records. Open the Customer Center by clicking the tab in the left vertical pane or opening the Customers menu and clicking on Customer Center. Double-click on a customer or click on the small pencil icon in the upper right. The Edit Customer window opens.
Click on the Additional Info tab on the left and then on the Define Fields button in the lower right. The Set up Custom Fields for Names window opens, as pictured above.
Click in the first column, under Label. Enter the name of the field as you would like it to appear in records and reports. Then click in the box or boxes below Cust, Vend, or Empl. If you want to use the same field in more than one record type, enter a check mark in both. Continue to enter field names until you’re done, then click OK.
Now when you create a customer record, you can fill in the blanks. And your new fields will appear as filters in some reports.
Figure 3: Custom fields can sometimes be used in reports.You’ll follow a similar set of steps when you create custom fields for items in QuickBooks. Open the Lists menu and select Item List. Double-click on any item to open the Edit Item window. Click the Custom Fields bar on the right, then Custom Fields and Define Fields. If your company sells a lot of products with multiple variations, call the office before you attempt this.
Personalizing your copy of QuickBooks by adding custom fields has a lot of benefits. But this major structural change requires a lot of thought and planning up front to make sure that this feature is a plus for your business.
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If you ever did your bookkeeping manually, you probably didn’t allow every employee to see every sales form and account register and payroll stub. Most likely, you established a system that allowed staff to work only with information that related to their jobs. Even so, there may have been times when, for example, someone pulled the wrong file folder or was sent a report that he or she shouldn’t have seen.
QuickBooks helps prevent this by setting virtual boundaries. You can specify which features of the software can be accessed by employees who work with your accounting data. Each employee receives a unique username and password that unlocks only the areas he or she should be visiting.
Figure 1: To help minimize errors, maintain data integrity, and preserve confidentiality, QuickBooks lets you restrict users to designated areas in the software.Here’s how you as the Administrator can define these roles. Open the Company menu and select Set Up Users and Passwords | Set Up Users. The User List window opens. You should see yourself signed up as the Admin. Click Add User and enter a User Name and Password for the employee you’re adding. Confirm the Password and check the box in front of Add this user to my QuickBooks license. Click Next.
Note: You can have as many as five people working in your QuickBooks company file at the same time, depending on how many user licenses you’ve purchased. Not sure? Press F2 and look in the upper left corner. If you need more than five user licenses, please call the office to find out about upgrading to QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions.
In the next window that opens (see above screen), you’ll be given three options. Probably you’ll most often select the second option, which lets you specify the screens this user can see and what he or she can do there. The first–All areas of QuickBooks–would seldom be granted. And the third allows us to come in and do whatever tasks have been outlined in our work relationship (troubleshooting, monitoring, creating and analyzing reports, etc.).
Click the button in front of Selected areas of QuickBooks and then Next. You’ll see the first in a series of screens that deal with the software’s functional areas: Sales and Accounts Receivable, Purchases and Accounts Payable, Checking and Credit Cards, Inventory, Time Tracking, Payroll and Employees, Sensitive Accounting Activities (funds transfers, online banking, etc.), Sensitive Financial Reporting, and Changing or Deleting Transactions.
Figure 2: When you give employees Selective Access in a particular area, you can further define their roles there.The Sales and Accounts Receivable screen is a good example. You can see the options offered in the above image. By clicking on the buttons pictured, you’re giving this employee permission to both create and print transactions. Below these options, you’ll be able to keep him or her from seeing customers’ credit card numbers in their entirety by clicking in the small box. When you’re finished, click Next.
Keep clicking Next and proceed through the rest of the screens. Your choices will be similar on each. But be sure to read all of the descriptive text very carefully. Keep in mind the importance of confidentiality issues and security as you go along.
The ninth screen, Changing or Deleting Transactions, deserves special attention. First, should this employee be able to change or delete transactions in his or her assigned area(s)? Even though you trusted these employees to work with finances when you hired them, consider this question carefully. Depending on the volume of transactions processed every day, you may want to reserve this ability for yourself.
We may or may not have established and password-protected a Closing Date for your company file. This is the date when the books for a specific time frame have been “closed,” meaning that transactions should not be entered, added, or deleted prior to it. We can talk with you about the pros and cons of such an action.
Figure 3: A summary of user access rightsHere and on every other screen in this multi-step wizard, you can always click the Back button if you want to return to a previous window. When you’re finished, you’ll see a screen like the one in the above image that summarizes the choices you have just made.
If you’re feeling any uncertainty or confusion about the whole issue of access rights, please call to discuss your options. These are important decisions. You’ll want to stress to your employees that restricting their permissions does not signal a lack of your trust in them. Rather, QuickBooks provides these tools to protect everyone who uses the software as well as any external individuals and companies that might be affected.
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QuickBooks was designed to be used by millions of businesses. In fact, it’s possible to install it, answer a few questions about your company and start working right away.
However, we strongly suggest you take the time to specify your Preferences. QuickBooks devotes a whole screen to this customization process. You can find it by opening the Edit menu and selecting Preferences.
This is the screen you’ll see when you go to Edit | Preferences in QuickBooks. You can turn features off and on, and customize the software in numerous other ways.Let’s look at some examples of what you can do on this page. In the image above, Accounting is highlighted. You can see that QuickBooks makes it easy for you to specify your preferences. You simply click in boxes to check or uncheck them. Sometimes, you’ll click on the desired button in front of a list item. Other times, you’ll be asked to enter numbers and text.
Tip: When you click on a tab in the left navigation pane of the Preferences window, you’ll notice that there are two tabs in the larger pane on the right. If My Preferences is highlighted and there are no options on that screen, click on Company Preferences.
Some of the screens here, like Accounting, contain complex concepts. Do you know, for example, why you would or wouldn’t want to Use account numbers? What Retained Earnings are?
Warning: While the mechanics of this process are simple, there may be times when you don’t understand what’s being asked because you’re either not familiar with the terms or you don’t know which option you should choose. Rather than guessing, please connect with us to set up a time to go over all of the content in the Preferences window.
Some preferences are easier to define. Let’s look at one of these.
The Time & Expenses window in QuickBooks’ PreferencesThe image above is a partial snapshot of the screen that opens when you select Time & Expenses from the left vertical tab in the Preferences window.
Tip: If you start making changes and decide you’d like to return to the options selected before you started, click the Default tab in the upper right.
Your options here are very simple:
- Do you want to use the time-tracking features in QuickBooks?
- On what day does your work week start?
- Does all of the employee time worked and recorded get billed back to the appropriate customer? (You can change this manually on each time entry by checking or unchecking the box in front of Billable.)
- When you create an invoice for a customer who has outstanding time charges, do you want to be able to select those from a list?
If you check the box in front of Create invoices from a list of time and expenses, this box will appear when you open the Create Invoices window and select a customer who needs to be billed for time:
If you are creating an invoice for a customer who has received services but who has not been billed for them yet, you can opt to have those charges added to the invoice.You’ll notice that there’s a box in the lower left corner labeled Save this as a preference. While QuickBooks allows you to specify preferences in countless areas in the Preferences window, you will often have the opportunity to make an exception for a particular action as you’re working on transactions. Also, as shown here, you can sometimes turn on specific preferences once you’ve already started a task.
You’re not required to go through all of the entries in the Preferences window before you start working. You can always go there to see if there’s a setting you can change if an element of QuickBooks isn’t performing the way you expected.
It’s a good idea to learn about all of your options in the QuickBooks software before you get started–and we can help. If you let us go through this process with you, you’ll not only learn about the customization allowed, but you’ll also get a good introduction to all of the things that QuickBooks can do, and learn more about your business and its needs.
Need help? Don’t hesitate to call!
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Reports are your reward for all that hard work you put in entering records and transactions in QuickBooks. Sure, you can always find individual invoices, sales receipts, and customers by using the software’s search tools, but in order to make smart business decisions, you need to be able to see related subsets of the information you so carefully entered in neat rows and columns.
You’ve probably created at least some basic reports in QuickBooks. You may have, for example, wanted to see who’s late paying you, or whether you have unpaid bills. You might need to know your stock levels, or which purchase orders are still unfilled. You certainly want to keep a close eye on whether you’re making or losing money.
Figure 1: The QuickBooks Report Center displays examples of reports you can create using your company’s own data.QuickBooks makes it easy to get those answers in only a few seconds. But to get really meaningful, targeted views of your accounting information, you’ll want to shape your reports so that they reveal precisely what you need to know. You can do some of this on your own, but you might want to enlist our help to drill down even further–and to create and analyze the more complex output that some reports can provide.
Configure Preliminary Settings
As often happens when starting a tutorial on a specific QuickBooks feature, the first step is to send you to the Preferences window. Open the Edit menu and select Preferences, then Reports & Graphs. With the My Preferences section open, you can instruct QuickBooks on some of the ways reports should be handled. You can choose to:
- Have the Modify Report window open every time you create a report (to remind you to make any necessary changes first).
- Set your Refresh options. If you always want to have the most current data displayed when you generate a report, you can tell QuickBooks to Prompt me to refresh or Refresh automatically by clicking on the button in front of the appropriate response. Choose Donât refresh–the fastest method–if you don’t want to be interrupted when you’re working with a report. You can refresh when you’re done.
- Draw graphs in 2D to make them run faster, and Use [black and white] patterns instead of colors to better differentiate between segments.
Each person who has access to QuickBooks can set these Preferences any way he or she wishes.
Setting Up Company Preferences
Figure 2: You must be the QuickBooks Administrator to set Company Preferences.You can decide on your own whether Aging Report should start the aging process from the due date or the transaction date. Decide how you want Items and Accounts to appear in reports. And if you click the Format button located directly below Default formatting for reports, you can alter their appearance, for example, by changing fonts and indicating what information should appear in the header and footer.
For other preferences, you may need help. For example, do you understand the difference between running Summary Reports as Accrual or Cash? And have you worked with a Statement of Cash Flows before so you can assign accounts to various sections? This is a report the office should be generating and analyzing periodically for you, so don’t worry about dealing with it on your own.
Note: QuickBooks was designed for small business people, not accountants. But if you really want to get the most out of it to make the best business decisions possible, call the office for assistance with any concepts you don’t understand.
Navigating the Report Center
Figure 3: The QuickBooks Reports menu.Unless you’re working with a very old version of QuickBooks, you have two options for accessing the software’s reporting functions. You can simply click on Reports in the left vertical pane to open the Report Center. Or you can get there by opening the Reports menu (which includes links to other areas, like the Transaction Journal, in addition to lists of QuickBooks’ reports divided by category).
Next month’s QuickBooks will cover several reports and their customization options. In the meantime, as always, don’t hesitate to call if you need help with QuickBooks reports and setup.
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QuickBooks is a faster, safer, and more accurate method of doing your bookkeeping than using a manual system is. Still, you may occasionally tire of your daily tasks and wonder what all of these forms and records mean in terms of your overall financial health–and how to create the reports that go along with them.
The actual mechanics of creating reports in QuickBooks are fairly straightforward. You can go to the Report Center, make a selection, maybe change the date range, and voila! Your company’s related data appears in neat rows and columns.
Figure 1: You may be able to get some of the information you need by simply changing the date range on a QuickBooks report.But perhaps you to see different columns than what QuickBooks’ report templates include. Furthermore, you might want to filter your output for more meaningful, targeted analysis. Some of QuickBooks’ reports–particularly those included in the categories Company & Financial and Accountant & Taxes—can be a little advanced for the average small businessperson with little bookkeeping experience. Yes, they’re easy to run, but they are also difficult to understand so you may need the assistance of a professonal.
We strongly encourage you to let us run these more complex reports, such as the Balance Sheet, for you on a regular (monthly or quarterly) basis. Balance sheets provide valuable insight when making critical business decisions.
But we don’t want to discourage you from working with QuickBooks’ reports on your own either. Some of the easier reports are A/R Aging Detail (to keep an eye on past-due payments) and Unpaid Bills Detail (to see where you stand with your own financial obligations).
Make Reports Yours
Sometimes, QuickBooks’ own report output is a bit too broad for your needs. So the program provides sophisticated customization options. You can work with these to narrow down and shape the data that appears in your reports.
First, columns. Building reports from scratch would be too time-consuming and frustrating for you to do all of the time. And it’s unnecessary, since QuickBooks provides templates for its reports, sets of columns and data filters that would serve some businesses well, but which can be modified by each user.
Try this. Open the Profit & Loss Detail report and click on the Customize Report button in the upper left corner. You will see that the Modify Report window opens.
Figure 2: QuickBooks lets you modify the columns that appear in reports.The Display tab should be highlighted. Change the Report Date Range if necessary by clicking on the down arrow to the right of the Dates field. You can also create your own custom date range by deleting the dates in the From and To fields and entering new ones, or by clicking on the small calendar icons and clicking on the desired dates.
Warning: Do you understand the difference between running reports as either Accrual or Cash? This is important. If you don’t, letâs get together to go over some basic report concepts.
It’s easy to change the default columns that appear in reports. You can either enter a column label in the Search Columns box or scroll down the list of all possible labels. Click in the space in front of the ones you want to include, and click on existing check marks if you want to remove those labels. You can also designate a sort order, either Ascending or Descending.
If you want to work with the Advanced options, or if you come across a Display screen that puzzles you (depending on the report, you may have some complex choices), let us know.
Figure 3: QuickBooks report Filters screenWhen you’re done here, click on the Filters tab. This is a powerful element of QuickBooks report customization. You can limit your report output to data that meet certain criteria. In the image above, for example, you can tell QuickBooks which subset of Accounts should be included. Click on the Billing Status filter, and you can limit the results to Any, Not Billable, Unbilled, or Billed. You get the idea.
You can apply multiple filters to a report. Every one you select will appear in the list under Current Filter Choices.
The Header/Footer and Fonts & Numbers tabs are primarily cosmetic options you can explore on your own, but as you can see from this brief overview there are many ways to use QuickBooks reports as is or customized for your particular situation. We recommend that you work with reports regularly, both on your own and with us. The insight they provide can help your company grow and flourish instead of just getting by.
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When you started your business, maybe you were able to keep track of your inventory by peering in the closet or your garage. As it grew, that simply took too long. But you became tired of running out of stock because you didn’t have time to constantly check its levels, and you forgot about items that did not sell and were tucked away in a corner.
You need inventory–tracking. QuickBooks can help you create thorough records for each product you sell. It keeps track of how much you have on hand and warns you when your stock is running low. And its reports tell you what is selling and what is not, so you can make better, smarter purchasing decisions.
Activating Inventory-Tracking
Before you get started creating item records and including them in transactions, you need to make sure that QuickBooks is set up to start tracking. Open the Edit menu and click Preferences. Click Items & Inventory in the left vertical pane and then select the Company Preferences tab. This window will open:
QuickBooks needs to know what your intentions are when it comes to inventory-tracking.First, of course, click in the box to the left of Inventory and purchase orders are active if it is not already checked. Click the next box down if applicable. The rest of this window deals with two concepts you need to understand. Quantity on Hand refers to the number of items that you actually have. Quantity Available subtracts items currently on Sales Orders. QuickBooks will warn you if you do not have enough of a specific item to commit to a customer. You just have to decide which definition of Quantity you want to use.
When you are done here, click OK.
Accuracy Matters
Now you can start entering records for the products you sell. Accuracy is absolutely essential here. You will see why as you explore QuickBooks’ tracking capabilities.
There are a few ways to open an item record window. You can click Items & Services in the upper right corner of the Home Page, or open the Lists menu and select Item List. Both will open a window displaying any item records that have been entered in a register-type view. Right-click anywhere and select New, or click the arrow next to Item in the lower left corner and select New.
Double- and triple-check your work as you enter information in the QuickBooks item record window.QuickBooks lets you create records for numerous types of items, including Service, Discount, and Inventory Assembly. To see how inventory-tracking works, select Inventory Part from the drop-down menu under TYPE. Next, enter an Item Name/Number in that field.
If you have already named a main category (like Hardware, in the example above) and want to place your product in a subcategory of it, click the Subitem of box and choose from the drop-down list. Manufacturer’s Part Number is optional. You can ignore UNIT OF MEASURE, if this is not an option in your version of QuickBooks.
Purchase Information
If you buy this item from a vendor, fill in this side of the window. Write the description that should appear on purchase transactions when you place an order. Enter the cost you pay for it, and select the COGS (Cost of Goods Sold) account if the default is not correct. Do you buy this product exclusively from one supplier? Select the name in the drop-down menu under Preferred Vendor.
Sales Information
Enter the description you would like customers to see on invoices and the price you’ll charge. If you are at all unsure of what to select for Tax Code or Income Account or need assistance understanding your Chart of Accounts and how these accounts are used in records and transactions, please call the office.
Inventory Information
Here is where the software’s tracking capabilities come in. QuickBooks will probably default to your Inventory Asset account, which is fine. Enter the minimum number of items that should be in stock when you get a reminder to reorder, and the maximum you want to have at any one time. Fill in the On Hand field with the number you currently have. QuickBooks will automatically calculate the Total Value.
In the screen shot above, you see an example of what that last line looks like once you start using that item in transactions. You will see its Average Cost and the number that are currently on purchase orders and sales orders.
Creating records for every product you sell can be tedious, time-consuming work. But the payoff comes in the real-time knowledge you will have of your inventory that will lead to better, smarter purchasing decisions. As always, help is just a phone call away.
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When you started your business, maybe you were able to keep track of your inventory by peering in the closet or your garage. As it grew, that simply took too long. But you became tired of running out of stock because you didn’t have time to constantly check its levels, and you forgot about items that did not sell and were tucked away in a corner.
You need inventory-tracking. QuickBooks can help you create thorough records for each product you sell. It keeps track of how much you have on hand and warns you when your stock is running low. And its reports tell you what is selling and what is not, so you can make better, smarter purchasing decisions.
Activating Inventory-Tracking
Before you get started creating item records and including them in transactions, you need to make sure that QuickBooks is set up to start tracking. Open the Edit menu and click Preferences. Click Items & Inventory in the left vertical pane and then select the Company Preferences tab. This window will open:
Figure 1: QuickBooks needs to know what your intentions are when it comes to inventory-tracking.First, of course, click in the box to the left of Inventory and purchase orders are active if it is not already checked. Click the next box down if applicable. The rest of this window deals with two concepts you need to understand. Quantity on Hand refers to the number of items that you actually have. Quantity Available subtracts items currently on Sales Orders. QuickBooks will warn you if you do not have enough of a specific item to commit to a customer. You just have to decide which definition of Quantity you want to use.
When you are done here, click OK.
Accuracy Matters
Now you can start entering records for the products you sell. Accuracy is absolutely essential here. You will see why as you explore QuickBooks’ tracking capabilities.
There are a few ways to open an item record window. You can click Items & Services in the upper right corner of the Home Page, or open the Lists menu and select Item List. Both will open a window displaying any item records that have been entered in a register-type view. Right-click anywhere and select New, or click the arrow next to Item in the lower left corner and select New.
Figure 2: Double-and triple-check your work as you enter information in the QuickBooks item record window.QuickBooks lets you create records for numerous types of items, including Service, Discount, and Inventory Assembly. To see how inventory-tracking works, select Inventory Part from the drop-down menu under TYPE. Next, enter an Item Name/Number in that field.
If you have already named a main category (like Hardware, in the example above) and want to place your product in a subcategory of it, click the Subitem of box and choose from the drop-down list. Manufacturer’s Part Number is optional. You can ignore UNIT OF MEASURE, if this is not an option in your version of QuickBooks.
Purchase Information
If you buy this item from a vendor, fill in this side of the window. Write the description that should appear on purchase transactions when you place an order. Enter the cost you pay for it, and select the COGS (Cost of Goods Sold) account if the default is not correct. Do you buy this product exclusively from one supplier? Select the name in the drop-down menu under Preferred Vendor.
Sales Information
Enter the description you would like customers to see on invoices and the price you’ll charge. If you are at all unsure of what to select for Tax Code or Income Account or need assistance understanding your Chart of Accounts and how these accounts are used in records and transactions, please call the office.
Inventory Information
Here is where the software’s tracking capabilities come in. QuickBooks will probably default to your Inventory Asset account, which is fine. Enter the minimum number of items that should be in stock when you get a reminder to reorder, and the maximum you want to have at any one time. Fill in the On Hand field with the number you currently have. QuickBooks will automatically calculate the Total Value.
In the screen shot above, you see an example of what that last line looks like once you start using that item in transactions. You will see its Average Cost and the number that are currently on purchase orders and sales orders.
Creating records for every product you sell can be tedious, time-consuming work. But the payoff comes in the real-time knowledge you will have of your inventory that will lead to better, smarter purchasing decisions. As always, help is just a phone call away.
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Your accounting work involves a lot of repetition. You send invoices. Pay bills. Create purchase orders. Generate payroll checks and submit payroll taxes.
Some of the time, you only fill out those transaction forms once. You might be doing a one-time purchase, like paying for some new office furniture. Other times, though, you’re paying or charging the same companies or individuals on a regular basis.
QuickBooks contains a shortcut to those recurring tasks, called Memorized Transactions. You can save the details that remain the same every time, and use that template every time the bill or invoice is due, which can save a lot of time and improve accuracy. Here’s how it works.
Making Copies
To memorize a transaction, you first need to create a model for it. Let’s say you have a monthly bill for $450 that’s paid to Bruce’s Office Machines. You’d click Enter Bills on the home page or open the Vendors menu and select Enter Bills. Fill in the blanks and select from drop-down lists to create the bill. Then click Memorize in the horizontal toolbar at the top of the form. This window will open.
Figure 1: Before you can Memorize a transaction, you first have to create a model (template) for it.The vendor’s name will already be filled in on the Memorize Transaction screen. Look directly below that. There are three ways that QuickBooks can handle these Memorized Transactions when one of their due dates is approaching:
- Add to my Reminders List. If you click the button in front of this option, the current transaction will appear on your Reminders List every time it’s due. You might request this for transactions that will change some every time they’re processed, like a utility bill that’s always expected on the same day, but which has a different amount every month.
- Do Not Remind Me. Obviously, QuickBooks will not post a reminder if you click this button. This is best used for transactions that don’t recur on a regular basis. Maybe you have a snow-shoveling service that you pay only when there’s a storm. So the date is always different, but everything else is the same.
- Automate Transaction Entry. Be very careful with this one. It’s reserved for transactions that are identical except for the issue date. They don’t need your approval–they’re just created and dispatched.
Click the down arrow in the field to the right of How Often and select the correct interval. Then click the calendar icon to pick a date for the next occurrence. If you have selected Automate Transaction Entry, the grayed-out lines below Next Date not shown here) contain fields for Number Remaining and Days in Advance to Enter.
How Does QuickBooks Know?
Obviously, you’ll want advance warning of transactions that will require processing. QuickBooks lets you specify how many days’ notice you want for each type. Open the Edit menu and select Preferences. Click Reminders in the left vertical pane, then the Company Preferences tab. You can tell QuickBooks whether you want to see a summary in each category or a list, or no Reminder. Then you can enter the number of days’ warning you want.
Figure 2: QuickBooks lets you specify the content and timing of your Reminders.Working with Memorized Transactions
Once you’ve created some Memorized Transactions, you will undoubtedly need to review them at some point. QuickBooks makes this happen. Open the Lists menu and select Memorized Transaction List to see all the templates for recurring bills, invoices, etc., that you’ve defined. Right-click on one you want to work with and this menu appears:
Figure 3: The Memorized Transaction List with the right-click window open.You have several options here. If your list is so long that it fills multiple screens, you can Find the transaction you’re looking for. If you’ve created multiple related transactions, you can save them as a New Group. You can also Edit, Delete, and Enter Memorized Transactions.
Anytime you’re letting QuickBooks do something on its own, it’s critical that you thoroughly understand the mechanics of setting the process up. We’d be happy to go over the whole topic of Memorized Transactions with you, or any other aspect of QuickBooks operations.



























































































































































Figure 2: It’s easy to duplicate an entry’s information.






















































































































































