Introduction 1 About This Book 1 Foolish Assumptions 2 Icons Used in This Book 3 Beyond the Book 3 Where to Go from Here 3 Part 1: Quickly into QuickBooks 5 Chapter 1: QuickBooks: The Heart of Your Business 7 Why QuickBooks? 7 Why you need an accounting system 8 What QuickBooks does 9 Why not QuickBooks online? 10 What Explains QuickBooks’ Popularity? 11 What’s Next, Dude? 12 How to Succeed with QuickBooks 13 Budget wisely, Grasshopper 13 Don’t focus on features 14 Outsource payroll 15 Get professional help 16 Use both the profit and loss statement and the balance sheet 16 Chapter 2: The Big Setup 17 Getting Ready for QuickBooks Setup 17 The big decision 18 The trial balance of the century 19 The mother of all scavenger hunts 21 Stepping through QuickBooks Setup 23 Starting QuickBooks 23 Using the Express Setup 25 The Rest of the Story 32 Should You Get Your Accountant’s Help? 33 Chapter 3: Populating QuickBooks Lists 35 The Magic and Mystery of Items 35 Adding items you might include on invoices 37 Creating other wacky items for invoices 45 Editing items 49 Adding Employees to Your Employee List 49 Customers Are Your Business 51 It’s Just a Job 55 Adding Vendors to Your Vendor List 59 The Other Lists 63 The Fixed Asset Item list 63 The Price Level list 64 The Billing Rate Levels list 64 The Sales Tax Code list 65 The Class list 65 The Other Names list 65 The Sales Rep list 66 Customer, Vendor, and Job Types lists 66 The Terms list 67 The Customer Message list 67 The Payment Method list 67 The Ship Via list 68 The Vehicle list 68 The Memorized Transaction list 68 The Reminders list 68 Organizing Lists 69 Printing Lists 69 Exporting List Items to Your Word Processor 70 Dealing with the Chart of Accounts List 70 Describing customer balances 70 Describing vendor balances 71 Camouflaging some accounting goofiness 71 Supplying the missing numbers 77 Checking your work one more time 80 Part 2: Daily Entry Tasks 81 Chapter 4: Creating Invoices and Credit Memos 83 Making Sure That You’re Ready to Invoice Customers 84 Preparing an Invoice 84 Fixing Invoice Mistakes 91 If the invoice is still displayed onscreen 91 If the invoice isn’t displayed onscreen 91 Deleting an invoice 92 Preparing a Credit Memo 92 Fixing Credit Memo Mistakes 96 Printing Invoices and Credit Memos 96 Loading the forms into the printer 97 Setting up the invoice printer 97 Printing invoices and credit memos as you create them 100 Printing invoices in a batch 101 Printing credit memos in a batch 103 Sending Invoices and Credit Memos via Email 104 Customizing Your Invoices and Credit Memos 105 Chapter 5: Reeling in the Dough 107 Recording a Sales Receipt 108 Printing a Sales Receipt 112 Special Tips for Retailers 114 Correcting Sales Receipt Mistakes 115 Recording Customer Payments 116 Correcting Mistakes in Customer Payments Entries 121 Making Bank Deposits 121 Improving Your Cash Inflow 124 Tracking what your customers owe 124 Assessing finance charges 125 Dealing with deposits 129 Chapter 6: Paying the Bills 131 Pay Now or Pay Later? 131 Recording Your Bills by Writing Checks 132 The slow way to write checks 132 The fast way to write checks 138 Recording Your Bills the Accounts Payable Way 140 Recording your bills 141 Entering your bills the fast way 145 Deleting a bill 146 Remind me to pay that bill, will you? 147 Paying Your Bills 149 Tracking Vehicle Mileage 152 Paying Sales Tax 153 Chapter 7: Inventory Magic 155 Setting Up Inventory Items 156 When You Buy Stuff 157 Recording items that you pay for up front 157 Recording items that don’t come with a bill 157 Paying for items when you get the bill 159 Recording items and paying the bill all at once 161 When You Sell Stuff 161 How Purchase Orders Work 162 Customizing a purchase order form 163 Filling out a purchase order 163 Checking up on purchase orders 166 Receiving purchase order items 166 Assembling a Product 167 Identifying the components 167 Building the assembly 168 Time for a Reality Check 169 Dealing with Multiple Inventory Locations 171 Manually keep separate inventory-by-location counts 171 Use different item numbers for different locations 172 Upgrade to QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions 172 The Lazy Person’s Approach to Inventory 173 How periodic inventory systems work in QuickBooks 173 The good and bad of a periodic inventory 174 Chapter 8: Keeping Your Checkbook 175 Writing Checks 175 Writing checks from the Write Checks window 176 Writing checks from the register 177 Changing a check that you’ve written 179 Packing more checks into the register 180 Depositing Money in a Checking Account 181 Recording simple deposits 181 Depositing income from customers 182 Transferring Money between Accounts 185 Setting up a second bank account 185 Recording deposits into the new account 185 About the other half of the transfer 187 Changing a transfer that you’ve already entered 187 Working with Multiple Currencies 188 To Delete or to Void? 188 Handling NSF Checks from Customers 190 The Big Register Phenomenon 190 Moving through a big register 191 Finding that darn transaction 191 Chapter 9: Paying with Plastic 193 Tracking Business Credit Cards 193 Setting up a credit card account 194 Selecting a credit card account so that you can use it 195 Entering Credit Card Transactions 196 Recording a credit card charge 197 Changing charges that you’ve already entered 199 Reconciling Your Credit Card Statement and Paying the Bill 200 So What about Debit and ATM Cards? 201 So What about Customer Credit Cards? 201 Part 3: Stuff You Do from Time to Time 203 Chapter 10: Printing Checks 205 Getting the Printer Ready 205 Printing a Check 208 A few words about printing checks 209 Printing a check as you write it 209 Printing checks by the bushel 211 What if I make a mistake? 214 Oh where, oh where do unprinted checks go? 215 Printing a Checking Register 215 Chapter 11: Payroll 219 Getting Ready to Do Payroll without Help from QuickBooks 219 Doing Taxes the Right Way 220 Getting an employer ID number 220 Signing up for EFTPS 221 Employees and employers do their part 221 Getting Ready to Do Payroll with QuickBooks 221 Paying Your Employees 223 Paying Payroll Liabilities 226 Paying tax liabilities if you use a full-meal-deal payroll service 226 Paying tax liabilities if you don’t use a full-meal-deal payroll service 226 Paying other nontax liabilities 227 Preparing Quarterly Payroll Tax Returns 228 Using the Basic Payroll service 228 Using a full-meal-deal payroll service 228 Using the QuickBooks Enhanced Payroll service 228 Filing Annual Returns and Wage Statements 229 The State Wants Some Money Too 230 Chapter 12: Building the Perfect Budget 231 Is This a Game You Want to Play? 231 All Joking Aside: Some Basic Budgeting Tips 232 A Budgeting Secret You Won’t Learn in College 233 Setting Up a Secret Plan 234 Adjusting a Secret Plan 237 Forecasting Profits and Losses 237 Projecting Cash Flows 238 Using the Business Planner Tools 238 Chapter 13: Online with QuickBooks 239 Doing the Electronic Banking Thing 239 So what’s the commotion about? 239 A handful of reasons to be cautious about banking online 240 Making sense of online banking 243 Signing up for the service 243 Making an online payment 243 Transferring money electronically 245 Changing instructions 246 Transmitting instructions 246 Message in a bottle 247 A Quick Review of the Other Online Opportunities 248 Part 4: Housekeeping Chores 249 Chapter 14: The Balancing Act 251 Balancing a Bank Account 251 Giving QuickBooks information from the bank statement 252 Marking cleared checks and deposits 254 Eleven Things to Do If Your Nononline Account Doesn’t Balance 258 Chapter 15: Reporting on the State of Affairs 263 What Kinds of Reports Are There, Anyway? 263 Creating and Printing a Report 266 Visiting the report dog-and-pony show 268 Editing and rearranging reports 269 Reports Made to Order 272 Processing Multiple Reports 275 Your Other Reporting Options 275 Last but Not Least: The QuickReport 276 Chapter 16: Job Estimating, Billing, and Tracking 279 Turning On Job Costing 279 Setting Up a Job 280 Creating a Job Estimate 281 Revising an Estimate 284 Turning an Estimate into an Invoice 284 Comparing Estimated Item Amounts with Actual Item Amounts 286 Charging for Actual Time and Costs 287 Tracking Job Costs 288 Chapter 17: File Management Tips 289 Backing Up is (Not That) Hard to Do 289 Backing up the quick-and-dirty way 291 Getting back the QuickBooks data you backed up 296 Using the Accountant’s Copy 298 Working with Portable Files 299 Using an Audit Trail 300 Using a Closing Password 300 Chapter 18: Fixed Assets and Vehicle Lists 303 What is Fixed-Assets Accounting? 303 Fixed-Assets Accounting in QuickBooks 305 Setting Up a Fixed Asset List 306 Adding items to the Fixed Asset list 306 Adding fixed-asset items on the fly 308 Editing items in the Fixed Asset list 309 Tracking Vehicle Mileage 310 Identifying your vehicles 310 Recording vehicle miles 312 Using the vehicle reports 313 Updating vehicle mileage rates 313 Part 5: The Part of Tens 315 Chapter 19: Tips for Handling (Almost) Ten Tricky Situations 317 Tracking Depreciation 317 Selling an Asset 318 Selling a Depreciable Asset 319 Owner’s Equity in a Sole Proprietorship 320 Owner’s Equity in a Partnership 320 Owner’s Equity in a Corporation 321 Multiple-State Accounting 322 Getting a Loan 323 Repaying a Loan 323 Chapter 20: (Almost) Ten Secret Business Formulas 325 The First “Most Expensive Money You Can Borrow” Formula 326 The Second “Most Expensive Money You Can Borrow” Formula 328 The “How Do I Break Even?” Formula 328 The “You Can Grow Too Fast” Formula 331 How net worth relates to growth 331 How to calculate sustainable growth 332 The First “What Happens If ?” Formula 333 The Second “What Happens If ?” Formula 335 The Economic Order Quantity (Isaac Newton) Formula 337 The Rule of 72 338 Part 6: Appendixes 341 Appendix A: Installing QuickBooks in Ten Easy Steps 343 Appendix B: If Numbers Are Your Friends 347 Appendix C: Sharing QuickBooks Files 365 Index 375

Organize and manage your financesMonitor transactions and keep up with inventoryRecord sales receipts, create invoices, and pay bills Your best-selling guide to painless accounts Millions of small businesses bank on QuickBooks to manage financial tasks—and save big-time on hiring expensive professionals. In a friendly and easy-to-follow style, small business advice guru Stephen L. Nelson shows you how just useful this amazing software can be. In no time at all, you'll be using QuickBooks to track profits, plan budgets, generate reports—and do pretty much any other financial or accounts task that lands on your desk—leaving you with way more time (and money) to enjoy the fruits of your labors! Inside... Populate QuickBooks listsCreate invoicesPay your expensesManage inventoryAdminister payrollRun and understand reportsManage your filesHandle tricky situations

Introduction 1 Part 1: Quickly into QuickBooks 5 Chapter 1: QuickBooks: The Heart of Your Business 7 Chapter 2: The Big Setup 17 Chapter 3: Populating QuickBooks Lists 35 Part 2: Daily Entry Tasks 81 Chapter 4: Creating Invoices and Credit Memos 83 Chapter 5: Reeling in the Dough 107 Chapter 6: Paying the Bills 131 Chapter 7: Inventory Magic 155 Chapter 8: Keeping Your Checkbook 175 Chapter 9: Paying with Plastic 193 Part 3: Stuff You Do from Time to Time 203 Chapter 10: Printing Checks 205 Chapter 11: Payroll 219 Chapter 12: Building the Perfect Budget 231 Chapter 13: Online with QuickBooks 239 Part 4: Housekeeping Chores 249 Chapter 14: The Balancing Act 251 Chapter 15: Reporting on the State of Affairs 263 Chapter 16: Job Estimating, Billing, and Tracking 279 Chapter 17: File Management Tips 289 Chapter 18: Fixed Assets and Vehicle Lists 303 Part 5: The Part of Tens 315 Chapter 19: Tips for Handling (Almost) Ten Tricky Situations 317 Chapter 20: (Almost) Ten Secret Business Formulas 325 Part 6: Appendixes 341 Appendix A: Installing QuickBooks in Ten Easy Steps 343 Appendix B: If Numbers Are Your Friends 347 Appendix C: Sharing QuickBooks Files 365 Index 375