QuickBooks 2021 All-in-One For Dummies E-Book

Stephen L. Nelson

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Fachliteratur
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2020

Seitenzahl: 917

Beschreibung

Do the numbers in double-quick time with this trusted QuickBooks bestseller! Running your own business can be cool, but some of the financial side--accounting and payroll, for instance--is not always so cool! That's why millions of small business owners around the world bank on QuickBooks to easily manage accounting and financial tasks and save big-time on shelling out for an expensive professional. QuickBooks 2021 All-in-One For Dummies contains eight information-rich mini-books that account for all your financial line-item asks, showing you step-by-step how to plan your perfect budget, simplify tax returns, manage inventory, create invoices, track costs, generate reports, and accurately check off every other accounting and financial-management task that comes across your desk! * Get the most out of QuickBooks 2021 * Sharpen up on the basics with an accounting primer * Craft a world-class business plan * Process taxes and payroll in double-quick time Written by expert CPA and small business advisor Stephen L. Nelson, QuickBooks All-in-One 2021 For Dummies is the best-selling blue-chip go-to that will save you time and money--and will allow you to enjoy the fruits of your labors!

Leseprobe

QuickBooks® 2021 All-in-One For Dummies®

Published by: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030-5774, www.wiley.com

Copyright © 2021 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey

Published simultaneously in Canada

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Library of Congress Control Number: 2020948815

ISBN: 978-1-119-67680-5 (pbk); 978-1-119-67682-9 (ebk); 978-1-119-67678-2 (ebk)

QuickBooks® 2021 All-in-One For Dummies®

To view this book's Cheat Sheet, simply go to www.dummies.com and search for “QuickBooks 2021 All-in-One For Dummies Cheat Sheet” in the Search box.

Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Introduction

About This Book

Foolish Assumptions

Icons Used in This Book

Beyond the Book

Where to Go from Here

Book 1: An Accounting Primer

Chapter 1: Principles of Accounting

The Purpose of Accounting

Reviewing the Common Financial Statements

The Philosophy of Accounting

A Few Words about Tax Accounting

Chapter 2: Double-Entry Bookkeeping

The Fiddle-Faddle Method of Accounting

How Double-Entry Bookkeeping Works

Almost a Real-Life Example

A Few Words about How QuickBooks Works

Chapter 3: Special Accounting Problems

Working with Accounts Receivable

Recording Accounts Payable Transactions

Inventory Accounting

Accounting for Fixed Assets

Recognizing Liabilities

Closing Out Revenue and Expense Accounts

One More Thing …

Book 2: Getting Ready to Use QuickBooks

Chapter 1: Setting Up QuickBooks

Planning Your New QuickBooks System

Installing QuickBooks

Dealing with the Presetup Jitters

Running the QuickBooks Setup Wizard

Identifying the Starting Trial Balance

Chapter 2: Loading the Master File Lists

Setting Up the Chart of Accounts List

Setting Up the Item List

Working with the Price Level List

Using Sales Tax Codes

Setting Up a Payroll Item List

Setting Up Classes

Setting Up a Customer List

Setting Up the Vendor List

Setting Up a Fixed Assets List

Setting Up a Price Level List

Setting Up a Billing Rate Level List

Setting Up Your Employees

Setting Up an Other Names List

Setting Up the Profile Lists

Chapter 3: Fine-Tuning QuickBooks

Accessing the Preferences Settings

Setting the Accounting Preferences

Setting the Bills Preferences

Setting the Calendar Preferences

Setting the Checking Preferences

Changing the Desktop View

Setting Finance Charge Calculation Rules

Setting General Preferences

Controlling Integrated Applications

Controlling Inventory

Controlling How Jobs and Estimates Work

Dealing with Multiple Currencies

Starting Integrated Payment Processing

Controlling How Payroll Works

Telling QuickBooks How Reminders Should Work

Specifying Reports & Graphs Preferences

Setting Sales & Customers Preferences

Specifying How Sales Are Taxed

Setting the Search Preferences

Setting the Send Forms Preferences

Fine-Tuning the Service Connection

Controlling Spell Checking

Controlling How 1099 Tax Reporting Works

Setting Time & Expenses Preferences

Book 3: Bookkeeping Chores

Chapter 1: Invoicing Customers

Choosing an Invoice Form

Customizing an Invoice Form

Invoicing a Customer

Billing for Time

Printing Invoices

Emailing Invoices

Recording Sales Receipts

Recording Credit Memos

Receiving Customer Payments

Assessing Finance Charges

Using Odds and Ends on the Customers Menu

Chapter 2: Paying Vendors

Creating a Purchase Order

Recording the Receipt of Items

Simultaneously Recording the Receipt and the Bill

Entering a Bill

Paying Bills

Reviewing the Other Vendor Menu Commands

Chapter 3: Tracking Inventory and Items

Looking at Your Item List

Adding Items to the Item List

Editing Items

Managing Inventory in a Manufacturing Firm

Chapter 4: Managing Cash and Bank Accounts

Writing Checks

Making Bank Deposits

Transferring Money between Bank Accounts

Working with the Register

Using Edit Menu Commands

Reconciling the Bank Account

Reviewing the Other Banking Commands

Chapter 5: Paying Employees

Setting Up Basic Payroll

Scheduling Payroll Runs

Paying Employees

Editing and Voiding Paychecks

Paying Payroll Liabilities

Book 4: Accounting Chores

Chapter 1: For Accountants Only

Working with QuickBooks Journal Entries

Updating Company Information

Working with Memorized Transactions

Reviewing the Accountant & Taxes Reports

Creating an Accountant’s Copy of the QuickBooks Data File

Using the Client Data Review Commands

Chapter 2: Preparing Financial Statements and Reports

Some Wise Words Up Front

Producing a Report

Working with the Report Window

Modifying a Report

Processing Multiple Reports

A Few Words about Document Retention

Chapter 3: Preparing a Budget

Reviewing Common Budgeting Tactics

Taking a Practical Approach to Budgeting

Using the Set Up Budgets Window

Managing with a Budget

Some Wrap-Up Comments on Budgeting

Chapter 4: Using Activity-Based Costing

Reviewing Traditional Overhead Allocation

Understanding How ABC Works

Implementing a Simple ABC System

Seeing How QuickBooks Supports ABC

Turning On Class Tracking

Using Classes for ABC

Chapter 5: Setting Up Project and Job Costing Systems

Setting Up a QuickBooks Job

Tracking Job or Project Costs

Job Cost Reporting

Using Job Estimates

Progress Billing

Book 5: Financial Management

Chapter 1: Ratio Analysis

Some Caveats about Ratio Analysis

Liquidity Ratios

Leverage Ratios

Activity Ratios

Profitability Ratios

Chapter 2: Economic Value Added Analysis

Introducing the Logic of EVA

Seeing EVA in Action

Reviewing Some Important Points about EVA

Using EVA When Your Business Has Debt

Presenting Two Final Pointers

And Now, a Word to My Critics

Chapter 3: Capital Budgeting in a Nutshell

Introducing the Theory of Capital Budgeting

Calculating the Rate of Return on Capital

Measuring Liquidity

Thinking about Risk

What Does All of This Have to Do with QuickBooks?

Book 6: Business Plans

Chapter 1: Profit-Volume-Cost Analysis

Seeing How Profit-Volume-Cost Analysis Works

Calculating Break-Even Points

Using Real QuickBooks Data for Profit-Volume-Cost Analysis

Recognizing the Downside of the Profit-Volume-Cost Model

Using the Profit-Volume-Cost Analysis Workbook

Chapter 2: Creating a Business Plan Forecast

Reviewing Financial Statements and Ratios

Using the Business Plan Workbook

Understanding the Workbook Calculations

Customizing the Starter Workbook

Chapter 3: Writing a Business Plan

What the Term “Business Plan” Means

A Few Words about Strategic Plans

Look, Ma: No Strategy

A White-Paper Business Plan

A New-Venture Plan

Book 7: Care and Maintenance

Chapter 1: Administering QuickBooks

Keeping Your Data Confidential

Using QuickBooks in a Multiuser Environment

Using Audit Trails

Enabling Simultaneous Multiuser Access

Maintaining Good Accounting Controls

Chapter 2: Protecting Your Data

Backing Up the QuickBooks Data File

Restoring a QuickBooks Data File

Condensing the QuickBooks Company Files

Chapter 3: Troubleshooting

Using the QuickBooks Help File and This Book

Browsing Intuit’s Product-Support Website

Checking Another Vendor’s Product-Support Website

Tapping into Intuit’s Online and Expert Communities

When All Else Fails …

Book 8: Appendixes

Appendix A: A Crash Course in Excel

Starting Excel

Stopping Excel

Explaining Excel’s Workbooks

Putting Text, Numbers, and Formulas in Cells

Writing Formulas

Scrolling through Big Workbooks

Copying and Cutting Cell Contents

Formatting Cell Contents

Recognizing That Functions Are Simply Formulas

Saving and Opening Workbooks

Printing Excel Workbooks

One Other Thing to Know

Appendix B: Government Web Resources for Businesses

Bureau of Economic Analysis

Bureau of Labor Statistics

Census Bureau

Securities and Exchange Commission

Federal Reserve

Government Publishing Office

Internal Revenue Service

Appendix C: Glossary of Accounting and Financial Terms

Index

About the Author

Connect with Dummies

End User License Agreement

List of Tables

Book 1 Chapter 1

TABLE 1-1 A Sales Journal

TABLE 1-2 An Expenses Journal

TABLE 1-3 Simple Income Statement

TABLE 1-4 A Simple Balance Sheet

TABLE 1-5 Owner’s Equity for a Partnership

TABLE 1-6 Owner’s Equity for a Corporation

TABLE 1-7 Another Simple Balance Sheet

TABLE 1-8 A Simple Statement of Cash Flows

TABLE 1-9 An Accounts Receivable Report at End of Day

TABLE 1-10 An Inventory Report at Start of Day

Book 1 Chapter 2

TABLE 2-1 A Simple Income Statement for the Hot Dog Stand

TABLE 2-2 A Simple Balance Sheet for the Hot Dog Stand

TABLE 2-3 You Must Remember This

TABLE 2-4 Journal Entry 1: Recording the Cash Sale

TABLE 2-5 Journal Entry 2: Recording the Inventory Purchase

TABLE 2-6 Journal Entry 3: Recording the Advertising Expense

TABLE 2-7 A Trial Balance at the Start of the Day

TABLE 2-8 Journal Entry 4: Recording the Rent Expense

TABLE 2-9 Journal Entry 5: Recording the Wages Expense

TABLE 2-10 Journal Entry 6: Recording the Supplies Expense

TABLE 2-11 Journal Entry 7: Recording the Sales Revenue

TABLE 2-12 Journal Entry 8: Recording the Cost of Goods Sold

TABLE 2-13 Journal Entry 9: Recording the Payoff of Accounts Payable

TABLE 2-14 Journal Entry 10: Recording the Payoff of the Loan

TABLE 2-15 A T-Account of the Cash Account

TABLE 2-16 A T-Account of the Inventory Account

TABLE 2-17 A T-Account of Accounts Payable

TABLE 2-18 A T-Account of the Loan Payable Account

TABLE 2-19 A Trial Balance at End of Day

Book 1 Chapter 3

TABLE 3-1 Journal Entry 1: Recording a Credit Sale

TABLE 3-2 Journal Entry 2: Recording the Customer Payment

TABLE 3-3 Journal Entry 3: Recording an Allowance for Uncollectible Accounts

TABLE 3-4 Journal Entry 4: Writing Off an Uncollectible Receivable

TABLE 3-5 Journal Entry 5: Recording a Credit Purchase

TABLE 3-6 Journal Entry 6: Recording the Payment to Vendor

TABLE 3-7 Journal Entry 7: Recording an Allowance for Obsolete Inventory

TABLE 3-8 Journal Entry 8: Recording Disposal of Inventory

TABLE 3-9 Journal Entry 9: Recording Inventory Shrinkage

TABLE 3-10 Journal Entry 10: Recording Fixed-Asset Purchase

TABLE 3-11 Journal Entry 11: Recording Fixed Asset Depreciation

TABLE 3-12 Journal Entry 12: Recording Fixed-Asset Sale for Gain

TABLE 3-13 Journal Entry 13: Borrowing Money via a Loan

TABLE 3-14 Journal Entry 14: Buying an Asset with a Loan

TABLE 3-15 Journal Entry 15: Paying a Loan Payment

TABLE 3-16 Journal Entry 16: Accruing a Liability

TABLE 3-17 Journal Entry 17: Reversing an Accrual

TABLE 3-18 Journal Entry 18: The “Real” Loan Interest Payment

TABLE 3-19 A Trial Balance at the End of the Period

TABLE 3-20 Journal Entry 19: Closing the Period

Book 2 Chapter 1

TABLE 1-1 A Trial Balance

TABLE 1-2 A Trial Balance

Book 4 Chapter 4

TABLE 4-1 A Simple Income Statement

TABLE 4-2 Traditional Income Statement by Product Line

TABLE 4-3 ABC Income Statement by Product Line

Book 5 Chapter 1

TABLE 1-1 A Simple Balance Sheet

TABLE 1-2 A Simple Income Statement

TABLE 1-3 Fixed-Charges Calculation

TABLE 1-4 Income Available for Fixed Charges

Book 5 Chapter 2

TABLE 2-1 A Simple Income Statement

TABLE 2-2 A Simple Balance Sheet

TABLE 2-3 Estimating the All-Encompassing Capital Charge

TABLE 2-4 Simple Income Statement

TABLE 2-5 A Simple Balance Sheet

TABLE 2-6 Estimating the New Capital Charge

Book 5 Chapter 3

TABLE 3-1 Calculating the Investment

TABLE 3-2 Summary of Building Cash Flows

TABLE 3-3 Estimating the Liquidation Cash Flow

TABLE 3-4 Combining All Cash Flows

Book 6 Chapter 1

TABLE 1-1 Applying the Profit-Volume-Cost Formula

TABLE 1-2 Miniature Income Statements

Book 7 Chapter 1

TABLE 1-1 A Sample Monthly Accounting To-Do List

TABLE 1-2 A Sample Annual Accounting To-Do List

Appendix A

TABLE A-1 Some Example Excel Formulas

List of Illustrations

Book 2 Chapter 1

FIGURE 1-1: The QuickBooks Setup window, showing the welcome message.

FIGURE 1-2: The first screen of the EasyStep Interview collects general company...

FIGURE 1-3: The Filename for New Company dialog box.

FIGURE 1-4: The EasyStep Interview dialog box that lets you select the start da...

FIGURE 1-5: The EasyStep Interview screen shows you its recommended income and ...

FIGURE 1-6: The QuickBooks Setup screen that prompts you to enter your own info...

FIGURE 1-7: The QuickBooks Setup screen that collects information about the peo...

FIGURE 1-8: The Make General Journal Entries window, showing a simple trial bal...

FIGURE 1-9: The Make General Journal Entries window, showing the final part of ...

Book 2 Chapter 2

FIGURE 2-1: The Chart of Accounts window.

FIGURE 2-2: The first Add New Account window.

FIGURE 2-3: The second Add New Account window.

FIGURE 2-4: The Item List window.

FIGURE 2-5: The Class List window.

FIGURE 2-6: The New Class dialog box.

FIGURE 2-7: The Customer Information window.

FIGURE 2-8: The New Customer window.

FIGURE 2-9: The Payment Settings tab.

FIGURE 2-10: The Additional Info tab.

FIGURE 2-11: The Vendor Information window.

FIGURE 2-12: The New Vendor window.

FIGURE 2-13: The Payment Settings tab.

FIGURE 2-14: You describe each fixed asset by using the New Item window.

FIGURE 2-15: The New Sales Rep dialog box.

FIGURE 2-16: The New Customer Message dialog box.

Book 2 Chapter 3

FIGURE 3-1: The My Preferences tab of the Accounting Preferences dialog box.

FIGURE 3-2: The Company Preferences tab of the General Preferences dialog box.

FIGURE 3-3: The Company Preferences tab of the Accounting Preferences dialog bo...

FIGURE 3-4: The My Preferences tab of the Checking Preferences dialog box.

FIGURE 3-5: The Company Preferences tab of the Checking Preferences dialog box.

FIGURE 3-6: The My Preferences tab of the Desktop View Preferences dialog box.

FIGURE 3-7: The Company Preferences tab of the Desktop View Preferences dialog ...

FIGURE 3-8: The My Preferences tab of the General Preferences dialog box.

FIGURE 3-9: The Company Preferences tab of the General Preferences dialog box.

FIGURE 3-10: The Company Preferences tab of the Integrated Applications Prefere...

FIGURE 3-11: The Company Preferences tab of the Items & Inventory Preferences d...

FIGURE 3-12: The Company Preferences tab of the Jobs & Estimates Preferences di...

FIGURE 3-13: The Company Preferences tab of the Payroll & Employees Preferences...

FIGURE 3-14: The Company Preferences tab of the Reminders Preferences dialog bo...

FIGURE 3-15: The My Preferences tab of the Reports & Graphs Preferences dialog ...

FIGURE 3-16: The Company Preferences tab of the Reports & Graphs Preferences di...

FIGURE 3-17: The Header/Footer tab of the Report Format Preferences dialog box.

FIGURE 3-18: The Fonts & Numbers tab of the Report Format Preferences dialog bo...

FIGURE 3-19: The Company Preferences tab of the Sales & Customers Preferences d...

FIGURE 3-20: The Company Preferences tab of the Sales Tax Preferences dialog bo...

FIGURE 3-21: The Company Preferences tab of the Send Forms Preferences dialog b...

FIGURE 3-22: The My Preferences tab of the Service Connection Preferences dialo...

FIGURE 3-23: The My Preferences tab of the Spelling Preferences dialog box.

FIGURE 3-24: The Company Preferences tab of the Tax: 1099 Preferences dialog bo...

FIGURE 3-25: The Company Preferences tab of the Time & Expenses Preferences dia...

Book 3 Chapter 1

FIGURE 1-1: The Header tab of the Additional Customization dialog box.

FIGURE 1-2: The Columns tab of the Additional Customization dialog box.

FIGURE 1-3: The Footer tab of the Additional Customization dialog box.

FIGURE 1-4: The Print tab of the Additional Customization dialog box.

FIGURE 1-5: The Basic Customization dialog box.

FIGURE 1-6: The Manage Templates dialog box.

FIGURE 1-7: The Example dialog box.

FIGURE 1-8: The Layout Designer dialog box.

FIGURE 1-9: The Properties dialog box.

FIGURE 1-10: The Create Invoices window.

FIGURE 1-11: How a Create Invoices window may look when complete.

FIGURE 1-12: The Check Spelling on Form dialog box.

FIGURE 1-13: The Weekly Timesheet window.

FIGURE 1-14: The Time/Enter Single Activity dialog box.

FIGURE 1-15: The Choose Billable Time and Costs dialog box.

FIGURE 1-16: The Create Invoices window, billing for billable time.

FIGURE 1-17: The Send Invoice dialog box.

FIGURE 1-18: The Enter Sales Receipts window.

FIGURE 1-19: The Create Credit Memos/Refunds window.

FIGURE 1-20: The Customer Payment window.

FIGURE 1-21: The Discount and Credits dialog box.

FIGURE 1-22: The Company Preferences tab of the Preferences dialog box, display...

FIGURE 1-23: The Assess Finance Charges dialog box.

Book 3 Chapter 2

FIGURE 2-1: The Create Purchase Orders window.

FIGURE 2-2: The Create Item Receipts window.

FIGURE 2-3: The Select Time Period dialog box.

FIGURE 2-4: The Enter Bills window.

FIGURE 2-5: The Enter Bills window, again.

FIGURE 2-6: The Select Item Receipt dialog box.

FIGURE 2-7: The Enter Bills window, yet again.

FIGURE 2-8: The Pay Bills window.

FIGURE 2-9: The Discount tab of the Discount and Credits dialog box.

FIGURE 2-10: The Credits tab of the Discount and Credits dialog box.

FIGURE 2-11: The Vendor Center window.

Book 3 Chapter 3

FIGURE 3-1: The Item Code column and drop-down list in the Create Invoices wind...

FIGURE 3-2: The Item List window.

FIGURE 3-3: The Edit Item window.

FIGURE 3-4: The New Item window.

FIGURE 3-5: The Inventory Part version of the New Item window.

FIGURE 3-6: The regular Non-Inventory Part version of the New Item window.

FIGURE 3-7: The kooky Non-Inventory Part version of the New Item window.

FIGURE 3-8: The Other Charge version of the New Item window.

FIGURE 3-9: The Subtotal version of the New Item window.

FIGURE 3-10: The Group version of the New Item window.

FIGURE 3-11: The Discount version of the New Item window.

FIGURE 3-12: The Payment version of the New Item window.

FIGURE 3-13: The Sales Tax Item version of the New Item window.

FIGURE 3-14: The Sales Tax Group version of the New Item window.

FIGURE 3-15: The Set Up Custom Fields for Items dialog box.

FIGURE 3-16: The Custom Fields for Unnamed Item dialog box.

FIGURE 3-17: The Adjust Quantity/Value on Hand window.

FIGURE 3-18: The expanded version of the Adjust Quantity/Value on Hand window.

FIGURE 3-19: The Change Item Prices window.

FIGURE 3-20: The New Price Level window.

FIGURE 3-21: Choosing a price level with the Create Invoices window.

FIGURE 3-22: The Inventory Assembly version of the New Item window.

FIGURE 3-23: The Build Assemblies version of the New Item window.

Book 3 Chapter 4

FIGURE 4-1: The Write Checks window.

FIGURE 4-2: The Write Checks window, filled out to record an expense.

FIGURE 4-3: The Write Checks window, displaying the Items tab.

FIGURE 4-4: The Select Checks to Print dialog box.

FIGURE 4-5: The Print Checks dialog box.

FIGURE 4-6: The Fonts tab of the Print Checks dialog box.

FIGURE 4-7: The Select Font dialog box.

FIGURE 4-8: The Partial Page tab of the Print Checks dialog box.

FIGURE 4-9: The Payments to Deposit dialog box.

FIGURE 4-10: The Make Deposits window.

FIGURE 4-11: The Transfer Funds between Accounts window.

FIGURE 4-12: The Use Register dialog box.

FIGURE 4-13: The Register window, showing transactions that affect the bank acc...

FIGURE 4-14: The Register window, showing the Splits area.

FIGURE 4-15: The Go To dialog box.

FIGURE 4-16: The Print Register dialog box.

FIGURE 4-17: A sample QuickReport.

FIGURE 4-18: A one-line version of the register.

FIGURE 4-19: The Simple tab of the Find window.

FIGURE 4-20: Result of a simple search in the Find window.

FIGURE 4-21: The Advanced tab of the Find window.

FIGURE 4-22: The Begin Reconciliation dialog box.

FIGURE 4-23: The Reconcile window.

FIGURE 4-24: The Reconcile window when the reconciliation is complete.

FIGURE 4-25: The Enter Credit Card Charges window.

Book 3 Chapter 5

FIGURE 5-1: The first payroll setup web page.

FIGURE 5-2: The Personal tab of the New Employee window.

FIGURE 5-3: The Payroll Info tab of the New Employee window.

FIGURE 5-4: The Federal tab of the Taxes dialog box.

FIGURE 5-5: The Sick and Vacation dialog box.

FIGURE 5-6: The Employee Center: Payroll Center window.

Book 4 Chapter 1

FIGURE 1-1: The Make General Journal Entries window.

FIGURE 1-2: The Memorized Transaction List window.

FIGURE 1-3: The Trial Balance report.

FIGURE 1-4: The first Save Copy or Backup dialog box.

FIGURE 1-5: The second Save Copy or Backup dialog box.

FIGURE 1-6: An updated Save Accountant’s Copy dialog box.

FIGURE 1-7: The Import Accountant’s Changes dialog box.

FIGURE 1-8: The Client Data Review – Start Review dialog box.

Book 4 Chapter 2

FIGURE 2-1: The Report window, showing a profit and loss statement.

FIGURE 2-2: The Comment on Report window.

FIGURE 2-3: The Memorize Report dialog box.

FIGURE 2-4: The Settings tab of the Print Reports dialog box.

FIGURE 2-5: The Margins tab of the Print Reports dialog box.

FIGURE 2-6: The Send Report to Excel dialog box.

FIGURE 2-7: The Advanced Excel Options dialog box.

FIGURE 2-8: A simple profit and loss statement with a single Total column.

FIGURE 2-9: A profit and loss statement with Customer:Job columns.

FIGURE 2-10: The Display tab of the Modify Report dialog box for a profit and l...

FIGURE 2-11: The Advanced Options dialog box.

FIGURE 2-12: The Filters tab of the Modify Report dialog box.

FIGURE 2-13: Select an account filter.

FIGURE 2-14: The Select Account dialog box

FIGURE 2-15: The Header/Footer tab of the Modify Report dialog box

FIGURE 2-16: The Fonts & Numbers tab of the Modify Report dialog box

FIGURE 2-17: The Column Labels version of the Change Font dialog box

FIGURE 2-18: The Process Multiple Reports dialog box.

Book 4 Chapter 3

FIGURE 3-1: The Create New Budget dialog box.

FIGURE 3-2: The Additional Profit and Loss Budget Criteria selections.

FIGURE 3-3: Choosing whether to create a budget from scratch.

FIGURE 3-4: The Set Up Budgets window.

FIGURE 3-5: The Adjust Row Amounts dialog box.

Book 4 Chapter 4

FIGURE 4-1: The Company Preferences check boxes for setting your accounting pre...

FIGURE 4-2: The New Class dialog box.

FIGURE 4-3: The Create Invoices window.

FIGURE 4-4: The Write Checks window.

FIGURE 4-5: The Make General Journal Entries window.

Book 4 Chapter 5

FIGURE 5-1: The Customer Center window.

FIGURE 5-2: The Address Info tab of the New Job window.

FIGURE 5-3: The Payment Settings tab of the New Job window.

FIGURE 5-4: The Job Info tab of the New Job window.

FIGURE 5-5: The Create Invoices window.

FIGURE 5-6: The Time/Enter Single Activity window.

FIGURE 5-7: The Write Checks window.

FIGURE 5-8: The Create Estimates window.

FIGURE 5-9: The Company Preferences tab for Job & Estimates Preferences.

FIGURE 5-10: The Create Progress Invoice Based on Estimate dialog box.

FIGURE 5-11: The Specify Invoice Amounts for Items on Estimate dialog box.

Book 5 Chapter 3

FIGURE 3-1: A simple Excel worksheet that shows investment cash flows.

Book 6 Chapter 1

FIGURE 1-1: The inputs area of the Profit-Volume-Cost Analysis workbook.

FIGURE 1-2: The Break-Even Analysis Forecast.

FIGURE 1-3: The Profit-Volume Forecast, in dollars.

FIGURE 1-4: The Common Size Profit-Volume Forecast.

FIGURE 1-5: The break-even line chart.

FIGURE 1-6: The profit-volume-cost analysis area chart.

FIGURE 1-7: These cells supply the chart data.

Book 6 Chapter 2

FIGURE 2-1: The inputs area of the business plan workbook.

FIGURE 2-2: The Balance Sheet portion of the business planning starter workbook...

FIGURE 2-3: The Common Size Balance Sheet portion of the business plan workbook...

FIGURE 2-4: The Income Statement and the first few rows of the Common Size Inco...

FIGURE 2-5: The Cash Flow Statement.

FIGURE 2-6: The Financial Ratios Table.

Book 6 Chapter 3

FIGURE 3-1: The first page of the QuickBooks Business Planner.

FIGURE 3-2: The home page of the SBA’s website provides general planning inform...

FIGURE 3-3: The Write Your Business Plan page of the SBA’s website provides lin...

Book 7 Chapter 1

FIGURE 1-1: The Change Your Password dialog box.

FIGURE 1-2: The Users and Roles dialog box.

FIGURE 1-3: The New User dialog box.

FIGURE 1-4: The Role List tab of the Users and Roles dialog box.

FIGURE 1-5: View Permissions window.

FIGURE 1-6: The Edit User dialog box.

FIGURE 1-7: The Duplicate User dialog box.

FIGURE 1-8: The Delete User dialog box.

FIGURE 1-9: An Audit Trail report.

Book 7 Chapter 2

FIGURE 2-1: The first Save Copy or Backup dialog box.

FIGURE 2-2: The second Save Copy or Backup dialog box.

FIGURE 2-3: The Backup Options dialog box.

FIGURE 2-4: The Save Copy or Backup dialog box asks when you want to back up.

FIGURE 2-5: The Open or Restore Company dialog box.

FIGURE 2-6: The Open or Restore Company dialog box that asks where you’ve backe...

FIGURE 2-7: The Open Backup Copy dialog box.

FIGURE 2-8: The Save Company File As dialog box.

FIGURE 2-9: The Condense Your Company File dialog box.

FIGURE 2-10: The Condense Data dialog box.

FIGURE 2-11: The second Condense Data dialog box.

FIGURE 2-12: The third Condense Data dialog box.

FIGURE 2-13: The fifth Condense Data dialog box.

FIGURE 2-14: The sixth, and final, Condense Data dialog box.

Book 7 Chapter 3

FIGURE 3-1: The QuickBooks Help window.

FIGURE 3-2: Help topics for the search term.

FIGURE 3-3: The QuickBooks Desktop Support website.

FIGURE 3-4: QuickBooks support articles about printing checks.

Appendix A

FIGURE A-1: A folder that shows Excel workbooks.

FIGURE A-2: The Excel window with an empty workbook.

FIGURE A-3: A simple worksheet that budgets expenses.

FIGURE A-4: The Font tab of the Format Cells dialog box.

FIGURE A-5: A worksheet that sums numbers.

FIGURE A-6: The Insert Function dialog box.

FIGURE A-7: The Function Arguments dialog box.

FIGURE A-8: The Save As dialog box.

FIGURE A-9: The Open dialog box.

FIGURE A-10: The Print page.

Appendix B

FIGURE B-1: The Bureau of Economic Analysis website.

FIGURE B-2: The Save As dialog box.

FIGURE B-3: The Bureau of Labor Statistics home page.

FIGURE B-4: The Consumer Price Index page.

FIGURE B-5: Some BLS data appears in text files.

FIGURE B-6: A Consumer Price Index publication in PDF format.

FIGURE B-7: The Census Bureau home page.

FIGURE B-8: The Population web page.

FIGURE B-9: The Small Business web page.

FIGURE B-10: The EDGAR home page.

FIGURE B-11: The EDGAR search page.

FIGURE B-12: The Company Filings search page.

FIGURE B-13: The Federal Reserve System home page.

FIGURE B-14: The Discover U.S. Government Information area of the Government Pu...

FIGURE B-15: The Internal Revenue Service home page.

Guide

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Table of Contents

Begin Reading

Appendix A: A Crash Course in Excel

Appendix B: Government Web Resources for Businesses

Appendix C: Glossary of Accounting and Financial Terms

Index

About the Author

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Introduction

Few people read introductions to reference books, so I’ll make this very brief. I just want to tell you which versions of QuickBooks this book works for, what’s in the reference, what it assumes about your existing skills, and what conventions I use.

About This Book

The desktop version of QuickBooks comes in several flavors, including QuickBooks Pro, QuickBooks Premier, and QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions. This reference talks about QuickBooks 21 Enterprise Solutions, which is a superset of QuickBooks 2021 Premier and QuickBooks 2021 Pro. If you’re using QuickBooks Self-Employed or QuickBooks Online, you shouldn’t use this book. Instead, you should check out QuickBooks Online for Dummies.

On the other hand, even though this book is written for QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions, if you’re using QuickBooks Premier or QuickBooks Pro, don’t worry. You’re just fine with this book. And don’t freak out if you’re using some version of QuickBooks that’s very similar to QuickBooks 2021, such as QuickBooks 2020 or QuickBooks 2022. Although this reference is about QuickBooks 2021, it also works just fine for the 2019, 2020, and probably 2022 versions of QuickBooks because QuickBooks is a very mature product at this point. The changes from one year to the next are modest. This means that if you’re using QuickBooks 2020, stuff may look a little different if you closely compare the images in this book with what you see on your screen, but the information in this reference will still apply to your situation.

Note, too, that specialty versions of QuickBooks, such as QuickBooks Accountant’s Edition and QuickBooks Contractor, also work almost identically to QuickBooks Premier.

If you use QuickBooks Pro and see some whistle or bell that you really want to use but that isn’t available in your version of QuickBooks, you’ll know that you should upgrade to the Premier or Enterprise Solutions version of QuickBooks.

The bottom line? Yes, QuickBooks comes in several flavors. Yes, Intuit publishes new editions of its QuickBooks products every year. But you can use this book for any recent version of QuickBooks Pro, Premier, or Enterprise Solutions.

To make the best use of your time and energy, you should know about the conventions I use in this book:

When I want you to type something such as

Jennifer,

it’s in bold letters.

By the way, except for passwords, you don’t have to worry about the case of the stuff you type in QuickBooks. If I tell you to type Jennifer, you can type

JENNIFER

. Or you can follow poet e e cummings’s lead and type

jennifer

.

Whenever I tell you to choose a command from a menu, I say something like Choose Lists⇒   Items, which simply means to first choose the Lists menu and then choose Items. The ⇒     separates one part of the command from the next part.

You can choose menus and commands and select dialog-box elements with the mouse. Just click the thing that you want to select.

While I’m on the subject of conventions, let me also mention something about QuickBooks conventions, because it turns out that there’s really no good place to point this out: QuickBooks doesn’t use document windows the same way that other Windows programs do. Instead, it locks the active window into place and then displays a list of windows in its Navigator pane, which is like another little window. To move to a listed window, you click it.

You can tell QuickBooks to use windows like every other program does, however, by choosing View⇒   Multiple Windows. You can even remove the Navigator pane by choosing View⇒   Open Window List.

Foolish Assumptions

I’m making only three assumptions about your QuickBooks and accounting skills:

You have a PC with Windows 7, Windows 8, or Windows 10. (I took pictures of the QuickBooks windows and dialog boxes in Windows 10, in case you’re interested.)

You know a little bit about how to work with your computer.

You have, or will buy, a copy of QuickBooks Pro, QuickBooks Premier, or QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions for each computer on which you want to run the program.

In other words, I don’t assume that you’re a computer genius or an MBA, or that you’re super-experienced in the arcane rules of accounting. I assume that QuickBooks and accounting are new subjects to you. But I also assume that you want to understand the subjects because you need to do so for your job or your business.

Please note that I wrote this book in 2020 for the 2021 version of QuickBooks. QuickBooks automatically adds a time stamp of the date on which I enter transactions into the system. Consequently, in some screen shots, you can see that I entered the transactions into QuickBooks in 2020, even though the transaction dates for my examples are in 2021. I hope you don’t find this situation too confusing; there’s just no way I can work around it.

Icons Used in This Book

Like many computer books, this book uses icons, or little pictures, to flag things that don’t quite fit into the flow of things.

The Warning icon tells you to watch out! It marks important information that may save you headaches when using QuickBooks 2021.

Remember icons mark the information that’s especially important to know. To siphon off the most important information in each chapter, skim these icons.

The Tip icon marks tips (duh!) and shortcuts that you can use to make QuickBooks easier.

The Technical Stuff icon marks information of a highly technical nature that you normally can skip.

Beyond the Book

QuickBooks 2021 All-in-One For Dummies includes some extra content that you bought with your book but didn’t get inside the book. Okay, I know that sounds bad at first blush. But don’t worry. This extra, premium stuff is available online:

The Cheat Sheet for this book is at https://www.dummies.com.

In the Search field, type QuickBooks 2021 All-in-One For Dummies Cheat Sheet to find the Cheat Sheet for this book.

Updates to this book, if there are any, are also at

https://www.dummies.com

. Search for the book’s title to find the associated updates.

Where to Go from Here

This reference combines eight short books, including a minibook about accounting, one about setting up the QuickBooks system, one for bookkeepers using QuickBooks, one for accountants and managers using QuickBooks, a minibook about small-business financial management, a minibook about business planning, a minibook about taking care of a QuickBooks accounting system, and a minibook of appendixes of further useful information.

I’m not going to go into more detail here about what’s available in the book. If you have a specific question about what’s covered or where some topic is covered, refer to the table of contents in the front of this reference. Also remember that the book provides an index to help you find just the pages that have the information you need.

While I’m on the subject of what’s in this book and how to find information, let me make four tangential points:

You’ll never read this book from cover to cover unless you’re someone who has an obsessive-compulsive personality (like me) and many hours to devote to reading. But that’s okay. This reference isn’t meant to be read from cover to cover like some Val McDermid page-turner. Instead, chapters within the eight minibooks are organized into largely self-contained descriptions of how you do the things that you need to do. You just read the paragraph, page, or chapter that provides the information you want.

I haven’t discussed in any detail how to use the QuickBooks Premier and QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions features for business planning. The wizard-based approach that QuickBooks Premier and QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions provide for business planning is not, in my humble opinion, the right way. Instead, I discuss in detail alternative, superior approaches to business planning and budgeting (using spreadsheets) in

Book 6

. (Just so you know: The approach I describe and recommend here is the same one that any business school teaches its students.)

At a few points in the book, you’ll find me saying things like “Well, I really don’t think you should use this part of the product.” I just want to explain here, up front, where I’m coming from. First, know that I think QuickBooks is an outstanding product, but not every feature and every command is good. I’ve already mentioned that the new business planning tools aren’t ones that I can recommend. And payroll, very frankly, is another pain-in-the-butt feature that most businesses should avoid. (I do briefly discuss payroll in Book 3,

Chapter 5

.) So if I think that a particular feature is one that you shouldn’t use, I don’t take up page space (or much page space) describing the feature. I’d rather use that space to describe other stuff that I believe is going to be valuable to you and other readers.

I should also mention one final thing: Accounting software programs require you to do a certain amount of preparation before you can use them to get real work done. If you haven’t started to use QuickBooks yet, I recommend that you skim

Book 1

and then read

Book 2

to find out what you need to do first.

Book 1

An Accounting Primer

Contents at a Glance

Chapter 1: Principles of Accounting

The Purpose of Accounting

Reviewing the Common Financial Statements

The Philosophy of Accounting

A Few Words about Tax Accounting

Chapter 2: Double-Entry Bookkeeping

The Fiddle-Faddle Method of Accounting

How Double-Entry Bookkeeping Works

Almost a Real-Life Example

A Few Words about How QuickBooks Works

Chapter 3: Special Accounting Problems

Working with Accounts Receivable

Recording Accounts Payable Transactions

Inventory Accounting

Accounting for Fixed Assets

Recognizing Liabilities

Closing Out Revenue and Expense Accounts

One More Thing …

Chapter 1

Principles of Accounting

IN THIS CHAPTER

Figuring out the purpose of accounting

Taking a look at common financial statements

Understanding the philosophy of accounting

Discovering income tax accounting and reporting

Any discussion of how to use QuickBooks to better manage your business begins with a discussion of the basics of accounting. For this reason, in this chapter and the next two, I attempt to provide the same information that you’d receive in an introductory college accounting course. I tailor the entire discussion, of course, to QuickBooks and the small-business environment. What you’ll read about here and in the next two chapters of this book pretty much describes how accounting works in a small-business setting when you’re using QuickBooks.

If you’ve had some experience with accounting, if you know how to read an income statement and balance sheet, or if you know how to construct a journal entry, you don’t need to read this chapter or the next. But if you’re new to accounting and business bookkeeping, take the time to read this chapter carefully. I start the chapter by giving you a high-level overview of the purpose of accounting. Then I review the common financial statements that any accounting system worth its salt produces. I also discuss some of the important principles of accounting and the philosophy of accounting. Finally, I talk a little bit about income tax law and tax accounting.

The Purpose of Accounting

In the movie Creator, Peter O’Toole plays an eccentric professor. At one point, O’Toole’s character attempts to talk a young student into working as an unpaid research assistant. When the student protests, noting that he needs 15 credit hours, O’Toole creates a special 15-credit independent-study course named “Introduction to the Big Picture.” In the next section, I describe the “big picture” of accounting. At its core, accounting makes perfect, logical sense.

The big picture

The most important thing to understand about accounting is that it provides financial information to stakeholders. Stakeholders are the people who do business with or interact with a firm; they include managers, employees, investors, banks, vendors, government authorities, and agencies that may tax a firm. Stakeholders and their information requirements deserve a bit more discussion. Why? Because the information needs of these stakeholders determine what an accounting system must do.

Managers, investors, and entrepreneurs

The first category of stakeholders includes the firm’s managers, investors, and entrepreneurs. This group needs financial information to determine whether a business is making money. This group also wants any information that gives insight into whether a business is growing or contracting and how healthy or sick it is. To fulfill its obligations and duties, this group often needs detailed information. A manager or entrepreneur may want to know which customers are particularly profitable — or unprofitable. An active investor may want to know which product lines are growing or contracting.

A related set of information requirements concerns asset and liability record keeping. An asset is something that the firm owns, such as cash, inventory, or equipment. A liability is some debt or obligation that the firm owes, such as bank loans and accounts payable.

Obviously, someone at a firm — perhaps a manager, bookkeeper, or accountant — needs to have very detailed records of the amount of cash that the firm has in its bank accounts, the inventory that the firm has in its warehouse or on its shelves, and the equipment that the firm owns and uses in its operations.

If you look over the preceding two or three paragraphs, nothing I’ve said is particularly surprising. It makes sense, right? Someone who works in a business, manages a business, or actively invests in a business needs good general information about the financial affairs of the firm and, in many cases, very detailed information about important assets (such as cash) and liabilities (such as bank loans).

External creditors

A second category of stakeholders includes outside firms that lend money to a business and credit-reporting agencies that supply information to these lenders. Banks want to know about the financial affairs and financial condition of a firm before lending money, for example. The accounting system needs to produce the financial information that a bank requires to consider a loan request.

What information do lenders want? Lenders want to know that a business is profitable and enjoys a positive cash flow. Profits and positive cash flows allow a business to repay debt easily. A bank or other lender also wants to see assets that could be liquidated, in a worst-case scenario, to pay a loan — and other debts that may represent a claim on the firm’s assets.

Vendors also typically require financial information from a firm. A vendor often lends money to a firm by extending trade credit. What’s noteworthy about this fact is that vendors sometimes require special accounting. One category of vendors that a company such as John Wiley & Sons, Inc., deals with is its authors. To pay an author the royalty that he or she is entitled to, Wiley puts in a fair amount of work to calculate royalty-per-unit amounts and then reports and remits these amounts to authors.

Other firms sometimes have similar financial reporting requirements for vendors. Franchisees (such as the person who owns and operates the local McDonald’s) pay a franchise fee based on revenue. Retailers may perform special accounting and reporting to enjoy rebates and incentives from the manufacturers of the products that they sell.

Government agencies

Predictable stakeholders that require financial information from a business also include the federal and state government agencies that have jurisdiction over the firm. Every business in the United States needs to report on its revenue, expenses, and profits so that it can correctly calculate income tax due to the federal government (and often, the state government too) and then pay that tax.

Firms with employees must also report to the federal and state governments on wages paid to those employees and pay payroll taxes based on metrics, such as number of employees, wages paid to employees, and unemployment benefits claimed by past employees.

Providing this sort of financial information to government agencies represents a key duty of a firm’s accounting system.

Business form generation

In addition to the financial reporting described in the preceding paragraphs, accounting systems typically perform a key task for businesses: producing business forms. An accounting system almost always produces the checks needed to pay vendors, for example. In addition, an accounting system prepares the invoices and payroll checks. More sophisticated accounting systems, such as those used by large firms, prepare many other business forms, including purchase orders, monthly customer statements, credit memos to customers, and sales receipts.

Every accounting function that I’ve described so far is performed ably by each version of QuickBooks: QuickBooks Simple Start, QuickBooks Pro, QuickBooks Premier, and QuickBooks Enterprise.

Reviewing the Common Financial Statements

With the background information just provided, I’m ready to talk about some of the common financial statements or accounting reports that an accounting system like QuickBooks produces. If you understand which reports you want your accounting system to produce, you should find it much easier to collect the raw data necessary to prepare these reports.

In the following sections, I describe the three principal financial statements: the income statement, the balance sheet, and the statement of cash flows. I also briefly describe a fourth, catch-all category: accounting reports.

Don’t worry — I go through this material slowly. You need to understand what financial statements your accounting systems are supposed to provide and what data these financial statements supply.

The income statement

Perhaps the most important financial statement that an accounting system produces is the income statement, also known as a profit and loss statement. An income statement summarizes a firm’s revenue and expenses for a particular period. Revenue represents amounts that a business earns by providing goods and services to its customers. Expenses represent amounts that a firm spends providing those goods and services. If a business can provide goods or services to customers for revenue that exceeds its expenses, the firm earns a profit. If expenses exceed revenue, obviously, the firm suffers a loss.

To show you how this all works — and it’s really pretty simple — take a look at Tables 1-1 and 1-2. Table 1-1 summarizes the sales that an imaginary business enjoys. Table 1-2 summarizes the expenses that the same business incurs for the same period. These two tables provide all the information necessary to construct an income statement.

TABLE 1-1 A Sales Journal

Joe

$1,000

Bob

500

Frank

1,000

Abdul

2,000

Yoshio

2,750

Marie

2,250

Jeremy

1,000

Chang

2,500

Total sales

$13,000

Using the information from Tables 1-1 and 1-2, you can construct the simple income statement shown in Table 1-3. Understanding the details of an income statement is key to your understanding of how accounting works and what accounting tries to do. Therefore, I want to go into some detail in discussing this income statement.

The first thing to note about the income statement shown in Table 1-3 is the sales revenue figure of $13,000. This figure shows the sales generated for a particular period. The $13,000 figure shown in Table 1-3 comes directly from the sales journal shown in Table 1-1.

TABLE 1-2 An Expenses Journal

Purchases of hot dogs and buns

$3,000

Rent

1,000

Wages

4,000

Supplies

1,000

Total expenses

$9,000

TABLE 1-3 Simple Income Statement

Sales revenue

$13,000

Less: Cost of goods sold

3,000

Gross margin

$10,000

Operating expenses

Rent

$1,000

Wages

4,000

Supplies

1,000

Total operating expenses

6,000

Operating profit

$4,000

One important thing to recognize about accounting for sales revenue is that revenue gets counted when goods or services are provided, not when a customer pays for the goods or services. If you look at the list of sales shown in Table 1-1, for example, Joe (the first customer listed) may have paid $1,000 in cash, but Bob, Frank, and Abdul (the second, third, and fourth customers) may have paid for their purchases with a credit card. Yoshio, Marie, Jeremy, and Chang (the fifth through eighth customers listed) may not have even paid for their purchases at the time the goods or services were provided. These customers may simply have promised to pay for the purchases at some later date. The timing of payment for goods or services doesn’t matter, however. Accountants have figured out that you count revenue when goods or services are provided. Information about when customers pay for those goods or services, if you want that information, can come from lists of customer payments.

Cost of goods sold and gross margins are two other values that you commonly see in income statements. Before I discuss cost of goods sold and gross margins, however, let me add a little more detail to this example. Suppose that the financial information in Tables 1-1, 1-2, and 1-3 shows the financial results from your business: the hot dog stand that you operate for one day at the major sporting event in the city where you live. Table 1-1 describes sales to hungry customers. Table 1-2 summarizes the one-day expenses of operating your super-duper hot dog stand.

In this case, the actual items that you sell — hot dogs and buns — are shown separately in the income statement as cost of goods sold. By separately showing the cost of the goods sold, the income statement can show what is called a gross margin. The gross margin is the amount of revenue left over after paying for the cost of goods. In Table 1-3, the cost of goods sold equals $3,000 for purchases of dogs and buns. The difference between the $13,000 of sales revenue and the $3,000 of cost of goods sold equals $10,000, which is the gross margin.