Vendors

Introduction

You have more than enough to do running your business, so you don’t want bookkeeping to take any longer than necessary. The QuickBooks Home page is your command center for all things financial; it helps you get your accounting done quickly and efficiently. The page not only provides a visual roadmap to the bookkeeping tasks you perform regularly, it also gives you quick access to tasks and

information related to vendors, customers, and employees, along with the commands and overall financial info you use most often. Click an icon, and the corresponding window or dialog box appears.

The Home page also includes Company and Banking panels with icons that open windows like the Chart of Accounts, Item List, Write Checks, and everyone’s favorite—Make Deposits. This chapter explains how to use the workflow icons on the Home page, as well as the Vendor, Customer, and Employees centers that open when you click the corresponding buttons on the left side of the Home page. You’ll also learn how to review your company’s finances in the Company Snapshot window and access QuickBooks commands from the menu bar and icon bar. Finally, you’ll learn how to work with all the windows you open during a rousing bookkeeping session.

The QuickBooks Home Page

 QuickBooks’ Home page is a slick way to work through your company’s bookkeeping tasks. The page is divided into several panels: Vendors, Customers, Employees, Company, and Banking. When you create your company file with the EasyStep Interview, the things you tell QuickBooks determine what you see on the Home page. For example, if you tell the Interview that you invoice customers and send statements, the Customers panel includes icons for invoicing and statements. Or if you run a one-person shop with no employees, you won’t see the Employees panel.

The Home page also has icons for other must-do tasks, like the Chart of Accounts icon in the Company panel, which opens the Chart of Accounts window, and the Check Register icon in the Banking panel, which opens your checking account register window. This section shows you how to use the Home page to best advantage.

If a feature you use doesn’t appear on the Home page, choose Edit➝ Preferences➝Desktop View and then click the Company Preferences tab.

For example, if you want to create sales receipts, turn on the Sales Receipts checkbox, as shown here. Some features (like Estimates) have their own section of preferences; these features are listed in the bottom half of the Preferences window (not shown here). To turn one of these features on or off or adjust its settings, click its link in the Preferences window and QuickBooks switches to the corresponding preference section. Turn on checkbox to display icon on the Home page

 The Home page shows you how bookkeeping tasks fit together so you can follow your money from start to finish. Vendors, customers, and employees each have their own panel on the Home page. The bookkeeping tasks for each group are laid out like breadcrumbs you can follow from start to finish. Each company is different, so you don’t have to use every icon you see. This section outlines the tasks you can access from each panel and where you can find detailed instructions

 Vendors

Whether you purchase products and services to run your company or to sell to your customers, the Vendors panel steps you through purchasing and paying for the goods and services you use;. Click the Vendors button on the left side of the panel (or choose Vendors➝Vendor Center) to open the Vendor Center shown in Figure 2-2, where you can set up and edit vendors, or check the status of purchase orders, bills, and other vendor transactions. The Vendor Center is the best place to create, edit, and view what’s going on with your vendors. Here’s what you can do there:

 • Create a new vendor. In the Vendor Center toolbar at the top of the window, click New Vendor➝New Vendor (how’s that for redundant?), and the New Vendor window opens so you can create a new vendor record. If you click New Vendor➝Add Multiple Vendors instead, QuickBooks lets you create multiple vendors in one window.

• Find a vendor.

 If you have a bazillion vendors, you can shorten the vendor list that you see in the Vendor tab on the left side of the Vendor Center. The tab’s View drop-down list is initially set to Active Vendors. If you want to see active and inactive vendors alike, choose All Vendors instead. If you’d rather see only the vendors you owe money to, choose “Vendors with Open Balances”. Or choose Custom Filter to specify exactly the criteria you want. To do a quick search of vendor records, type part of a vendor’s name in the Vendor tab’s Find box and then click the Find button, which has a magnifying glass on it.

• Review a vendor’s record.

 When you select a vendor on the Vendors tab (shown in Figure 2-2), basic info about that vendor appears on the right side of the window.

 • Edit an existing vendor’s record.

To change a vendor’s record, on the Vendors tab, right-click the vendor’s name and then choose Edit Vendor. The Edit Vendor window opens with the same fields you filled in when you created the record ( 131). If you select the vendor in the list so its info appears on the right, you can also click the Edit Vendor button in the right-hand pane to open the same window.

• Attach an electronic document to a vendor record. You can add attachments to a vendor’s record and even scan them right in QuickBooks.

• Create transactions for a vendor. In the Vendor Center toolbar, click New Transactions to display a drop-down menu of vendor-related commands like Enter Bills, Pay Bills, and Receive Items. (These do the same thing as the icons in the Home page’s Vendors panel

  

The Vendor Center puts all vendorrelated tasks in a single window. When you choose a vendor from the list on the left, the Vendor Information pane on the right displays info about that vendor and its transactions. Click the Open Balance link (circled) to see how much you owe that vendor. If the vendor’s record includes an email address, you can click the “Send to” link (also circled) to email the vendor. You can even click the Map or Directions link to find out how to get to your vendor.

 • Review transactions for a vendor. When you select a vendor in the Vendors tab, the table at the bottom-right of the Vendor Center lists that vendor’s transactions. By filtering these transactions, you can find out which purchase orders are still open, whether any bills are overdue, or what payments you’ve made. To see a specific kind of transaction, in the Show drop-down list, choose a transaction type, like Bills or Bill Payments. The Filter By drop-down list lets you restrict the transactions you see by their status, such as Open Bills or Overdue Bills. To track down transactions within a specific date range, choose a date range from the Date drop-down list.

Tip: To view a transaction in its corresponding window, double-click the transaction in the list.

• Print or export vendor information. In the Vendor Center toolbar, click Print to print vendor lists, vendor information, or vendor transactions. Click Excel to paste, import, or export vendor information and transactions

• Prepare vendor letters. In the Vendor Center toolbar, click Word to create letters to vendors