Setting Up and Getting Started with Quickbooks Online
QuickBooks Online from Intuit is one of the most popular small business accounting solutions on the market — and my pick for the best business accounting software overall. It’s easy to use and loaded with features, including several that can save you time. The company estimates that, on average, it saves its users 40 hours each month on accounting tasks.
It can be used by nearly every type of business and has plans for businesses of all sizes, from self-employed individuals to small businesses with basic accounting needs to established businesses that need advanced features such as time, project and inventory tracking.
Quickbooks is easy to learn and, setting up isn't a hassle at all follow this guideline and you’ll get started using QuickBooks in no time
Step 1: Customize your Company Preferences and Account Settings
You can use your QuickBooks dashboard to display a helpful To Do list and other tools. When you log in for the first time, you’ll also see a series of tutorials that let you set up different parts of your new account.
Before you do any of those things, you should first set your company preferences.
To start, click the Company tab at the top menu bar and then select Preferences. Edit your company’s contact information. Then, change your account settings however you like. Settings you might want to change include:
- Invoice automation
- Time tracking and payroll
- Credit card payments (you may want to choose to accept online payments, for example)
One of the nice parts about QuickBooks Online is that you’re not forced to complete all of these settings options prior to opening your account. The old desktop versions of QuickBooks forced you to edit all of these settings (even if you didn’t totally understand what they meant).
If you don’t want to change these settings around right now, you can just ignore them until you have more time.
Step 2: Set Up Chart of Accounts
The Chart of Accounts is the backbone of your bookkeeping and accounting system. All of the transactions that you enter into QuickBooks are categorized behind the scenes using the Chart of Accounts so that financial statements, such as your profit & loss statement or income statement, can be generated.
QuickBooks Online will create a chart of accounts list based on the industry that you selected when you set up your account.
Below is a list of accounts that QuickBooks will automatically create for you:
- Accounts receivable
- Accounts payable
- Inventory asset
- Sales tax payable
- Retained earnings
Any additional accounts have to be made manually.
Step 3: Import Business data
QuickBooks Online lets you import or export data. Instead of starting from scratch, you can transfer information to and from QuickBooks in case you need to convert, upgrade or create a new company file.
Before you start importing or exporting data, you need to identify the transaction type and file format to ensure that QuickBooks will be able to handle them. Generally, QuickBooks allows you to import or export list to and from MS Excel. You can import certain transactions like your bank’s online web connect files and you can export all reports as Excel or PDF file.
Here’s a snapshot of the file types and formats that you can bring in to or out of QuickBooks:
Step 4: Sync Bank Accounts with Quickbooks
Automatically connect your business’s bank account data with QuickBooks by clicking on the Banking tab at the top of the screen. Then click Download Transactions.
You’ll see a pop-up window where you can enter the name of your bank and the account number for the account you wish to sync. At this point, you’ll need to use your online banking login name and password.
Then, QuickBooks will spend a few minutes importing all your business account’s bank transactions into the software.
Once that transfer is complete, you can attach vendor or customer names (or even specific accounts) to each transaction. This can help you make sense out of a wall of credit and debit info.
Most modern banks have seamless QuickBooks integration and the process should go smoothly
Step 5: Customize Invoices for your Company
Change the look and feel of your invoices, estimates, and sale receipts in QuickBooks Online so they highlight your company’s brand. You can create a custom template for specific transactions or customize standard templates which you can use for all transaction types.
A custom template has advanced customization options available for invoices, estimates, and sales receipts only
Keep in mind that complete invoice customization is only available to QuickBooks Plus subscribers.
To access the customization menu, click on the Customers tab at the top of the QuickBooks menu. Then, select Create Invoices. Choose your desired invoice template from the drop-down list. The invoices all have the same basic layout but shift certain things around — so experiment with a few different designs before finding one that suits your business
You're All Set
These are the basic requirements to getting started with QuickBooks online, All though there are more advanced features you need to eventually learn and master, for now, you can start handling basic bookkeeping duties for your firm using the guideline provided above.
As you start using the software more and more, you’ll get better at it which will allow you to work more efficiently and be more productive. The best feature about QBO is the smart AI that will automate a lot of the strenuous task that goes along with bookkeeping giving you more time to focus on your business.
