How to set up a new quickbooks account
Quickbooks, in my opinion, is the most important tool you have in your tool bag. Accurate books makes decisions so much easier, whether you want to hire a tech, upgrade tools, or buy a new service vehicle, QuickBooks can help. Im going to show you how to;
- Buy QuickBooks
- Enter your logo, business name, EIN
- Link your bank accounts
- Add customers
- Make custom line items
- Produce invoices
- Receive payments
QuickBooks is a monster of a tool that will require a lot of learning over your entire career. If you can at least start off with the information that we are going to discuss you will have a good base to run reports on in the future. Lets start.
Two different types of QuickBooks
There are two forms of QuickBooks. You can buy the desktop or the online version. QuickBooks desktop allows you to download to your computer and the only way to access this version is from that computer. The online version can be accessed from anywhere so long as you have internet access. Quickbooks also has an app that allows you to access your books from your phone in the field if you have the online version.
We are going to buy the online version, so lets go to the Quickbooks website and make our purchase.
How to buy
Here Im going to purchase the “Essentials Plan,” I have found that this version allows for the best results as a home service trade professionals. You can purchase the “Simple Start” plan to get started and upgrade at any time. QuickBooks does not have contracts so feel free to upgrade or even cancel whenever you see fit.
Follow the prompts, eneter your credit card info and make the purchase.
Your dashboard
This is your dashboard. This is what you are going to see each time you log onto your QuickBooks. Becoming familiar with all the prompts on the left is going to allow you to navigate through QuickBooks easily. In the top right you will see a setting gear icon. We will be using that in this tutorial as well.
Enter Business name, logo, and EIN
The first thing I suggest you do is enter your business name, your business logo, and your business EIN. You do this by clicking on the gear icon at the top right and then selection “Account Settings.”
You will see at the top of the page you can enter your business name, upload your logo, as well as enter your EIN number.
Link your bank account
To link your bank account from your dashboard select “banking services” on the left hand side and then select the “link account.”
Here im going to level you on your own. QuickBooks does a good job guiding you along this route. Make sure that you link all of your business bank accounts that you will use. This includes your business checking account, savings account, and credit cards.
If your bank is not listed you can enter your banks website URL into the top space provided.
Select all your accounts and link them. Done.
Add Customers
To add customers first start from your dashboard. Select the prompt on the left side that says, “customer and leads.” This is where you can always return to your list of customers.
On the top right select the green button that says add customers.
Fill out all of the customers information. Don’t forget to add their email address. This is important when sending out invoices.
When you have finished filling out all of your customers information hit “save”
Create line items
Line items are a very important part of your QuickBooks. You should be as descriptive as possible as the reports are very heavily produced on how you create your line items and how you fill them out.
Starting from your dashboard, click on the gear icon on the top right and under “Lists” select “Products and Services.”
This is where your line items live. To add a new line item, click the “New” button at the top right then select “Service.” Enter your new line item info here.
Now, when you go to invoice out a customer, these line items will show up under the drop down of “Products/Services.”
You can also enter new line items on the fly by selecting the “+ Add new” under the product and service of your line item when invoicing out.
Invoice out your customer
From your Customers & Leads page select the customer you wish to invoice out.
Once you are in the customers account, select the green button on the top right of your screen labeled “New Transaction.” A drop down will show up and you select “Invoice.”
Once in this screen I like to switch the view to “old layout.” you can see this on the top right of your screen while in the invoice.
Terms
The terms on a invoice is the amount of time the customer has to pay the invoice once invoiced.
Any invoice set at a “net” allows the customer the amount of days to pay the invoice following the net.
For instance, invoices are commonly set for a new 15 or a net 30. This allows the customer either 15 or 30 days to pay the invoice from the invoiced date.
On the other hand you can have an invoice that is “Due on receipt.” This informs your customer that the invoice is due when they receive it.
It is common practice to have customers that are on a monthly service plan set up on a net invoice for their regular service and a due on receipt for repairs or one time jobs.
Product/Service
These are your line items we just went over. Select which one or ones you need in order to represent the work you provided to your customers.
Description
You can have this information hard entered so that when you select it, the description pops up. If you don’t wish to hard enter anything for the description while setting up your line items, you can enter it as you see fit while invoicing out.
Quantity
When you are invoicing out, it is important to note the quantity. Don’t always select one and then adjust the amount to fit. Be aware of what you are invoicing out and know that QuickBooks is tracking it. Enter the quantity of the items you have sold so that you can run reports against it later.
Rate
The rate is the amount you are charging for the line item you have selected. It is a good idea to have this hard entered but you can change it if need be. Enter in the rate of ONE and QuickBooks will automatically multiply it by the quantity auto populating the amount for you.
When you are completely finished with the invoice click the button in the bottom right hand corner labeled “Save and Send.”
Send Invoice
This is your invoice memo allowing you to overlook everything one final time before you send.
You can see the sender and the subject of your invoice that your customer will see as well as the body of the email. These can all be adjusted here now or permanently in your settings.
I would suggest customizing all of this in a creative way but for now, just select the “Send and Close” button at the bottom right.
Receive Payment
Let me show you how to receive a payment from Cash, Check, or Credit Card.
From your customers account page find the invoice you wish to collect on and select the blue link to the right labeled “Receive Payment.”
Once in the receive payment page, first choose what form of payment you wish to process under the “Payment method” prompt.
Cash
Select cash then choose which account you are depositing it into under the “deposit to” prompt. Hit save and close.
Check
Select check, put the check number in where it asks for the reference no. and then select which account you want this money to go into. Then select save and close.
Credit Card
Customers can pay with their credit card from a link in the email you sent the invoice in. If you wish to collect over the phone, select the payment method credit card.
A new screen will pop up for you to enter the customers credit card when you select the button “Enter credit card details. Once entered hit use this info.
All set
Even if you arent doing that much work for your new home service trade business, its a good idea to have QuickBooks. This way all your information is saved because the true magic of QuickBooks, is running reports.
