NEWS FLASH!
QuickBooks releases useful customization tips compiled from feedback Intuit’s received from experienced QuickBooks customers.
Here are three customization videos on YouTube that you could use as well.
Basic Customization
Additional Customization I
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Ah yes, just what the world needs –
another edition of QuickBooks. Sigh.
You know how I feel about “if it ain’t broke,
don’t fix it”, right?
And last year, I told you, for the first time, QuickBooks 2007 is a must-have.
So, do you think that I’m about to recommend an upgrade two years in a row?
Well, it all depends.
If you’re using some version of QuickBooks now – and you’re happy with it and understand how it works, and can do what you need to do – stay where you are.
For those of you who are using QuickBooks right now, and who find it confusing, or who often have questions about how to use a feature or what to do – YES. Absolutely!
Also, if you’re one of those people in business for yourself, who can’t seem to get your billing together and get invoices sent out until months later – you’re losing money. And YOU need the new edition of QuickBooks.
QuickBooks Pro and QuickBooks Premier Edition 2008 is all about help.
Help – There’s a permanent Help tool that you can keep open in the right-hand column. Whatever you’re working on, it will give you tips. Intuit has learned more about context-sensitive functions. So, whatever field you’re in, in whatever form or screen, the Help tool will display links to explanations specifically about that. Another new feature – you’ll be able to click a link that takes you directly into the QuickBooks Community Site. The link will take you directly to right discussion page. Oh, I nearly forgot. There’s a video tutorial you can watch to walk you through a variety of tasks.
Road Map – In fact, when you open your company’s QuickBooks 2008 file, you’ll see a string of icons highlighted, to walk you through the ‘what do I do next?’ maze. Just mouse-over any icon to see the whole workflow.
Set-up – When you set up a new business now, the QuickBooks development team has cut the steps down from about 100 to about 30. They’ve come to the realization that you can make some decisions as you go along, once you have a better grasp of your company’s needs.
Invoicing – (available in Premier only) There’s a vastly improved time tracking function. When you finish a job or project, or week, or day, or whatever your billing increment is – you’ll be able to press a key and produce all your invoices, ready for your review. Once you’ve made your adjustments for time or expenses you don’t want to bill; or for things/functions that have special prices (higher or lower) – just click that key and it will e-mail all your invoices to your clients. In fact, using QuickBooks new Online Time Tracker (sold separately) you can integrate it directly with your Outlook appointment/time tracking software. So you’ll only need to enter time and related out of pocket expenses once.
Mileage – Incidentally, did you know that they added a mileage tracker 3 years ago, that integrates into the billing system?
Outlook Integration – QuickBooks 2008 integrates client data, e-mails and other from Microsoft Outlook and Outlook Express – so you can enter all the data into one place and save a lot of time and keypunch errors.
Unit of Measure – It’s always been a pain to enter something as an “Item” being sold in certain quantities, like one unit, or a box, or a pound – then end up selling it as a pair, or a case or a carton or a package deal. You’ll easily be able to set up instant conversions.
Reports – You’ll be able to generate pretty reports with graphs and charts to get a visual feel for how your business is doing. You’ll also be able to see key account balances at a glance, right on the screen.
Business Plan – (available in Premier only) – You can create a business plan, projecting income and expenses for up to 3 years. Of course, it’s exportable to Excel for any further tweaking and prettifying. And you can create a PDF version so you can lock the data in and share it with managers, investors, bankers, etc.
Multi-User – There’s a 3-user version which can be expanded up to 5-users with a Local Area Network (LAN) and additional upgrades.
Visiting Folks – Before you go to see a client, vendor, employee, or other office, simply pull up their record in QuickBooks 2008. It will link you to a map, with driving directions, which you can print out, complete with the address. In fact, if your travels take you to several people – just change your “from” address to the previous stop’s location – and you can print out directions for each stop of your day.
Internet Visibility – Last year, Intuit introduced their partnership with Google Ads. You got:
- 1) Integrated Google AdWords – new users would get a $50 in AdWords credits
- 2) Integrated Google Maps – users could easily create a Web presence by listing their businesses on Google Maps
- 3) QuickBooks Product Listing service – which would allow businesses to list their products on Google Base so they’d show up on Froogle, etc
This year, with their new WebListings, that’s been expanded to include Google Maps, Yahoo! Local, Yellowpages.com and superpages.com. And all the business has to do is enter their data once, and it populates all those local listings
Accountants – The Accountants version is also backward compatible with 2007 and perhaps a couple of other years. Like 2007, your clients can keep working and making entries while you make your adjustments – no matter how long it takes. BIG IMPROVEMENT – your clients can create an accountant copy with a press of key AND e-mail it directly to you, with ENCRYPTION.
Incidentally, there are 5 free webcasts you can attend to learn more about how to use QuickBooks 2008 – and get CPE. You can get 1-2 hours of CPE, depending on the workshop. Click here.
Get your copy of QuickBooks here – https://iTaxMama.com/QuickBooks
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- Reviews and Recommendations :: QuickBooks 2008
- TaxMama’s QuickBooks Shop ::
- QuickBooks Training with CPE ::
- Free – QuickBooks Training :: Basic Customization
- Free – QuickBooks Training :: Additional Customization I
- Free – QuickBooks Training :: Additional Customization II
