Reviewing the other Banking Commands

Earlier, I describe the most common and useful banking commands. You may not need to use the other commands provided by the Banking menu. Nevertheless, my compulsive personality requires that I describe these other commands.

Order Checks & Envelopes Command

The Order Checks & Envelopes command displays a submenu of commands you use to order QuickBooks checks and envelopes or to get information about ordering QuickBooks checks and envelopes.

Enter Credit Card Charges Command

If you set up a credit card account — this is a credit card account that you or your business would use to charge transactions — you can choose the Banking ð Record Credit Card Charges command to display a submenu of credit-card-related commands: Enter Credit Card Charges and Download Credit Card Charges.

If you choose the Enter Credit Card Charges command, the Enter Credit Card Charges window appears (see Figure 1). You can figure out how this window works without my help, I'm sure. You identify the credit card account for which you want to record transactions, and you describe the credit card purchase by using the field at the top of the screen. You then use the Expenses and Items tabs — these tabs work the same way as the similar tabs in the Write Checks window — to detail the reasons and the accounts affected by your charge.

Figure 1: The Enter Credit Card Charges window

If you choose the Download Credit Card Charges command — assuming you've set up credit card accounts that allow for online services — QuickBooks downloads recent credit card transactions directly into the credit card register. Perhaps obviously, for this command to work, several prerequisites must be met:

1. You need a credit card account already set up.

2. You need to have set up the credit card account for online services.

3. You need an Internet connection so QuickBooks can go grab the credit card transactions from the credit card company.

Online Banking Command

The Online Banking command displays a submenu of commands that you use to apply for online banking and to see which financial institutions (banks, savings and loans, and credit unions) let you do online banking. If you want to do online banking — this can save businesses a ton of time — call your existing bank and ask whether it provides the service. If it does, ask for a sign-up packet and for specific instructions on how to get going with online banking.

If you don't like the idea of calling your bank directly, choose the Set Up Account for Online Access command from the Online Banking submenu. This command walks you through the process for applying for and setting up online financial services.

Remerber

Can I close with an editorial comment? Online banking is a real time-saver for business owners. If you're not using online banking, you really should have a pretty darn good reason for not doing so.

Online Banking Center Command

Available only when you've set up online banking, the Online Banking Center command displays the Online Banking Center window. You display the Online Banking Center window to transmit online payments and online transactions to your bank. How you use this window is described in the online banking instructions that you get from your bank. In a nutshell, you display the window by choosing a command. You click the Send/Update Account, you provide a PIN, and then you simply watch in admiration as QuickBooks and your bank's computer exchange information. That's really all there is to it.

You can use the Online Banking Center window to record online payments (you can also record online payments by using the Write Checks window described earlier in the chapter), to record online transfers between accounts (you can also use the Transfer Money Between Accounts command described earlier in the chapter), and to send messages. Because you have other ways to do these things, I don't show you how to accomplish these same tasks with the Online Banking Center window. If you do want to use the Online Banking Center window, you can refer to the earlier discussions of the Write Checks window and the Transfer Money Between Accounts window for help about what information goes into what fields and boxes.

When your account won't balance

If your account won't reconcile, the problem stems from one of several conditions. None of the conditions is hard to describe, but they can be pretty hard to fix. Here's a quick overview of what may be causing you trouble and what may be preventing you from reconciling your account:

• Are you working with the right account? That sounds pretty dumb, doesn't it? But if you have several bank accounts, you may be trying to reconcile the wrong account or using the wrong statement to reconcile your account.

• Are you missing any transactions? If the bank has recorded transactions that you haven't, this causes your ending balance to not equal your cleared balance. Look on your statement for any transactions that you're missing or forgot to record, and then record these and mark them as cleared.

• Have you correctly recorded transactions? This may also sound silly, but if you recorded the transaction and you are a few pennies off or a few dollars off — perhaps you've transposed a couple of numbers — you won't be able to reconcile your account. I commonly find that I've entered a transaction or two wrong per month. (Maybe this is because my fingers are too arthritic to correctly record amounts.) But it's probably very common when you're entering dozens and dozens of transactions to occasionally record a transaction wrong. The occasional errors need to be fixed before you can reconcile an account.

Note that it's quite likely — especially as you are getting started — that you won't be able to successfully reconcile an account because of multiple errors. If you do something like record a transaction erroneously and then forget to record a couple of transactions, you'll need to fix each of these errors in order to reconcile your account.

One final tip: Reconciling an account is much easier if you're using online banking.

Loan Manager

The Loan Manager command displays a window that lists loan accounts you've sent up. This isn't all that special, but the Loan Manager window does do something else that is special. If you click the Add a Loan button, QuickBooks collects loan information from you so that it can break loan payments into principal and interest.

Other Names List

The Other Names list displays a window that lists all the other names you've used to record transactions. Individuals and businesses that appear on your Other Names list are not customers, vendors, or employees. In other words, the Other Names list includes names that don't neatly fit into one of the standard categories.