Channel: Ask the Accountant

Question: I use the order system in QuickBooks Premier. Why don’t the customer sales order and supplier purchase order appear in my financial statements?

Question: I am starting out as an ad specialty distributor. Is it better to set up my books on a cash or accrual basis for tax purposes?

Question: When I’m not sure how to make an entry in QuickBooks, should I make a general journal entry?

No; currently, QuickBooks Premier is a desktop software and not a subscription service. That means that when you buy the software, you own it.

QuickBooks supports its desktop software, such as Premier, for three years. QuickBooks Premier 2012, for instance, is supported until May 31, 2015. During this time period, you can expect to receive automatic updates and fixes, as well as support and access to any integrated add-on services.

The answer is yes! It is important that you have separate business bank accounts—be it checking, savings, money market or any other kind. You should also keep a credit card just for business use.

Yes, QuickBooks allows you to set up each portion of sales taxes separately as a sales tax item and then as a group sales tax. For instance, in North Carolina we must collect sales tax for state, county and transit taxes.

QuickBooks allows you to set up purchase orders as jobs. A report of profitability by job can be run after the PO has been invoiced and the supplier purchase order has been converted to a bill or paid.

My husband, Steve, consults with small businesses that he calls “underdogs”—businesses that rely primarily on the skills and efforts of their owner/operators. He helps them identify their “super powers” that they bring to their businesses.

I back up my files each night on a thumb drive. Is that enough? You do need to back up your files, especially your order and accounting files, so you can recover quickly when disaster strikes and not lose critical data.

There are five versions of QuickBooks, each designed for specific applications, and the ad specialty business was not one of their selected specifics.