QuickBooks Compatible Time Clocks

Imagine reducing your payroll expense by 5% a year. Would you do it? Businesses with employees can expect to pay anywhere from 20 to 30% of their gross revenue to cover payroll expenses. It is easy to see how 5% would help reduce expenses.

How would you save 5%? Simply installing a time clock in your company. Want further savings? Make the clock a biometric time clock.  The reason is two fold. A time clock will ensure accurate time reporting. This means, if you have manual timesheets, that employees wont be able to "fudge" the hours. It is common to see employees add a few minutes to their timesheets or come back from lunch a little late but report that they arrived on time when they turn in their hours. 

Now that we see why a clock is very important controlling your payroll expenses, but how to choose a clock that is effective but affordable. 

Ideally the time clock would be able to export to your payroll processor of choice such as ADP, Paychex or QuickBooks. 

So which clocks would be ideal? 

I have used EC200 from Easy Clocking. It is an affordable biometric time clock. The system it comes with is basic software that allows you to export to excel files. The one clock we have has an additional fee you can export the punches directly into QuickBooks via IIF file. Basically for the price of the clock (found cheap in here) and the exporter which the vendors on amazon can sell to you. 

I will be producing YouTube videos about the clocks shortly, and if you have any questions, I can answer them for you.

How To Fix an Unbalanced Balance Sheet in QuickBooks

This problem does happen every once in a while. You enter transactions, you go through the motions, and then you run a month end report just to see that your balance sheet is unbalanced.

What causes this issue? Majority of the time it is because you have a corrupted transaction.  While this might sound intimidating, the solutions are easy to follow.

The first thing you should do is rebuild the file. Open your QuickBooks program. Click on File>Utilities>Rebuild Data. This should fix the problem.

If it doesn't work the next solution is to try to search for the amount that you are off. This isn't the most likely solution, but it doesn't hurt to try.

If there are multiple issues causing the problem, you'll need to dig deeper into your accounts by following theses steps:

1. Pull your Balance Sheet report for All Dates then select month for Columns.
2. Find the first month that the report does not balance.
3. Change the dates to that month and select Day for Columns to find out what day does not balance.
4. Create a Custom Transaction Detail report for that day.
5. Total the report by Account.
6. Identify the issue.
7. Delete the transaction, then re-enter it.
8. You're done!

How to setup QuickBooks for a Car Dealership

Setting up QuickBooks to sync with your company function is an important step. Many times, people focus on their Chart of Accounts, however, the item list is the major part of proper accounting. A well thought out chart of accounts is useless if your item list is woefully lacking the same amount of thoughtfulness.

I am using for example how to set up an item list for a used car dealership.

1. Work with your accountant to set up a chart of accounts, or you can select Automotive Sales or Repairs as the industry when setting up a new company file.
2. Open your item list and create an inventory item for the cars you are selling.
4. Use the last four digits of the VIN.
5. Create a non-inventory or other charge item for your cost. Make sure these are mapped to the COGS accounts you’ve set up.
6. Create a Customer:Job. You can name it by car or make a general customer named _Auto Sales. Each car you buy would go under the customer as a job. You would use the name or VIN as the job name.
7. When you purchase a vehicle, use a PO. Enter the vendor then enter inventory item (make sure the VIN you created matches the car you are buying). Enter purchase price. Save and close. Then Receive the item into inventory.
   1. You can do the same process using the write a check feature in QuickBooks or entering a credit card charge. Make sure you place the VIN on the item tab.
8. When you sell a car. Go to the job under the customer you created and create the invoice. Make sure you use the same item!
9. Add your fees to the invoice. (DMV, Environmental Fees, etc...)
10. Your Finished!