Most large corporations will require you to place the Purchase Order number on the invoice or they won’t physically pay the bill.  There have been situations in my own business where we have failed to put the purchase order number on the invoice and the bill has gone unpaid for 90 days even though we have followed up. In one case they finally acknowledged that they wouldn’t pay because the PO number was missing.

Whilst this is a small mistake, it means that we have provided this company with free credit for an extended period of time which is not very good.

Quickbooks offers a simple field to enter the purchase order number in. On the image below you can see where it is located.

I recommend that as part of your business process development that you ensure that you state for your sales and accounting staff that it is mandatory for the purchase order number must be entered if a purchase order number is provided.

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In quickbooks we recommend trying to use the Australian numbering system for Chart of Accounts over the system used by Quickbooks.  I have noticed in the Version 19 that the numbering system reverted to a more corporate numbering system than what has been used traditionally in Australian Small business accounting systems.

For example the recommended number program should include:

Number Range        Account Type

1000 – 1999              Assets
2000 – 2999              Liabilities
3000 – 3999              Equity

4000 – 4999              Income
5000 – 5999              Cost of Sales
6000 – 6999              Expenses

8000 – 8999              Other Income
9000 – 9999              Other Expenses

Ultimately when you are setting up your chart of account numbers you should always talk to your accountant to ensure that your chart of accounts will give you the information that you need to effectively manage your business.

The whole point of using the chart of account numbers is to lesson the chance that you or your staff will misallocate a charge to the wrong chart of account.  By using the number system above you are ensuring that at least you are getting it into the right type.

For example if you are allocating an amount of income to a chart of account and you choose a one account then you know you have made a mistake because it should have been a 4 account.

When you are developing your Chart of Accounts ensure that you leave enough space between your Summary Accounts and Sub-accounts so that if you ever need to add additional chart accounts you have the numbering space available. You also need to ensure that you remove any chart of accounts that you aren’t using. We have found that misallocations will occur if you leave every chart of account in the list.

Whilst chart of account numbering may not seem like a big issue, this one function can make the different between a well managed chart of accounts or one that sabotages your business success.

In this article I am going to outline the process of how to create a subtotal item:

Step 1. Select the Lists menu and then choose Item List from the drop down menu.
Step 2. From the Item button at the bottom of the Item Lists dialog box, choose the New button to create a new item.
Step 3. In the New Item dialog box, select Subtotal from the Type drop down box.
Step 4. Using the tab key, move into the Item Name/Number field and add the text, Subtotal.
Step 5. Press the tab key again and type in the text, Subtotal into the description field.
Step 6. Finally press the OK button.

This means that you have now created the subtotal item in your items list which you can now use in your invoices.

To configure Quickbooks to move between fields when you press enter follow these steps:

1. Select the Edit menu and then choose Preferences from the drop down menu.
2. At this point the Preferences dialog box will open. Click on General in the left column.
3. Select the My Preference tab
4. The first check box will say “Pressing Enter moves between fields”.  To turn this function on make sure that the check box has a tick in it.
5. Select the OK button.

Once you have completed this procedure when you work in your forms and press enter you should be able to move between the fields.

There were many businesses like electricians, plumbers and construction companies that often buy products for projects but don’t store the excess items in their stock. The result was that when the flood occurred in many cases it wash away everything that was in the warehouses and the consequence was that the insurance companies denied their claims for those items cause they couldn’t show that they were in the warehouse.

In some cases the losses were in excess of $100,000.  This means it is very important that if you have collected items that you do put them into your inventory.  If they are not there then ensure that you do an inventory adjustment and put them into your system because the items are real assets and if lost could affect the long term viability of your business.

I recommend that at the end of each week you print a copy of your Inventory Valuation Summary report and put it with your backup copy of your Quickbooks file.  This means that even if your file doesn’t work you have proof of the inventory.  The other thing I recommend that you do is to take a photo of your business and its stock at least once a month to show what you had in your premises as evidence. 

This evidence maybe all that is needed to give the loss adjusters proof of your actual losses.