QuickBooks Online® Basics: Customers (Series 2, Lesson 1)

Over the past several months we’ve covered the set-up a new QuickBooks Online (QBO) file from scratch. Now that QuickBooks Online is set up for our company, it’s time to talk about the best part, and why the business exists in the first place: working with our Customers or Clients.

Customers

QBO offers all the tools needed to track a Customer from bid to invoice to payment to deposit. In the accounting world, this is known as Accounts Receivable, or A/R.

Using the proper workflow means the company can to analyze success by running reports about its clientele and their favorite products and services!

In this lesson we will cover Sales settings. By turning on and off the various options, QBO can become anything from a checkbook to an advanced customer tracking system.

Custom Form Styles

The first thing we need to do is set up the business’s choices for sales forms (Invoices, Sales Receipts, etc.).

Select Gear > Custom Form Styles. Note that you can also get there through Gear > Account and Settings > Sales > Customize look and feel.

Modify all Invoices and Sales Receipts to match the branding for your company.

Go through all the Design options (1-4) to refine the appearance of the forms you send to Customers.

Then go through Content (5) to add and remove the information displayed.

Under Emails (6), create the default text in the body of your emails when you Send forms to the Customer.

Payments (7) controls your default settings for QuickBooks Payments. Can the customer pay you by Credit Card, ACH, or both?

Sales and Customer Preferences

Here are the settings that can be modified for a specific Customer workflow. Click the pencil in the right column to change the content on the Sales Forms (Invoices, Sales Receipts, and Estimates):

  • What are the preferred Terms? Do Customers pay at the time of service (Due on Receipt), or do they have 15 days or a month to pay?
  • Are extra fields needed on an Invoice for Shipping addresses and dates, or tracking numbers?
  • Will any Custom Fields be needed, to appear on each Invoice, to track special needs?
  • Do you want to include Service Dates on the Invoice, different from the Invoice date? This is especially handy for Invoices that include line items for multiple days.
  • Does the business have its own numbering system? If so, turn on Custom transaction numbers.
  • Do you want the business to be able to apply discounts to a Customer’s Invoice? If so, turn Discounts on.
  • Do they take deposits for work to be performed? If so, mark the Deposits box.
  • Is it important to have a specific message to appear on all Invoices and Sales Receipts?

Under Products and Services, there are several more options:

  • The business can show its internal item numbers on the Sales Form, or hide them from Customers.
  • If the business charges different prices to different customers, use Price Rules.
  • Turn on or off Quantity and Price/Rate columns.
  • If they will be managing Inventory and counting how many products it has in stock, turn on Track quantity on hand.

Lesson Wrap-up

It’s important to talk to your clients as you set these Preferences. A business owner may not even know it’s possible to track certain information if the setting is turned off!

For more exciting & helpful advice on the subject, check out my video training, ‘QuickBooks Online Fundamentals’. I also have a live 6-hour webinar on February 11 demonstrating all the techniques in this QBO series. This course is only offered every few months, so take advantage of this opportunity to register for this interactive webinar in which I encourage my participants to ask questions. Make sure to also check out my Mentorship Membership Subscription for Bookkeepers and Accountants and my on-demand QBO tutorial library. 

In next weeks article we’ll take a look at navigating the QuickBooks Online Customer Center.