Using Quicbooks works great but the POS isnt so great

[acesdeals]

I recently have been using the Quickbooks software it is amazing i store all the details and can email invoices and estimates which not only saves the earth but saves money on paper and the customers are fine with the digital approach.

The problem is incorporating Quickbooks into a Quickbooks POS. The POS version of the software imports the customers but not all the notes and info i have on them. It does show the amount the customer owes from the invoice. But when i go to make a sale it doesnt have the items listed or services listed, it seems i have to recreate the item list from Quickbooks into Quickbooks POS.

I am not even sure if i need Quickbooks POS, do any of you use Quickbooks for making sales too or use a similar software that is not POS.

 

[cprompt]

Early on in my business (1997, if I remember correctly), I purchased my first version of Quickbooks. I have never used the POS version - always the regular Quickbooks or Quickbooks Professional. I use that for all of my bookkeeping, sales, inventory, payroll, etc.

However, the amount of retail sales I do is fairly small, compared to the amount of service. A larger retail store may benefit more from POS - I couldn't speak to that.

My biggest complaint about Quickbooks is that Intuit forces you to upgrade about every 3 years if you want to be able to continue using all of their online features - Credit Card Processing, e-mail invoices, etc. I'm running 3 licenses of Quickbooks right now, and so when I'm forced to upgrade it takes quite a bite. Because of that, I'm using PCRT as a secondary system. Eventually, all my e-mailing will be done through PCRT, but I will still enter everything into Quickbooks at the end of the day for the bigger picture of my net worth, tracking expenses, handling checkbooks, payroll, etc.

Hope this helps!

Brian.

 

[Tony_Scarpelli]

I recently have been using the Quickbooks software it is amazing i store all the details and can email invoices and estimates which not only saves the earth but saves money on paper and the customers are fine with the digital approach.

The problem is incorporating Quickbooks into a Quickbooks POS. The POS version of the software imports the customers but not all the notes and info i have on them. It does show the amount the customer owes from the invoice. But when i go to make a sale it doesnt have the items listed or services listed, it seems i have to recreate the item list from Quickbooks into Quickbooks POS.

I am not even sure if i need Quickbooks POS, do any of you use Quickbooks for making sales too or use a similar software that is not POS.

We use a cash register for all items in our store such as cash and carry new or used drives, memory, and such. WE create invoices with full contact information for all customers that get any level of service and purchase larger items over $100. So we have the contact info on most all our customers.

At the end of the day we take the cash register z and enter that in as a daily sale to a single account called daily sales.

This gives us all the contact we want. I tis not a pos.

I have a client who used the basic QB's Pro with scanners and such to make a pos. SO long as they have less than 10,000 items it works fine. This way preserves the line item detail both in sales recipe/invoices and in reports. The only draw back is that it uses the average cost rather than fifo/lifo for costing of inventory.

 

[Tony_Scarpelli]

Early on in my business (1997, if I remember correctly), I purchased my first version of Quickbooks. I have never used the POS version - always the regular Quickbooks or Quickbooks Professional. I use that for all of my bookkeeping, sales, inventory, payroll, etc.

However, the amount of retail sales I do is fairly small, compared to the amount of service. A larger retail store may benefit more from POS - I couldn't speak to that.

My biggest complaint about Quickbooks is that Intuit forces you to upgrade about every 3 years if you want to be able to continue using all of their online features - Credit Card Processing, e-mail invoices, etc. I'm running 3 licenses of Quickbooks right now, and so when I'm forced to upgrade it takes quite a bite. Because of that, I'm using PCRT as a secondary system. Eventually, all my e-mailing will be done through PCRT, but I will still enter everything into Quickbooks at the end of the day for the bigger picture of my net worth, tracking expenses, handling checkbooks, payroll, etc.

Hope this helps!

Brian.

I am a Quickbooks Pro Advisor and I strongly discourage anyone from using intergrated services in Any Quickbooks product for this reason. They got you by the short and currly's.

Accounting doesn't change for decades at a time. The basic QB v1 from 1990s will do 100% of what you need done but Intuit makes it so that you feel you need newer versions. I just bought 2012 only because I lost the disc and there are some features I want, otherwise I keep it for years and years and years. But if you use merchant accounts, payroll or other services then you will have to buy new every 3 years. Also QB's pro used to $99 now it is nearly $199, so they are getting impossibly greedy.

 

[acesdeals]

Thats great, i think i can use Quickbooks as is and not worry about the POS side as i am not really doing many purchases, since it fits the bill for service oriented sales that will work.

Yea i would probably use a separate merchant account with a bank or online credit card processing so that way they dont have us on there leash.

I might have to get better at QB or hire somebody who is familiar. I could take some time to learn it more, but then my repairs will be slacking, prob do a quick YouTube crash course.

 

[Tony_Scarpelli]

I think most of what you need to learn is in the installation DVD itself. There are industry specific videos that are 3-5 minutes ea.

Go though the setup wizard to start a new company. Make sure you have QB's Pro, can buy it at Officmax for $179 or online for $135 including shipping.

Turn on Inventory in the setup interview.

Then put on your IT hat and find some cheap keyboard scanners that plug into the keyboard or directly into the usb and that is how you can use bar codes for data entry.

If you do this step, then you might as well print out a sheet of all your services with their own bar code as well so that when you are checking out a customer you can scan each service as well as each Piece of equipment. You need only stop to enter the Customer contact at the beginning of the check in process.

It is easier than it sounds. I do not use the QB's inventory because It drives me crazy to go back and reconcile it. Barcodes help to get the right part, price and keep inventory in check but still there are times I take parts for a repair and don't enter them properly so now I am over one hd or mem stick. So with me, I need to buckle down and spend the time to do it right but hardware sales are less than 10-15% of my business and i hate the drudgery of it.

I love QB's for invoicing, tracking what people owe me (which is next to nothing as we are mostly cash); then track receipt of payments deposits, reconciling the visa payments against the visa charges as they come in (2-4 days) to make sure visa doesn't screw me. BTW if you are not reconciling your CC's then you are getting stolen from....Guaranteed.

When they know you are watching them they make no mistakes but every few months something small goes through. If you don't catch it then something big goes through and pretty soon you are getting totally ripped off.

Then QB's help keep track of expenses and what money you have in the bank. There is a work around for Visa. You don't want to make the deposits on visa when you process the cards. You just receive them but do not deposit the CC's until they post to your bank. Then you make the CC deposits separately as the post. This keeps your bank balance a real amount rather than having it over stated by your three days of visa deposits which have not yet posted.

Now is a perfect time to setup a new company and or switch over as you only have one month to enter and get real familiar with it.

I can give some free clues and hints on these forums but if anyone needs more intense support then I would work something out to swap services. I can use some website development, SEO and such in exchange for some QB's setup support and training. Just an Idea. I am not looking to make money on my friends but glad to swap my time for yours.

 

[cprompt]

I am a Quickbooks Pro Advisor and I strongly discourage anyone from using intergrated services in Any Quickbooks product for this reason. They got you by the short and currly's.

Accounting doesn't change for decades at a time. The basic QB v1 from 1990s will do 100% of what you need done but Intuit makes it so that you feel you need newer versions. I just bought 2012 only because I lost the disc and there are some features I want, otherwise I keep it for years and years and years. But if you use merchant accounts, payroll or other services then you will have to buy new every 3 years. Also QB's pro used to $99 now it is nearly $199, so they are getting impossibly greedy.

That's for sure - I first discovered this back around 2000 or 2001, when I was using Turbo Tax and automatically importing data from Quickbooks. It worked great, and was real easy. Then, I reached the point when Turbo Tax would no longer import the data, because Quickbooks was too old. At the time I was only using one licensed copy of Quickbooks, and so it wasn't quite as bad for upgrading, and I did so. But then, 3 years later I was back to the same point.

It's really frustrating, because although I am not a programmer, I KNOW that they could readily code the software to import from older versions. It's just their way of getting more $$ out of us.

Oh well - like I said, I'm working to move away from this with PCRT for e-mailing invoices and moving my CC processing to something other than Intuit. And my payroll I never used through Quickbooks, having found an easy to use and fairly inexpensive alternative a few years ago.

Brian.

 

[Tony_Scarpelli]

And my payroll I never used through Quickbooks, having found an easy to use and fairly inexpensive alternative a few years ago.

Brian.

-------------What is that Brian?

 

[cprompt]

-------------What is that Brian?

TaxAccountingSystems.com - it's a small company based in Massachusetts. I actually discovered it through one of my clients. I actually have very few employees, so it's more per employee than perhaps I should pay (I think it's $100 per year), but it computes all the payroll taxes, withholdings, etc. Each quarter at the click of a button it prints the form 941 that I sign and mail with the printed voucher and check. With an added module (can't remember how much that is) it prints my W-2's and W-3's as well.

Like I said - it's probably overkill for my small operation, but it means I'm not spending hours trying to track down this info each quarter. If I had more employees it would definitely be worth it.

Oh yes - it can also actually print the checks, but I don't use that option as I have to enter the information into Quickbooks anyhow for the accounting purposes, so I just print the check in Quickbooks.

Brian.

 

[Tony_Scarpelli]

Wow, that is an excellent resource. Thanks.

No $100 a year is not over kill for 1 employee. I don't think I have seen less than $25 per month for a service and $200 a year for software provider to do this.

 

[acesdeals]

I can give some free clues and hints on these forums but if anyone needs more intense support then I would work something out to swap services. I can use some website development, SEO and such in exchange for some QB's setup support and training. Just an Idea. I am not looking to make money on my friends but glad to swap my time for yours.

I would be happy to trade services, i have intermediate skills in SEO and web design Drupal and HTML but am teaching myself WP and Joomla when i have spare time which is not often.

I have spent some time with QB which seems to be fully loaded and works great. I am currently modifying the invoice to fit my needs and give the customer as much info about the work as possible.

Currently when they come in i fill in a new customer and send them an estimate. When it is done i call them and let them know, when they come to pay i create an invoice pre filled by the estimate and then i do receive payments after which the invoice is marked as paid and i email that out to them.

Getting busier and busier i need to get up to par and have a better system. Apparently a cash drawer will only work with QB if i have the printer but i use a regular printer so that i can give the customer a full invoice. So i have to use a key to manually open the drawer. I was considering getting a usb cash register and after doing receive payments in QB i would basically repeat it on the register which would then open and i can give change.

I currently use square but will be switching to a regular credit card swiper PNC bank is offering a great rate with a sign on bonus. No idea how to incorporate it into QB so i may have to manually swipe and enter into QB.

Reviews of QB mention internal services are horrible. So i will only be using QB for its free functions and will not pay for any extra services from them.

I am new and im sure i will learn better ways of using it and its fine for now, but as more and more records are there a better system is needed.

I have considered hiring somebody who is familiar with QB but since we are paying all our loans i will have to consider this.

 

[Tony_Scarpelli]

Lets Talk, PM your phone number and a good time to reach you. The tiny details are maddening trying to do it by forum or email. Mid afternoon or later evenings most days is best for me.

 

[twincountycomputers]

I would be happy to trade services, i have intermediate skills in SEO and web design Drupal and HTML but am teaching myself WP and Joomla when i have spare time which is not often.

I have spent some time with QB which seems to be fully loaded and works great. I am currently modifying the invoice to fit my needs and give the customer as much info about the work as possible.

Currently when they come in i fill in a new customer and send them an estimate. When it is done i call them and let them know, when they come to pay i create an invoice pre filled by the estimate and then i do receive payments after which the invoice is marked as paid and i email that out to them.

Getting busier and busier i need to get up to par and have a better system. Apparently a cash drawer will only work with QB if i have the printer but i use a regular printer so that i can give the customer a full invoice. So i have to use a key to manually open the drawer. I was considering getting a usb cash register and after doing receive payments in QB i would basically repeat it on the register which would then open and i can give change.

I currently use square but will be switching to a regular credit card swiper PNC bank is offering a great rate with a sign on bonus. No idea how to incorporate it into QB so i may have to manually swipe and enter into QB.

Reviews of QB mention internal services are horrible. So i will only be using QB for its free functions and will not pay for any extra services from them.

I am new and im sure i will learn better ways of using it and its fine for now, but as more and more records are there a better system is needed.

I have considered hiring somebody who is familiar with QB but since we are paying all our loans i will have to consider this.

i've researched several ways to integrate Quickbooks and make it a true point of sale, that being said, Intuit makes it pretty hard as they WANT to sell you their Quickbooks Point of Sale product.

a receipt printer is great and you can make your invoices/sales receipts fit on receipt paper, however you can't make quickbooks selectively pop a cash drawer, you could set the driver for the printer to pop the drawer whenever it prints, but if you have employees (that you might not trust) that is counter intuitive as they probably know a thing or 2 about computers to be working for you and a simple "test" printed from notepad will pop the drawer. also I use my receipt printer for other things so having the drawer pop at every print would be super annoying.

as far as credit cards the only truly integrated solution for credit cards is the quickbooks merchant service. a usb card swiper grabs data and off you go. their rates are really high though, I switched to a local bank with a stand alone terminal after 6 or so years with quickbooks and my monthly bill is half what it was with quickbooks. I do recall that another provider had a plugin for quickbooks to be able to integrate their merchant service but I don't remember who that was. again Intuit doesn't make it easy as they want to sell their service.


other devices such as a pole display are pretty much out also.

a plain-text usb or keyboard-wedge barcode scanner does work fine though

 

[PCX]

mhelpdesk is a great ticket tracker that integrates with quickbooks. One of their next releases will include a payment gateway for credit card processing.