Here’s some tips we’ve put together to help you keep your books up to date and correct while saving fees later for cleaning things up. Paying attention to the details as you go means you can print accurate reports from your accounting system anytime.

1. If unsure of where to put a transaction, do not guess. Charge it to a suspense account or Other Expense account.
2. If your entity is an S corporation, distributions should be charged to the shareholder distribution account, an equity type account. If you don’t have a distribution account, you can create one. That account will usually have a debit balance and so will be shown with brackets on QuickBooks® reports.

3. Don’t make journal entries to QuickBooks® unless told to do so by a QuickBooks Certified Pro Advisor. In most cases, there’s a better way to enter changes than a journal entry and journal entries will make your job costing reports inaccurate.
4. Backup daily and take a copy of your backup home with you on a removable hard drive or USB drive.
5. Credit card charges must be entered into the books in detail. The best method is to create a credit card liability account for each credit card and enter the credit card charges and payments individually into QuickBooks.
6. Don’t void checks written prior to your last year end.
7. Reconcile all bank and credit card accounts monthly using QuickBooks Reconcile feature. Don’t push the Reconcile button unless the difference is immaterial. Reconciliation differences will automatically be entered to and expense account called Reconciliation Differences.
8. Don’t make note payments using the Enter Bills/Pay Bills process. Use the Write Checks feature.
9. If you’re not working with an amortization schedule, charge your note payments to the long term liability account associated with the note payment. If unsure about where to charge note payments, put them all in the Interest Expense account and call for help.
10. Pay Payroll Liabilities using the Pay Liabilities feature. Don’t use the Write Check function. The only way to repair this error is to delete the transaction and re-enter it correctly.
11. Pay Sales Tax Liabilities using the Pay Sales Tax feature. Don’t use the Write Check function.
12. Enter a closing date at the last date a tax return was filed. Retained Earnings should agree with the tax return filed.
13. Use the memorized transactions feature to save time and reduce errors in coding.
14. Charge all officer fringe benefit costs to one account. This includes health, dental, and disability insurance premiums, medical reimbursements and personal expenses. Be certain to complete the memo field so the purpose of the transaction goes into the general ledger.
15. Ask for help before you mess up the datafile. It’s cheaper to get help than it is to repair the damage from erroneous entries.