(816) 358-9300
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Whether it is a simple installation, customizing a chart of accounts for your business, or developing a comprehensive job cost system, Steve would enjoy helping you. Setting up the payroll features is a challenging but very important project. Since setup is a one-time event, then it is usually not worth your time to research the many payroll details. It is easier to hire it out.
Sometimes it is helpful to let someone show you how to use the bank reconciliation feature. Many people are nervous about simply starting the system - not knowing where to begin. Others do very well - except when it comes to more complicated procedures like job costing or interfacing with web commerce.
Why not take advantage of everything you already have? Call today at (816) 358-9300 or click on the envelope and send an e-mail.
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Intuit ® and QuickBooks ® are registered trademarks and/or registered service marks of Intuit, Inc. or one of its subsidiaries, in the United States and other countries.
Peachtree Accounting™ is a registered trademark of Peachtree Software, Inc.
Entrepreneurs are always excited about selling their goods and services and producing a profit. They wake up each day with a renewed purpose of building their business. This makes them uniquely qualified to do what they do. Since the "back office" never produces revenue and most entrepreneurs are more interested in production, then accounting sometimes goes lacking. Worse, many small operators leave the accounting function for when there might be little else to do.
S O F T W A R E
H E L P
[Links to both of these vendors are available on the Useful Links page.]
Each of these low-end packages is very powerful. Even in the basic editions they can:
- Write computer generated checks or allow for entry of manual checks,
- Invoice customers and keep accounts receivable,
- Pay vendors and keep accounts payable,
- Provide you with an extremely convenient way to balance the books against the bank statements,
- Compute payroll checks and payroll tax deposit requirements, and
- Keep track of inventory.
In my opinion, QuickBooks' advantage is in its ability to track activity by departments. For example, if you have several retail stores, then you can set up one general ledger account (for example, utilities) and still know the amount that applies to each store. This is useful in situations where there might be different operating divisions in the company, several rental units, or multiple locations. You are able to print a profit and loss statement, in columnar format, that will show you each department's activity. However, one problem with QuickBooks is its "sunset" policy. Since the basic elements of accounting have not changed in hundreds of years, then one accounting package could be good forever (all things being equal). Therefore, beware that some QuickBooks features are designed to degenerate after a number of years and QuickBooks will not provide support! The result is that you will need to purchase a complete new package. You can visit QuickBooks web site and search the keyword "sunset."
In my opinion, Peachtree's advantage is in the area of job costing. If you are a contractor, remodeler, or builder of large custom products, then this may helpful to you. Each job can be divided into phases, such as the American Institute of Architecture codes. Job bid estimates can be entered and a report printed which compare actual results to bid amounts. This means there can be continual feedback about the accuracy of bidding (and the involvement in unprofitable jobs)!
Both vendors provide technical support, but it is very costly. If you use either of these packages for payroll, then you will need to pay for annual payroll tax table updates that are expensive. However, this is true for any accounting software since payroll tables change annually to conform to changes in income tax rate tables and exemption amounts.
But ask any entrepreneur that lays awake at night because of unfiled tax returns how important it is to keep up with the accounting. Or ask someone with payroll tax liens that cannot be dismissed in bankruptcy if they wish they could go back and do things differently.
It is important to establish systematic procedures and methods. In addition to tax compliance, accounting information can be useful for diagnosing day-to-day problems and can point the way to profitability.
Compared to 20 years ago accounting is now easier. Have you ever seen the old paper ledgers in those bulky binders that would not lay flat? And those subsidiary ledgers that were just as bulky! Just balancing the general ledger and subsidiary ledgers was a real chore!
Today we have powerful software that can do all this with the press of a button -- even on the "low end" packages. Even so, most features of these packages go unused. If a person is willing to take the time and expense to learn how to use these packages, then these can be a very beneficial tool!
