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Yes, it is time to upgrade. As you might be aware, QuickBooks Pro and Premier moved to SQL in 2006. This move alone dramatically increased the file size. Thus, if you were to convert your existing 190MB file over to 2006, it could be 2-4 times larger right off the bat. So you could be looking at a hardware upgrade as well - you need 1GB RAM. This could be an easy first step - upgrade your computer, and "Clean" the company file - this might revv you up a bit. Make a backup first!
To upgrade,you have the choice of a 5-user Premier or a 5-user Enterprise. That having been said, you might want to explore third party applications that share the load. What is it that your company does, and what do you use QuickBooks for? This information might enable me to help you further.
I am extracting data from quickbooks using an ODBC connection with excel. I am using this to create a report of daily sales orders to send to my warehouse for shipment. One field I am unable to extract is "Address Name" from the customer screen. Any thoughts on how to accomplish this?
To create this report, you would want to use the SalesOrderLine table as it contains the detail lines from the Sales Order in Quickbooks. The customer information in that table is contained in the following fields:
Question:
Mining the Knowledge Base Jan 10, 2007 07:54 pm
Thanks
At this point, we just want to fully utilize existing QB functions. I also updated my software version above. We are presently working with Storis.
Fortunately, or more likely luckily, your comments/suggestions dove tail with what my research had suggested to be the proper course of action. I appreciate your assistance.
I am also profiting from the use of sales orders to drive custom manufacturing, and pending invoices to handle customer deposits.
Question:
What version do I choose? Jan 10, 2007 07:56 pm
I am a graphic designer and am trying to decide what I should choose during the installation when it asks what configuration I would like, i.e. Contractor, Non-Profit, etc. Could you let me know what you think would be best? I was thinking it would fall under Professional Services, in my opinion, but didn't know. Thanks for the help.
Professional Services. If you're using 2007, you'll really enjoy the multiple Units of Measure - charge clients by the hour, by the day, or the week using the same item.
I am using Quickbooks for my persoanl account. I am closing down one bank account and opening another bank account. How do I transfer my data (assets & liabilities, due to/from accounts, etc.)from my old account to a new one I set up in Quickbooks. Or, do I not open another Quickbooks account?
Thanks,
Shawn
If you're opening a bank account, why not keep it simple: Open Chart of Accounts [Ctrl+A] and create a new Bank account. Make the old one inactive.
To answer the question about transferring data (for whatever reason) make a portable company file [File>Portable Company File>Create], move the file to wherever you'd like to take it, and then open it with a new name [File>Portable Company File>Create]. If you have a pre-2006 version, you could use File>Backup instead.
What is the average data file size for an Enterprise manufacturing client? Just trying to get a ballpark...I have a client with a 1.2 gig file size!!!
Could you send/post a reference link I could give to them? They are having issues (gee...I wonder why) and I'm trying to talk them into using Karl Irvin's Q2Q utility to start a new data file.
Speed is not always connected to file size. 1 GB is quite the norm for Enterprise.
I had a customer who had a file size that was a mere 171MB, but it c-r-a-w-l-e-d. Here's a snapshot. I draw your attention to
Transactions: 46971
Targets: 203001
Links: 102686
I then cleaned up the file before 12/31/2005, and took another snapshot. The file size went up marginally, but notice
Transactions: 46971 down to 22509
Targets: 203001 down to 109217
Links: 102686 down to 48940
Less than half on each. His reports now go so fast he calls them "Smokin'".
Seems to me that these are all threads that keep hanging when people open forms and reports, closing them halfway through a transaction - much like the mess left behind when you're rummaging through a dozen drawers looking for something! This 'housekeeping' makes it neat again, and we don't waste CPU cycles going down dead ends.
We use OneService company for shipping. They require to enter all the ship-to addresses for printing shipping labels and manifests. Another option is to upload a comma delimited file with the same information. We would like to do the later.
How can one produce a report for ship-to addresses for daily invoices, so it can be exported to a comma delimited file?
This is a QODBC function which comes standard with Enterprise.
Here's what you should do.
Open your QuickBooks file.
Open Excel> Data> Import External Data> New database query [snapshot 1]
Select QODBC data.
Within the data, select the Invoice table.
From the Invoice table columns, select the shipping data you need [snapshot 2].
Import into Excel, auto-filter for date, and save as a .csv
We are new to QB and are trying to figure out how to job cost. We receive raw material and do turning work (manufacturing) in house and also send some of the material to outside vendors to have work done, which ends up being an expense to us. We cannot define how to set up these part numbers when we receive a customer PO and then create a sales order in QB. Is there a tutorial site available that we can utilize for job costing, or some place that can offer instuction? Thank You.
Create a service item for labor - one for each employee.
Create an inventory item for raw material (or non-inventory if you will use it all up for this job).
For internal jobs, create an inventory assembly, putting together the above elements.
For the external job order, create a service item.
Now, when you get a job, create a Sales order made out to the customer:job (new job everytime). This is where you insert your bill of materials as assemblies and service items. This becomes your anchor.
From within the sales order itself, create Purchase orders [snapshot 1 below] for the raw material and the sub-contractor. Receive inventory and bills against this PO.
For your labor, enter weekly timesheets wherein they select the customer:job and their service item.
When it comes time to invoice, create the invoice from the Sales Order with a single click. If you'd like to suppress the above details, create an item called Group before making the Sales Order - uncheck "Print items in Group" so these details do not show in your final invoice.
You can now view Profit & Loss by Customer:Job - modify the Profit & Loss standard as shown in Snapshot 2 below.
Here are a few links (you might need to copy and paste the whole link into your browser):
1. The video training tutorials (the Contractor edition has job costing)
Question:
Local printing problem Jan 11, 2007 08:10 pm
I have a customer that is using QB enterprise via terminal server (win2003 server). Both the server and the remote client computer (XP Pro) have the same hp laserjet 2300 printer attached locally (via parallel port). The remote client can't print locally--any ideas?
Terminal server is an emulation - there is no application at the remote site. When you want to print, the list of printers that appears will be the ones connected to the server. The fact that its the same printer model at both ends might be causing confusion.
As you must be aware, Enterprise users with a current support plan also get 12 months of the basic Webex plan free - which otherwise costs $14.95/month. However, only the Webex platinum plan (for which they need to pay $29.95/month) enables remote printing as you describe.
Question:
Looking for the right product Jan 12, 2007 07:19 am
I am the Burlington County Supervisor of Highways and Bridges. My IT Dept. gave me this web site. I am looking for a product that will do a cost accounting for the many jobs that we do during the year.I would like to do an annual report to see the cost effectivness of our department vs out sourcing.
QuickBooks Enterprise - Construction edition would work for this purpose. Using a single customer (e.g. Controller, Burlington County) create a new "Job" for every project. Modify the chart of accounts to map the ones you already use for budgets. This will enable you to see Profit&Loss by customer:job (see my post above about this).
Now, lets walk through a transaction: you would like to build a bridge, and send out an RFP. Lets assume you take the lowest one as a benchmark, and decide to do it inhouse. Your costs will be: employee time, supervisor time, labor time and materials.
I assume this is only for analysis - its too risky to "throw out" whats currently working, so lets work with whatever system works at this time. We therefore have only our time sheets and materials bills to work with. Click on the 'Enter Time' icon, and select "Enter weekly timesheet" [Snapshot 1 & 2 below]. Enter the timesheet for that employee, selecting the job and service item - with a description and the hours spent. [We do not need to use this for payroll since that is already being taken care of].
When a bill is received, enter the bill, selecting an item that points to the correct account. Make sure you select the Job [Snapshot 3].
Next time you run a P/L by job, these costs will appear side by side, enabling you to do the cost accounting for ALL the jobs you do. You could also click on the 'Export' button to export it to Excel and analyze it against the RFP amounts. This is a plain vanilla walkthrough, but illustrates the fact that QuickBooks Enterprise is a robust yet simple platform to address the issues you face. Furthermore, Enterprise has 115 flavors of security to prevent people from accessing information that doesn't concern them.
This is the reduced version for your analysis (and also a "dry run"). Once it works, you could go operational with a few steps:
(i) start paying the bills and migrate the checking over.
(ii) Create Sales orders when you plan on a project, and from it, issue stage Purchase orders with a single click. You can then track progress of every order.
(iii) Since you are already capturing time sheets, process payroll from within QuickBooks as well. It will spare up many hours for the person who is doing payroll. This is useful for your purposes since it captures costs as a by-product of the person processing timesheets for payroll.
Question:
Foreign Exchange Student Employee Jan 12, 2007 08:22 am
I have a foreign exchange student who was an employee in 2006. I need to prepare W-2's and need a state abbreviation. What do I put in the state abbreviation of his address? He is from Germany.
W-2 is a form you send for employment in the United States - for the US Govt. to cross-refer when someone files their taxes. The address you need to use is the address on file when you paid his wages. The fact that he is from Germany has nothing to do with it. If he is back in Germany now, you could just mail it to him so your records are in order.
Question:
Financial Statement Designer Jan 12, 2007 01:45 pm
I would like to know if the following is possible, and if so how do I go about doing it:
In Financial Statement Designer I know it is possible to have 3 columns next to each other with balances and then a forth column with the totals.
However, as each row is a different line item, such as "Cash, AR, AP" and so on, is it possible to have a cell in that row have different accounts in it compared to the other cells in that row.
For example, a client has 3 entities within it, I would like to show the B/S for the 3 entities side by side, but they will each have different cash accounts.
Thus, on the cash line I want Entity #1 to have cash account 1000 in that cell in that row, and next to is I want Entity #2 to have cash account 1001 in the cell in that row. And the same for Entity #3 next to it.
First, lets get these basics out of the way:
1. Financial Statement Designer can pull information from ONE company file, and merge accounts - essentially recasting the Chart of Accounts and remembering this mapping for the future. This helps CPAs produce Financial Statements with the click of a button, without needing clients to permanently modify their Chart of Accounts to suit the CPA's needs!
2. You can compare data from the same company in multiple columns. Thereafter, you can export it to Excel, and open the next company to repeat this cycle. However, you cannot import data simultaneously from two companies into FSD.
3. Enterprise allows you to combine reports from multiple companies into Excel: Reports>Combine Reports from Multiple Companies. However, it keeps the Chart of Accounts as-is.
Now, to address your question:
"In Financial Statement Designer I know it is possible to have 3 columns next to each other with balances and then a forth column with the totals." Yes, but only the same company.
"However, as each row is a different line item, such as "Cash, AR, AP" and so on, is it possible to have a cell in that row have different accounts in it compared to the other cells in that row." No. This violates the 'mapping' rule.
"For example, a client has 3 entities within it, I would like to show the B/S for the 3 entities side by side, but they will each have different cash accounts.
Thus, on the cash line I want Entity #1 to have cash account 1000 in that cell in that row, and next to is I want Entity #2 to have cash account 1001 in the cell in that row. And the same for Entity #3 next to it." I assume you have 3 separate companies - otherwise you could not have 3 separate balance sheets. If that is the case, why not use the same Chart of Accounts? If Entity 1 has Commerce Bank and E2 has BoA, they could still be 1000 Checking Account.
That way, you could set up FSD for one company, import the data, merge "rows" i.e. accounts, and export to Excel. Close FSD. Close Company 1. Open Company 2. Open the same FSD. If there is any change in the Chart of Accounts, it will essentially warn you of impending failure. If its the same CoA, it will import and preserve the merger of rows. When you export to excel, the row numbers will match and you should be fine.
Another option: Create a FSD for each company. Map its CoA once. Import into FSD so your accounts merge on the fly, export to Excel. Repeat for other companies. Each becomes a separate tab in Excel, but the columns remain constant.
Question:
Multiple Local Areas working during a weekly payroll period. Jan 13, 2007 07:19 pm
We are a masonry contractor that works diferrent crews in different local areas throughout the week. Our question is how we track the different local taxes through our time cards, with different employees at these different locations, and pass them through to the payroll so they show up on the paycheck stubs auotmaticly and correctly.
You need to create a new payroll item for each jurisdiction (e.g. if you are in Madison NJ, you would rename your existing Carpentry item to Carpentry - Madison NJ. For a Chester PA job, create a new item Carpentry-Chester PA posting to the correct tax jurisdictions]. When entering someone's time sheet, select Carpentry-Madison for work done in Madison and Carpentry-Chester for work done in Chester.
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