1 Lesson 2 – Job Flow-Estimate to Final Payment Date: January 17, 2012 (1:00 EST, 12:00 CDT, 11:00 MDT 10:00 PDT) Time: 1.5 hours Presented by:Vickie Ayres The Countess of QuickBooks & Tech Support Specialist for QuickBooks & Quoting Note: This webinar is being demonstrated with QuickBooks Premier 2011. The basic concepts are the same in all versions of QuickBooks even if some screens or features appear differently in your version of QuickBooks. OverView Step 1 – Create Your “Estimate” (Pick up your down payment from the Customer) Add the “Upfront Deposit” Item to the Estimate Create a “Sales Receipt” for the down payment check Use the “Deposit” screen to deposit the money into your checking account Step 2 - Create “Purchase Orders” Receive Items and “Enter bills” “Pay Bills” (Fabricate or Assemble the Job) Step 3 - Create “Invoice” from the Estimate Deliver and Install the job, picking up the final check Receive the payment, using the “Payment” screen, applying it to the open invoice Use the “Deposit” screen to deposit the money into your checking account
Transcript
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Lesson 2 – Job Flow-Estimate to Final Payment Date: January 17, 2012 (1:00 EST, 12:00 CDT, 11:00 MDT 10:00 PDT) Time: 1.5 hours Presented by:Vickie Ayres
The Countess of QuickBooks & Tech Support Specialist for QuickBooks & Quoting Note: This webinar is being demonstrated with QuickBooks Premier 2011. The basic concepts are the same in all versions of QuickBooks even if some screens or features appear differently in your version of QuickBooks.
OverView
Step 1 – Create Your “Estimate”
(Pick up your down payment from the Customer)
Add the “Upfront Deposit” Item to the Estimate
Create a “Sales Receipt” for the down payment check
Use the “Deposit” screen to deposit the money into your checking account
Step 2 - Create “Purchase Orders”
Receive Items and “Enter bills”
“Pay Bills”
(Fabricate or Assemble the Job)
Step 3 - Create “Invoice” from the Estimate
Deliver and Install the job, picking up the final check
Receive the payment, using the “Payment” screen, applying it to the open invoice
Use the “Deposit” screen to deposit the money into your checking account
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Inventory or Non-Inventory Items
Definitions
Inventory parts are items that you buy and then stock for a while before selling. QuickBooks tracks the quantity on hand, the current inventory value, and the average cost of your inventory items. It also tracks some accounting information like “cost of goods sold“for inventory items that you have sold.
Non-inventory parts are items that you purchase (usually on behalf of a specific customer) and then immediately sell or install, or items that you sell without ever buying. For non-inventory parts, QuickBooks will only track how much you have spent or taken in. Some people use non-inventory parts even for items that they stock because they prefer a simpler approach—even though it gives them less information.
Inventory Items will show up on your job Profitability report with cost and revenue amounts. Non-Inventory Items cost and revenue will not show up unless the bill you purchased them with has the Customer:Job designation on it. Think this through carefully…is it important enough to track on an individual basis or not. It is usually best to start with just one or two inventory items, get used to the process and then add Inventory Items as you see the need. If you buy a case of lamps and use a Lamp Item that is setup as a Non-Inventory Item, QuickBooks will NOT put them in inventory. You are probably not going to indicate the Customer:Job you are buying them for, because you don’t know that yet. However if you buy one lamp, using the Non-Inventory lamp item on the bill/check you can indicate the Customer:Job. The Job Profit report will also show a cost factor and a revenue factor for the lamp. The rule is, what ever Item you use to sell it to the customer on the Estimate, is the item you need to use on the bill/check to pay for it..
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Step 1 – The Estimate
You always want to start with a Group Item, but first we need to create a Group Item. Open your Item List List>Item List. A Group Item is a special kind of item, it is like a collection of items that are pre-assembled for a particular kind of Estimate. Lets create a simple group for creating a window treatment. Right-click anyplace in your Item List and choose New
I have two Group Items open above. One is for creating a Window Treatment Estimate. The other is for creating a Custom Furniture Estimate. Notice that I have one checked to print Item Detail on the Estimate and the other is set to NOT print Item detail on the quote. I have also named each group to start with a G, which stands for Group. The one that has a check mark to
print detail has GP- beginning. I bet you can guess, P stands for print. When we create the Estimate it will become clear the difference between the two.
The table at the bottom is where you choose what individual items you want to place into the group. By clicking on the drop down menu on each line you can choose the individual items.
To open a new Estimate go to the menu Customers>Create Estimates and the blank estimate opens up.
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When you work through the quote you want to do it in a systematic, consistent way. I teach a method called Vertical Quoting. You think of the quote as being divided into 5 Areas. You want to tab through the fields in Area 1, and use your up and down arrows to work up and down through the columns in the body. If you work with a system in the Estimate, after a little practice, you will get very fast and you don’t have to think so hard about what you are doing.
Here are a few techniques and tips to practice to help make your quoting quick and easy:
“CTRL Delete” deletes one line (1 item) at a time or (right-click “delete line”)
“CTRL Insert” inserts one line so you can add an item to your group on this estimate
Highlight text and “delete” to remove text not needed for this estimate on any item
“On the Fly” Edits are temporary, for this Proposal only (Quantity, Pricing, Description)
As you work down through the first column you are making decisions o What to keep? o What to Delete? o What to change to a similar item? o Do I need to add anything that did not come up automatically in the group?
Tab through Area 1
Up – Down Arrow keys to work vertically in a column
Save often……
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The screenshot below has 2 groups added in the Item column, the G-Window Treatments and the GP-Furniture groups. On the screen all the items show up and you can work through Area 1-5 editng the information for this Estimate.
The next screenshot is a Print Preview of the same Estimate:
Notice how it is the setup of the group (checkmark to print item detail) that makes all of the individual items print on the Estimate. There is nothing “magical about the G or the GP. The G- and GP- in the group name will make it easier to create estimates after you have your Item List fully populated and you have multiple groups to use.
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There are over 600 items in this Item list. It is a part of the QuickBooks & Quoting system you can purchase from Minutes Matter. Not only are the items all setup with pricing and perfect linkage to the Chart of Accounts, the Service Items have yardage information you use to finish your quote with. You have no limitations on size, quantity, fabric or type of home décor items you can quote. Imagine the time it would take to create an Item List this extensive.
This is a screenshot of the Group area of the Item List. The groups are setup and ready to use on your quotes. You can always edit these groups to add or subtract the items that come up automatically. Because the big part of the job is done, after completing your coaching it becomes an easy process to edit things vs starting from scratch. You will have the skills you need to do this on your own…but why would you want to?
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Below is an Estimate created using a G- Group, so it doesn’t print any item detail.
Her is the Print Preview of the Estimate.
I prefer to use G- groups for all of my Estimates and use the Letter function to get item detail for clients or designers that require it. This also gets me a detail copy for my files. That way I don’t have to open QuickBooks every time I need to look up how the Estimate items billed out. At the top of the Estimate you choose Letters follow the screen shots shown on the next page.
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This is the document that Word will open for you. It needs to be Saved As before you start making changes. Save it with the same name but give it your initials, I used RS Est with Details. These are the changes you need to make
Narrrow margins .5 all around
Landscape Orientation
Delete text you don’t need (circled info)
Apply 3 column formatting to the Job Details in the center
When you are finished it will look the document below. Save it again and close it all out and go back to QuickBooks. When you choose Letters now you can choose this template and create a letter with details. You will see a sample of that letter on the next page.
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Occasionally you might have to move some cells back in alignment with their proper column. This tends to happen in that 1 st column under the third cell.
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Upfront Deposits
Our method requires that you use the Estimate as the working document until you are ready to deliver and install the job. It is the cornerstone of everything you do from here on out. After your customer decides to go ahead with a job, signs off on the estimate and gives you a downpayment check, you will come back and open QuickBooks.
Open your Estimate and add the “Upfront Deposit” item to the Estimate. Notice that the amount is entered as a negative number in order to pull the balance due down. The asterisks are to prompt you to fill in the check number, total amount of the check (you might get one check that has to be applied to multiple estimates) and what it was for. This entry is for your benefit only, QuickBooks knows nothing about the money. The Sales receipt is what will tell QuickBooks that you have accepted money for a job.
Sales Receipts are under Customers>Enter Sales Receipts. You want to create a Sales Receipt that has the same DownPayment item that you added to the Estimate. I copied and pasted the description for the Dowpayment Item from the Estimate to the Sales Receipt. Now QuickBooks is going to take this money and hold it someplace safe, called Undeposited Funds. This is similar to wherever you store money safe on your desktop until you are ready to put them all on a deposit slip and go to the bank. When you physically create the Deposit slip, the one you create in QuickBooks must match.
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When you open your “Deposit” screen to deposit the money in the bank, Undeposited Funds will open up automatically, choose the payments you want to deposit and they will appear on the deposit slip like magic.
Money is in the check register and qb is keeping track of how much money you have accepted as DownPayments on jobs that has not been processed to the end of the job. Here is your Chart of Accounts:
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Step 2 –
Purchase Orders
Remember to match items on sales forms (estimates & invoices) to items used on purchase forms (Purchase Orders and Bills) we will see how this works as we create a PO for our job.
Method 1- Creating Purchase Orders from an Estimate (for QuickBooks Premier Users)
Open your estimate, click on the drop down menu arrow Create Invoice, choose Purchase Order
This is very important on the next screen that opens you want to choose Create Purchase Order for Selected Items
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The next screen that opens lets you choose which items to create a PO for. Choose only the items for one Vendor at a time. For example our Main Fabric and Contrast Fabric are both from Kasmir.
The PO opens and we must choose the Vendor , Kasmir is not on our vendor list so we will need to create it “on the fly”.
Here is our Purchase Order all filled out for us. Print, Save and Fax or call in to the Vendor. You can enter the reference number in the field after you have sent in your order. Don’t forget to enter in some info about the job in the memo field, This will make it easier when you are entering bills to match up with PO’s.
Notice how by allowing QB to create the PO from the Proposal/Estimate it used the EXACT SAME ITEM as we used on our Proposal? That’s the matching rule. This is very important if you want your cost and revenue from each item to show up on your Job Profitability report beside each other.
Method 2 for QuickBooks Pro Users
You will need to open the Purchase Order screen “Vendors Create Purchase Orders” and enter all of your information manually. It’s not hard you just have to make sure you remember the matching rule and use the same items on your Purchase Orders that you used on the Estimate. If you have the Estimate open and the PO open you can toggle back and forth between the screens easily. You can copy customized text from the Estimate and paste it on to the PO.
Receiving Items and Entering Bills
When you create PO’s you need to “Receive the Items”. There is a Two-Step method and a One–step method. Which method do you think I recommend? One-Step of course! That would be “Receive Items and Enter Bill”; you will find this under the Vendors menu. This method works in exactly the same way if you go straight to writing a check or entering a Credit Card transaction. When you choose the Receive Items and Enter Bill this is the screen that will open:
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You will choose Yes and then you can choose the PO that pertains.
Notice how our customized memo helped us know which PO we should choose? Its easy when you only have one…but what if you had 5 open PO’s and they all just had the Estimate number in the memo column? That is what will come up by default. Checkmark the PO and Voila!
Like Magic, QB creates the bill and employing “the matching rule” uses the EXACT same items again……its so easy! Your customized description flowed right on to the bill for you. Now you will want to edit the bill at this point for any price changes and the charge for shipping charges for the client. Make sure the billable column is unclicked, you have already charged the customer on the estimate for all of these items. Save & Close….
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Paying Bills - Let QuickBooks Do the Work
You do not have to post bills in order to write a check and pay bills, but we do recommend it. Do the things the same way, every time and you don’t have to think so hard, things become routine and easy. So let’s assume when you get bills you post them and then you pay them. You are doing it with PO’s so let’s use the same process for all bills. Under Vendors, Choose “Enter Bills”
We are going to enter a bill for our cell phone, when we start typing the vendor name, QB auto-fills the name and the amounts from our last bill posting. Very Handy! We are using the Expenses tab because these are business expenses and not items we have ordered for a customer.
The two screens above show one bill we have entered for Rowleys. We used the Expense tab for the items that were not for a particular customer, it was for a general business expense, thread and buckram. The item tab was used for the items we bought for our customer, some down pillow forms. Now we have all of our bills entered and we want to pay some bills. Choose “Pay Bills” under your Vendor menu. Click off the bills you want to pay. You can choose to pay them by check or by Credit Card. You can print your checks or you can assign check numbers to them based on checks you have hand written. Notice those two bills at the top that need to be paid, they showed up here because of the opening balances we entered during the company setup.
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Step 3 – Generate the Invoice & Apply the Final Payment
Open your Estimate and click on the Create Invoice button.
At this point you can make any changes that came up in the course of the job, fabric or trim that changed. Maybe they added some pillows or accessories. Remember that adding items inside the “Group” won’t print, if you want an item to print to show the change you must add that item outside of the “Group”, below the description line. Notice how QB “remembered” the down payment we collected for this job? Customers really like seeing that info on the final invoice, including the check number and date. I like I didn’t have to go look anything up or remember! Now all that is left is to deliver the job and pick up your money.
Come back to QuickBooks, use the Payment screen under Customer>Receive Payment to apply the money to an invoice. Remember she owed us money from an opening balance, she paid us in full so we can pay off both of these invoices with her one check. QuickBooks will put the money into Undeposited Funds again, waiting for you to be ready to go to the bank.
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Just like before choose the items you want to move from Undeposited Funds onto your deposit slip and it will create your deposit slip for you. Well that’s it, start to finish, from the Estimate to the final payment. At first it can feel like a lot to remember, but it is a system that when done the same way every time will become as routine as starting your car and driving down the road. Remember when that seemed hard?
Lesson 2 Project List
Create 2 Estimates – Start Estimate Number using a G- Group, a summary style quote. Use a GP- group, an Itemized Detail Quote for the second.
Accept a DownPayment on both Estimates
Create Sales Receipts for both Down Payments, Deposit these in your checking account
Create PO’s for 1 of the Jobs, create bills for the merchandise and then pay the bills. Pay some of the bills with a check and some with a credit card.
Turn the Estimates into Invoices, accept a final payment on one Invoice, Deposit it into your checking account.
Be prepared to show the transactions in order as they would have happened during one of your private consultations. Relax, no pressure, you are learning, it doesn’t have to be perfect. We learn as much from trying and failing as we do from breezing through.
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Dates Moving in a Window
Next Day + (plus key) Next Field Tab
Previous Day - (minus key) Previous Field Shift + Tab
Today T Beginning of Field/Row Home
First Day of the Week W End of Field/Row End
Last Day of the Week K Line Below Down Arrow
First Day of the Month M Line Above Up Arrow
Last Day of the Month H Down one screen Page Down
First Day of the Year Y Up One Screen Page Up
Last Day of the Year R Next Word in Field Ctrl + right arrow
