In QuickBooks when you enter a vendor bill, the due date fills in automatically, depending on the terms you have with the vendor. If you don’t set up terms for a vendor, the due date for a vendor bill is automatically filled out using a default number of days for paying bills. QuickBooks sets this default at 10 days, but you can change the default to a number of days that you choose. To change this default date in QuickBooks:

1. Choose Edit | Preferences from the QuickBooks menu bar.
2. Click the Bills icon on the left pane and click the Company Preferences tab.
3. Fill in the text box with the number of days after receipt bills are due.
4. Click OK to save the new setting.

QuickBooks gives you an option to impose finance charges on overdue amounts as an incentive to get your customers to pay on time. To use this option in QuickBooks you decide the rate and circumstances under which finance charges are assessed. In the Finance Charge preferences dialog box you must specify an interest rate to charge, a minimum finance charge, the grace period you permit before finance charges are assessed, the posting account, and which date to begin calculating finance charges from. Additionally, you can choose to issue a finance charge on overdue finance charges and to have QuickBooks automatically mark the invoices “To be printed”. To enable and establish finance charges for your customers in QuickBooks you must do the following:

1. Choose Edit | Preferences from the QuickBooks menu bar.
2. Click the Finance Charge icon on the left pane and then click the Company Preferences tab.
3. Fill in the Annual Interest Rate (%) field with the rate you want to charge annually (this means that if you want to charge 1.5% per month, you enter 18% in this field).
4. Fill in the Grace Period (days) field with the number of days of lateness you permit before finance charges are assessed.
5. Enter the income account you want to use to post finance charges (usually an income account).
6. Specify whether to calculate the finance charge from the due date or from the invoice date in the Calculate Charges From field by clicking either the Due Date or Invoice/Billed Date option.
7. Click OK to save your settings after you have filled out the window.

Class Tracking in QuickBooks lets you group transactions to match the way you want to track and report your business activities. In effect, you can use classes to “classify” your business by some pattern, such as divisions, branches, or types of activity. Because you must use classes consistently for the Use Class Tracking feature to be useful, QuickBooks offers an option called Prompt To Assign Classes, to remind users to assign classes. To enable these features:

1. Choose Edit | Preferences from the QuickBooks menu bar.
2. Click the Accounting icon on the left pane to open the Accounting preferences, and click the Company Preferences tab.
3. Check the Use Class Tracking check box.
4. Click the Prompt To Assign Classes check box.

Sometimes there is more text in a field than you can see. Using the Show ToolTips For Clipped Text option in QuickBooks means that when you hover your mouse over a field the entire block of text will display. Very handy!

1. Choose Edit | Preferences from the QuickBooks menu bar.
2. Click the General icon on the left pane and then click the My Preferences tab.
3. Click the Show ToolTips For Clipped Text option check box.

The Start With Payee Field On Check option applies to transactions connected to payables. Enabling this option can eliminate unnecessary keystrokes by telling QuickBooks where to insert the cursor when you open a payables transaction window. When enabled, the cursor automatically appears in the payee field (Write Checks), the Vendor field (Enter Bills), or the Purchase From field (Enter Credit Card Charges). One thing to note is that in the Enter Bills and Enter Credit Card Charges windows, this option is only effective if you have multiple Accounts Payable accounts or multiple Credit Card accounts. To enable this option:

If you need to open QuickBooks frequently throughout the day, the program will launch faster if QuickBooks is running in the background all of the time. Using the Keep QuickBooks Running For Quick Startups option, each time you open QuickBooks, it will load immediately. However, keeping QuickBooks running takes up RAM and other computer resources. In addition, you may have trouble updating, uninstalling, or repairing QuickBooks because software needs to be closed in order to apply changes. To configure this option to best meet your needs:

1. Choose Edit | Preferences from the QuickBooks menu bar.
2. Click the General icon on the left pane and then click the My Preferences tab.
3. Select or deselect the Keep QuickBooks Running For Quick Startups check box to enable or disable this option.

This option tells QuickBooks to flash a warning message when you change any existing transaction and try to close the transaction window without explicitly saving the changes. This means you have a chance to abandon the edits before you make a change that you’re not sure about. If you don’t use this option in QuickBooks, the edited transaction is saved automatically, unless it is linked to, and affects, other transactions (in which case, a warning message appears to apprise you of this complication). Do the following to turn on this option:

1. Choose Edit | Preferences from the QuickBooks menu bar.
2. Click the General icon on the left pane and then click the My Preferences tab.
3. Click the Warn When Editing A Transaction option check box.

Enabling the Warn When Posting A Transaction To Retained Earnings option means that QuickBooks displays a warning message when you try to post an amount to the Retained Earnings account.  The message explains that in QuickBooks the Retained Earnings account is designed to track profits, and the amounts that are posted to the account automatically are generated, not manually posted through a transaction. If this is a user who doesn’t understand the account (or inadvertently chooses the account from a drop-down list), the warning message might prevent the user from going on (which is almost always a good thing). Enable this option by doing the following:

1. Choose Edit | Preferences from the QuickBooks menu bar.
2. Click the Accounting icon on the left pane to open the Accounting preferences, and click the Company Preferences tab.
3. Choose the Warn When Posting A Transaction To Retained Earnings option by clicking the check box.

The Reminders option in QuickBooks allows you to see a message box when you open a company in QuickBooks, alerting you to accounting or bookkeeping tasks that need to be done. You can choose whether you want to see reminders in a summary list or with a complete detailed list. For a number of the tasks you must designate when you want your reminders to appear. To set up your reminders in QuickBooks:

1. Choose Edit | Preferences from the QuickBooks menu bar.
2. Click the Reminders icon on the left pane and click the Company Preferences tab.
3. Choose Show Summary, Show List, or Don’t Remind Me for each of the enumerated available reminders (Some of the items might be grayed out because they are only available in QuickBooks Premier editions).
4. Choose the amount of lead time you want for each of the items by filling in the box to the far right.
5. Click the My Preferences tab and click the Show Reminders List When Opening A Company File check box.

If you use this option in Quickbooks, when you enter characters in a currency field, a decimal point is automatically placed to the left of the last two digits. For example, if you type 5421, when you move to the next field the number changes to 54.21. If you want to type in even dollar amounts, type a period after you enter 54, and QuickBooks will automatically add the decimal point and two zeros (or you can take the time to enter the zeros, as in 5400, which automatically becomes 54.00). This is a handy feature for those of us who don’t want to take the time to add decimal points and zeros. To have the decimal point placed automatically:

1. Choose Edit | Preferences from the QuickBooks menu bar.
2. Click the General icon on the left pane and then click the QuickBooks My Preferences tab.
3. Select Automatically Place Decimal Point by clicking the check box.