How do I find the raw number of invoices?

I can't answer your question but I'd like to offer an alternative method. Use Invoices only. If you don't already have them setup create Payment Items for cash, check, visa, discover, mastercard, debit and tie them to Undeposited Funds.

When you have a completed sale enter it on the invoice the same as you would for the sales receipt then enter the payment method which will zero out the invoice and keep it from posting to A/R. Now you'll only be using one form and the difference between the last invoice number of any given time and the invoice number now will be how many invoices/sales you've had.

Credit memos are numbered sequentially with invoices -- you can't just subtract ending number from beginning number and presume the value is equal to number of invoices entered.

I don't know a report that includes those numbers BUT ..... if you automatically number your Invoices and Sales Receipts sequentially in separate sequences it should be a simple matter to check the numbers.

This may or may not help in this situation, but there's also a little-known report that can be unexpectedly useful. Reports, Banking, Missing Cheques. What isn't obvious is that this report can be modified to show documents other than cheques. Select Accounts Receivable instead of your bank account, for example, and the report lists Invoice numbers instead of cheques. The title is also somewhat misleading in that it doesn't list the missing documents, rather it lists the document numbers actually used and highlights the sequential gaps where document numbers are missing (deleted or unused) as well as duplicated numbers.

invoice

Maybe I'm backwards but I consider credit memos as part of the overall figure.

Heh. Not backwards at all. Overall sales are what is important to me, as well. However, the OP wanted a count of Invoices vs. Sales Reciepts. I have no CLUE as to why this information is important to him. But, as it was, I never thought to include credit memos in the count.

There is no report within QB for that. But there is more than one way to approach the problem.

For Invoices: From the reports menu select Custom Transaction Detail report. Click 'Modify Report'. On the filter tab filter for account 'Accounts Recievable'. Select 'no' under 'include split detail'. Select 'Transaction Type' of 'Invoice'. On the Display Tab, set the date range you wish and modify the columns to display only what you need -- You might not wish account information, amount due, clr, etc.

This will give you a list of invoices -- which you can either count, or send to a file for further manipulation.

For Sales Receipts, modify the report to filter for for Transaction Type 'Sales Receipt' and for selected accounts to include your bank account and/or the undeposited funds account.

Thank you for the reply... That's a great idea, but there is still no way to find the actual number of invoices... we are a repair shop and use a seperate program to generate and track workorders. If a mistake is made or the system sneezes or we cancel a job that workorder number is lost. For convienience I use that work order number as either the invoice number or sale number in quickbooks, too make cross reference easier. So if I want an exact number, I can't just subtract the last from the first.

Pretty sloppy bookkeeping on my part! In hindsight if I kept a list of unused numbers than I could do what you suggest, or let qbooks generate a seperate number, but I have been messy so long, I was hoping quickbooks could count them, but I may just need to get a cup of coffee and start counting myself.

Thanks again though!

My favorite little report -- I have it modified so I can find missing (non-sequential) invoice numbers. First one I tried. But, danged thing doesn't give a tally.

There should be a field added to the display option of reports for 'tally' - it would be so useful!

This might be off topic, but you all seem like smart folks, maybe I could get some opinions here... I run a small computer repair shop with two locations in Mineeapolis / St. Paul.

We don't sell anything, just fix computers for home and small businesses, and upgardes and such, we don't even sell many computers. Our customers are home users and small businesses, we have carry in and onsite service. We have always charged by time and materials, but i am considering switching to a flat rate price structure, meaning if you have a problem we charge one price to fix it no matter how long it takes.

I have been trying to total the number of jobs we have done in a given time period so I can get an idea of what the "average" job is and maybe base a flat rate on that. Hence my earlier questions.

Anyway, you all are computer users, I don't know if you have ever had to use a repair service or not, but where would you look for the value in choosing someone to help you if your computer had a problem that you couldn't deal with?

We strive for a combination of convienience, quick turnaround time, real expertise and of course honesty.

But if given the choice between an unknown possible number of hours working on your computer and a flat price where you would no ahead of time, what would you choose?

BTW, for desktop computers I am considering including replacement parts into the flat rate so you would absolutely know ahead of time how much it would cost...

Any replies woudl be appreciated...

Thanks again!

PS the simple estimate method, where you pay an estimate fee and we tell you what is wrong and how much it will cost too fix is difficult in this type of business, as with computers, to find out what is wrong you usually end up fixing the problem, so to give a real, honest, accurate estimate, you end up doing all the work you would do to fix the system in the first place.

Thanks everyone! I think I have learned what i needed to know, I sort of mispoke, I didn't need invoices vs sales receipts, but sum of the two.... sorry if that resulted in unsuitable responses!

Have a great day and thanks again...

Here's a possible solution. Its still not a report that just gives you a flat number but...

Reports > Accountant & Taxes > Transaction List by Date

Select date range

Modify Report: Filters: Transaction Type: Selected Transactions (Invoices, Sales Receipts, Credit Memos)

Sort by Type

This gives you a long list of all the above transaction types for the specified period. Export to Excel. Figure the number of transactions per type by looking at how many rows they consume.

For example, one of my clients has 2 credit memos, 331 invoices and 130 sales receipts.

Its not perfect but it only took about 3 minutes from start to finish.

Ouch. It's a tough call. Let's say your average service time was say, three hours, with materials/parts of say, $50. The client whose minor problem was fixed onsite and who saw you or your employee walk-in and leave in under an hour using no parts will surely balk at the size of the bill. Then again, the client with the eight hour problem who left the computer at your shop has NO IDEA of the bargain s/he made on your time. Estimates, in any service business, are ALWAYS tricky -- sometimes it takes longer than you planned and you have to 'swallow' the overage costs, other times you get it done in record time and have a bit of profit, until the customer calls for an adjustment to the bill :-P

What we have done in some cases is issue a 'Not to Exceed' proposal. It includes a fee for the troubleshoot, and then a T&M clause for the repair not to exceed a certain amount. If we find but can't fix the problem in the time allotted, the customer pays the troubleshoot fee. Otherwise, we bill for the T&M. The maximum is spelled out.

From a personal standpoint - I realize some problems cannot easily be identified -- car repair comes to mind. As a consumer I am, however, suspect of 'flat-rate' services because I *KNOW* that in order to cover the occasional job that takes longer than planned, some jobs will be over-billed, and I whole-heartedly suspect the overbilled one will be mine.

On an alternate note.. it just so happens I am looking for software to generate and track work orders. Would you care to share information as to what package you are using?

Thanks

Ayanova.com with some tweaks!

Print them in preview mode - look at the number QB says it will print if allowed to do so?