I run a local shop and have found ebay as a great way to move products that would other wise just lay around and loss value.
My question of the group is that when I do a checking reconciliation run after I get my bank statement, my account never balances right because I have money in pay-pal yet have a balance difference because I checked that the product had been shipped and paid for.
Any ebayers / pal-pay users have any suggestions?
One idea was to make pay-pal transfers BEFORE the end of the month but when you request transfer pay-pal can take up to 7 days! But to keep books balance It would not be able to ship any thing the last week of the month.
Another thought was to open a pay-pal account just like a checking account.
QuickBooks is NOT to forgiving when you mess up so BEFORE I do any thing I would like your feedback.
Ok, I use pay-pal but not in my business. I've had no problems reconciling my personal bank account with what goes in/out of paypal.
I'm unsure what your question is. Bank reconciliation takes into account that some transactions have *NOT* cleared by the time you get your statement.
You've stated "when I do a checking reconciliation run after I get my bank statement, my account never balances right" If that's the case, you are doing something wrong. Reconciliation is supposed to match what you have in your ledger with what has cleared (been processed by) your bank. Your stated problem is "because I have money in pay-pal yet have a balance difference because I checked that the product had been shipped and paid for."
That statement is incomprehensible. Checking shipping status does not affect your bank balance. Having a pending credit from pay-pal that has not posted to your bank yet will affect your bank balance (the funds will not have cleared) but will *NOT* affect your reconciliation (if the funds haven't been sent from paypal to you, then your bank account balance will be less. So long as you leave the deposit as not cleared, the amount of your bank balance in reconciliation should match the amount your bank says you have).
Pay pal is just another way to move money into and out of a bank account - like an electronic debit or direct deposit of a paycheck or credit from a merchant account via customer credit card. The problem you are having results most likely from not understanding the reconciliation process in QuickBooks - and not from where the funds are coming from.
Post back with exactly what you are doing - and why you think your account is not balancing right.
Create another "bank" type account called Paypal. If you don't already have one create an expense account called Paypal Fees in the same location you have Bank Service Charges.
In your Item List setup a Payment Item called Paypal. At the bottom of the entry screen check Deposit To (rather than Group with Undeposited Funds) and designate the Paypal bank account you just setup.
Now when you receive payment that goes to paypal you select Paypal as the payment type (as opposed to Visa, Check, Cash) and the customer payment automatically goes into the Paypal bank register.
Recording PP fees can be done several ways. I find it easiest to make a lump sum monthly entry in the Paypal bank register and assign it to the PP Fees expense account. You can move the money from PP bank to your checking account by doing a Funds Transfer.
Just make sure you always record in PP the actual amount paid to you and not the amount you actually receive. IOW, if a customer pays $500 but Paypal takes $10 give the customer credit for the full $500 payment and record the $10 fee as an expense.
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