New to Quickbooks - Direct entry of A/R from custom application? Check amount editing?

QuickBooks is a real accounting program and can post General Journal Entries. Without this feature an accounting program would be useless. Search help in QB for more information.

For the receivables, you could set up a customer called something like "All Customers" and do all invoicing & payments to that name. Then create one invoice per month allocating all the service accounts, and receive all payments against that invoice.

It may be easier to avoid the A/R account altogether & just create an asset account (non-A/R) that doesn't require a customer name - call it Customer Receivables. Then use that account in the JE just like you used to.

As for payroll, don't use the payroll module, just enter as a journal entry with the last entry a post to cash which can later be split up between cleared & uncleared checks.

I agree with this suggestion. Avoids all issues of A/R in journal entries that QB has imposed on the user.

One of my clients used your method and I found it made doing bank recs a PITA.

You might find it easier to record each net check plus a JE for the taxes paid by the company. This will eliminate the manual tracking of clear/uncleared checks when you do the bank rec.

For A/R, I agree with a summary sales receipt to a customer called 'monthly' sales or using a non A/R acct as well--either method will work.

For the payroll, the entries you make should match the actual bank activity. Hopeully, your payroll service pulls out payroll in 1 or 2 lump withdrawals (not each individual paycheck--otherwise you might was well be doing payroll yourself. Check into QB Assisted PR for about 1/2 the cost).

********** I have not run into any third party payroll providers that will take the employee pay out in a lump sum. I have always seen them take the taxes out in 1 or 2 lump sums but since they are issuing checks cut from your client's bank account, individual checks will be posted to your bank account.

And yes, you might as well use QB Assisted PR. Many business owners don't want to be bothered with payroll tax forms so that is one compelling reason they go with a third party provider.

We send timecard data on our employee's hours worked to our payroll service on Tuesday mornings. They already know all our employees pay rates and deductions such as 401K, insurance, child support, etc, but we inform them if there are any changes. They cut all the payroll checks and do the computations on taxes, and track the W2 and 1099 info. We receive the chacks in a packet on Thursday, along with a payroll check register and distribution report. We enter the entire payroll as a direct lump sum check into our checkbook, and then do GL journal entries that distribute the amounts. It all goes fairly smoothly. The only time there's a bobble is when a check is cut to, say, the State of Massachusetts for a quarterly tax payment and rounding has an effect. This happened last month; the payroll service rounded up and the State rounded down, so there was a discrepancy of a buck that had to be dealt with.

Our payroll service charges us $60 a week, and we're glad to pay it to not have to be bothered with the tax crap. I'd lose what little hair I have left if we brought payroll in-house.

Thanks to everyone for the advice, I feel like I'm on more solid ground now.

** Captain Infinity

Sir, take my advice, outsourcing your payroll is the best solution. Even though you are paying $60 per week, that is a small price to pay ADP, Paychex, PayLogic or whoever you use, especially if you have several employees. And it takes the hassle out of having to do it yourself. The problem is if you do it inhouse, you have the worry and frustration of doing it right, and it has to be correct all the time.

As for rounding taxes, it should not be out but a few cents. That difference can simply be put in as an adjustment due to rounding on the tax return.