Recording an Expense and Writing a Check

Contents

1. 1Before you begin
2. 2Choose the right form
3. 3What happens in the books
4. AProcedure A: Record an expense
5. SBefore Procedure B: set up check printing
6. BProcedure B: Write a check
7. 4After you save: the Check Register
8. 5Common mistakes and how to fix them
9. 6Working faster with the keyboard
10. 7Check your understanding
11. 8Quick reference card
12. §Notes

Bookkeeping goes faster when the paperwork is gathered first. Before you open BizBooks360, collect these four facts from the receipt, invoice or bank statement in front of you.

• Who was paid. The vendor's name as it appears on the receipt.
• Which account the money left. Your checking account, a savings account, or a company credit card.
• When it was paid. The date on the receipt, not the date you happen to be typing it in.
• What it was for, and how much. If one receipt covers two kinds of things, note each amount separately.

BizBooks360 has three forms for money going out. Picking the right one is the most important decision in this manual, because each form tells your books a different story about when and how the money moved.³ Ask two questions, in this order.

You never type debits and credits in these forms. BizBooks360 writes them for you. Still, knowing what happens underneath will help you catch mistakes, so here is the theory in one picture.

Every entry has two sides that must be equal.⁴ The lines you fill in (what it was for) are debited: each expense account goes up. The account the money came from is credited: your bank balance goes down by the total.

Use this when the purchase is already paid by card, cash, debit, bank transfer or online. Example used below: a $109.55 Staples receipt, paid with the company debit card, for printer supplies ($86.40) and cleaning supplies ($23.15).

Between the cards and the list sit three charts D. Where the money went splits your spending by expense account for This month, 3 months, This year or 12 months; click an account to open its register. Spending by month draws a bar for each month with the monthly average as a dashed line (Show as table gives the numbers). Bills to pay sorts the unpaid bills by how long they are past due and names the vendors you owe the most; click one to list that vendor's unpaid bills. If you only want the list, click Hide the charts E; the link becomes Show the charts, and BizBooks360 remembers the choice in this browser.

When a check has been saved but not yet printed, a strip above the tabs says so, here 1 check is waiting to be printed F, and its Open the check register link takes you to the Check Register to print it (Section 4). The strip is gone once nothing waits.

1. A1

   Open a new expense

   Click Expenses in the left menu A, then + Expense B. A blank Record an expense form opens. Today's date and a bank account are already filled in; change them in the next steps if needed.

1. A2

   Who was paid: Paid to 1

   Click the box and type the first letters of the vendor, here Sta. Press Tab or Enter to take the match. If the vendor is new, choose + Add a new vendor at the top of the list and save the short contact form.

2. A3

   Where the money came from: Paid from 2 and Date paid 3

   Pick the account the money actually left. A debit card or bank transfer comes out of a bank account such as Operating Checking. A company credit card purchase comes out of that credit card account. For the date, use the date on the receipt.

3. A4

   How it was paid 4 and Reference 5

   Choose the method: Cash, Check, Credit card, Debit card, Payment platform, ACH, EFT, Wire or Other. BizBooks360 suggests the method you used last time on this account. In Reference, type the receipt or confirmation number. It is optional but makes the entry easy to find later.

1. A5

   Say what it was for: the lines 6 to 10

   Under What was it for?, fill one line per kind of purchase:

   • 6 Account: the expense category, such as Operating Expenses:Office Expenses. On a 1,440-pixel screen a long name is cut short in the box (Operating Expenses:Office ...); the whole account is kept, and opening the list shows it in full.
   • 7 Project: the job this part of the cost belongs to, or No project. This column appears when your books have projects; each line can name its own.
   • 8 Description: a few plain words, such as "Printer paper and toner". A short description like this shows whole; a longer one is cut off at the edge of the box, so click into it to read or change all of the text.
   • 9 Unallowable: leave it unticked unless the cost may not be billed to a government contract. A ticked line asks why (10 characters or more) and is kept apart from the project's direct costs.⁶
   • 10 Amount: the part of the receipt that belongs on this account.

   If a line is on an account your books treat as a direct cost (such as Cost of Goods Sold:Freight-In) and has no project, BizBooks360 asks before saving whether to save it anyway, or refuses, depending on the books' setting. Office supplies and an accountant's fee are not direct costs, so the samples here save without the question; Chapter 3.2, Procedure B, shows it.

   Need another row? Click + Add a line 11. A new blank line also appears by itself as you fill the last one.

2. A6

   Check the total

   Total paid adds up your lines. Compare it with the bottom line of the receipt. If they differ, a line is missing or mistyped. Fix it now; it is much harder to find later.

3. A7

   Optional details 12

   Description is what the Expenses list shows. It copies your line descriptions until you type your own. Default project for new lines fills the Project column of every line you add after choosing it, which saves time when a whole receipt belongs to one job; a line can still name another project. Memo and the note in the register are for your own reminders.

4. A8

   Attach the receipt

   In the Attachments panel on the right, drop the receipt photo or PDF, or click to choose a file. Each file can be up to 10 MB.⁷

5. A9

   Save 13

   Click Save. To enter the next receipt straight away, click Save and new instead. BizBooks360 returns to the Expenses list, where the new entry sits at the top with the type Expense (Figure 6). The bank account's balance is now $109.55 lower.

BizBooks360 can print checks on blank or pre-printed check paper. Before it can, it needs to know what goes on the check: your bank's name and address, the routing and account numbers, and the next check number. You do this once for each bank account. If you only ever write checks by hand, skip to Procedure B.

1. S1

   Open the setup page

   On the Write a check form, an account that is not ready opens the check on Written by hand and says "This account is not set up for printing checks: a check on it is written by hand." The bank panel at the right says "Not set up for printing checks." Both carry a Set it up link. Click it. The page is titled Checks and deposit slips for your account.

1. S2

   The bank's block 1

   Type the bank's name, phone, street address, city, state and ZIP code. They print at the top center of each check.

2. S3

   Routing 2, account 3 and next check number 4

   Copy the numbers exactly. BizBooks360 tests the routing number as you type and answers "A valid US routing number."⁸ For Next check number, use the number printed on the first sheet of check paper you will load.

1. S4

   Paper 6 and position 7

   Match the check paper you bought: 3 checks per page, or 1 check per page with the check at the Top, Middle or Bottom (the rest of the page is a stub for your records).

2. S5

   Signature 8, then Save

   Choose No, the checks are signed by hand, or Yes, print the signature on file and type, draw or upload a signature. Check the company block at the bottom of the page, then click Save.

Use this when you pay with a paper check from a bank account. The form is drawn like a real check, so you fill it in the same order you would fill in paper. Example used below: check no. 2256 for $1,250.00 to Hawthorne & Lee CPAs for a quarterly bookkeeping review, printed by BizBooks360.

1. B1

   Open a new check

   Click Expenses, then + Check (C in Figure 3). The Write a check form opens.

1. B2

   Choose the bank: Pay from 1

   Bank accounts are offered here (with the books' Imbalanced holding account, which is not for checks), because only a bank account can write checks. The Bank account panel at the right shows the balance now, the balance after this check, and the next printed check number (Figure 10).

2. B3

   Printed or by hand 2, and the number 3

   • Print this check: leave Check no. empty. It shows Next: 2256 and takes that number when the check prints. Type a number only if the paper in the printer starts at a different one.
   • Written by hand: you wrote, or will write, a check from your checkbook. Type its number exactly as printed on the paper.
3. B4

   Date 4

   The date that will appear on the check.

4. B5

   Pay to the order of 5

   Choose the payee as in step A2. Their mailing address fills Payee address 8 from the contact. It prints on the check under the amount in words, where a window envelope shows it, so check it before you print.

5. B6

   Memo 9

   The memo prints on the check, so the payee sees it. Use it for something that helps them apply your payment: an invoice or account number. Keep private remarks for Notes (step B8).

1. B7

   Say what the check is for 11

   Fill the lines exactly as in step A5: account, project if any, description, the Unallowable tick if it applies, and amount. Here, one line to Operating Expenses:Professional Fees for $1,250.00, with no project. As you type, the check's Amount and the amount in words update by themselves. You never type the check amount directly.

2. B8

   Notes and attachments 12

   Notes stay with the check in your books and are never printed. Attach the invoice the check pays in the Attachments panel.

3. B9

   Save and print 13

   Load the check paper, then click Save and print (or press Ctrl+Alt+P). BizBooks360 saves the check, gives it the next number, and opens the check as a PDF in a new browser tab. Print that PDF at actual size.¹¹ To print later, click Save instead; the check waits in the Check Register under To print.

4. B10

   Confirm it printed, then sign

   The page now reads Check 2256 with a green Printed tag and the message "The check is saved and printed as no. 2256" (Figure 12). Sign the paper check, unless a printed signature is on file. For a handwritten check, click Save, then write the paper check so it matches the screen exactly.

Every check you write, on every bank account, is listed in one place: Bank Account → Check Register. The Expenses page also links to it at the right of its tabs. Use it to write and print checks in a batch and to see which checks the bank has not paid yet.

Outstanding checks are the ones you have written that the bank has not yet paid. A check moves to Cleared once it is matched to your bank statement during reconciliation.¹² A check that stays outstanding for months deserves a phone call: the payee may have lost it.

To correct any saved expense or check, open it from the Expenses list with Edit, change it and click Save changes.¹³

Deleting takes a right of its own. A member may delete a check, an expense, a bill or a vendor credit only if the owner has given them the delete permission for that kind of entry (Chapter 15.7); without it, the delete is refused with a message such as "You do not have permission to delete this check." Ask the owner of the books to delete it or to grant the right. Every add, change and delete of an expense or a check is also written to the books' Audit History (Chapter 6.7), with who did it and when.

Both forms show a Quicker by keyboard panel at the bottom right (Figure 16). Learn the first three rows and you rarely need the mouse.

Answer each question in your head, then open the answer.

The whole manual on one screen. Keep it open beside BizBooks360 until the steps are habit.