A question that we get quite a bit is how to track items that we pull out of inventory to use.  It really depends on your sales tax codes.  There are 2 ways to do this.  The first way is to do a qty adjustment and then when it gets posted to QBF, change the journal entry that was created to shop supplies.  You will have track the amount taken and usually pay some sort of use tax.  The easier solution if allowed is to sell the item to yourself at cost (collecting the tax) and use the payment on account.  In QBF, discount the invoice to your supplies expense.  With this method, no need to track use tax as you collected the tax when you sold it to yourself.

While I advise all of my clients not reverse receipt and instead do a return receipt, occasionally they will have a problem with a receipt that needs to be fixed.  For example, you rang up the wrong item with the same price, but now your inventory will be off.  If you reverse a receipt where you have processed a credit card, it will refund the customer credit card, so this is not a good idea.  What you can do is to do a return receipt on the same day and process the refund as payment on account.  You can either use the customer that was the problem or create a customer called sales receipt corrections. POS will prompt you to use this customer with QBF if you are hooked up to the financial product.  Also may prompt you for a credit limit.  Finish the return refunding to the “customer’s account”  Then ring up the sale correctly and in the take payment on account. The refund and payment will cancel each other out and now the inventory will be correct. This technique can be used for many purposes such as changing the date of a sale, etc.

If you find yourself running a report and not getting the results you expect, I would try to “revert” the report to it’s original version.  To revert, run the report and then click modify report.  At the lower left of the modify button is a revert button.  Press this button and it will run the report as original configured.  Then you can modify from there.  Sometimes POS will not clear all of the filters even if you remove them and this is a quick way to make sure.

Being the start of a new year and all, a lot of you are thinking about doing inventory.  The first step in a successful inventory is to buy or rent the POS inventory scanner.  Yes we do sell them, but that is not why I am telling you to get the scanner.  The scanner turns the inventory process from days to a few hours.  Next, in Version 6 and new, click on inventory and start phyiscal inventory. find a expected item with zero and put a 0 in the counted field.  Then save the change.  It will start the inventory process and ensure that anything gets sold or received will be flagged. Then scan or count your inventory making sure not to double count anything. If you are using the scanner, upload the counts, review the scans and save them.  After you are sure that you have counted everything, check the set everything not counted to zero box. and apply changes.  If the inventory was taken over a period of time, then you may need to adjust for items sold after being counted.  To do so, look for the flags next to the items change.  Then review your receiving or sales history and make the necessary adjustment.  When you are all done, apply changes and wait for your next inventory.

Hoping the best for you and yours during this holiday season.

Typically when a new business starts up, vendors require payment in advance for items ordered.  When using QuickBooks POS with QuickBooks Financial software, there is a relatively easy way to track this.  When posting your check or charge in QuickBooks Financial, enter accounts payable in the account field and the vendor you placed the order with in the customer job field.  Then receive your inventory on a receiving voucher as normal (you are using receiving vouchers right?)  When you go to QBF, click on pay bills. Find the bill and check it.  Then click on the set credit button and apply the credit. We don’t recommend checking the already paid for box in POS, because that creates an item receipt that needs to be turned into a bill before processing.  Another good reason for doing this is if the vendor charged you more than you received, you will see that and can call for an explaination.

When we are called into consult with a new client who either set up POS themselves or had another consultant work on it, the most common problem we see is a negative amount in the POS inventory adjustment expense.  This indicates that the client has not been receiving inventory in properly.  Most commonly, the client will just enter quanities of items in the on-hand field.  While POS does warn you that you are creating an adjustment, you can hide the message and most do.  What is happening is that you are telling POS that you have X qty at Y cost and therefore it increase the inventory and the offset is placed into POS inventory adjustment expense.  Since both accounts are debit accounts, the expense is driven negative. 

How to fix:  First of all, you must receive all inventory in on receiving vouchers.  Secondly, depending on how long this has been going on, the fix can be as simple as changing all of the check/or bills entered from whatever is listed to POS inventory adjustment expense.  We can consult with you regarding the specifics of your case as well as provide training on POS done right.  Give us a call

So version 8 of Point of sale has been out for a few months.  Here are my comments.  The web component is not quite ready for prime time.  It has very limited functionality and NOT a good fit for clothing store at this time as there is only 1 view available for each style and the styles display kind of weird.  We have been promised fixes early next year.  The simple cashier screen is great improvement for touchscreen use.  Please note however that not all of the data entry fields are on the simple cashier view. For example, to enter a customer you need to go back to the old screen. The good news is it is pretty simple toggle.  The currency buttons when taking cash are LONG overdue and really cool.

If you found this then you may be looking at buying QuickBooks POS or have it and need some help.  We have been working with POS since version 2 and have done well over 100 new installs and counting.  We invite you to post your questions and comments.  Simple questions we will answer for free like we have done for several years on the QuickBooks POS Community web site.  More complex problems, we can still help, but will need to charge you.  POS is a robust affordable product and with the addition of 8.0 and Cash Register Plus,  there are thousand of retailers who can benefit from these products and I look forward to speaking with you.

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