Archive for March, 2008

Editing your Bill of Materials

Today’s posting is a quick tip about editing a Bill of Materials for an assembly item in QuickBooks. A client was asking me about a feature in my CCRQBOM manufacturing plug-in program the other day, talking about a problem related to deleting a line in the BOM. There was a detail line in the middle of the BOM that was to be removed, and the only way he could come up with was to delete the item ID in the line. This, unfortunately, leaves a “hole” in the middle of the BOM.

How to Make a Test Company

There are times when I just want to play around with my QuickBooks data without affecting my “real” company information. Today I’m going to discuss how to set up a “test” company. On the surface this might seem to be simple, but there are a few issues I’d like to point out that many people miss.

QuickBooks 2008 R5 Update

Intuit has released the R5 update for QuickBooks Pro/Premier 2008 and Enterprise 8. If you are set up for automatic updates, you should be getting it, or get the manual update. If you aren’t sure how to determine what release you are using, see my posting on automatic updates.

Should I Use QuickBooks Automatic Updates?

Computer users are inundated with updates to the programs we use and to Microsoft Windows. Keeping your computer up to date is critically important, but it can also be a pain in the rear. QuickBooks updates fall into both categories.

Importing Information into QuickBooks

QuickBooks is a “closed” database, with limited ways to push information in. Today I’ll give you an overview of some of the methods that you can use to import information into your QuickBooks company file, with more details to come in future posts. I won’t be able to cover EVERY alternative, but I’ll hit the major ones.

Welcome!

Welcome to the “Practical QuickBooks” Blog. My name is Charlie Russell, and my goal is to talk about ways for you to get more out of QuickBooks for your business. I’ll talk about various add-on programs, tools that can help you, tricks I’ve learned, and ways to accomplish different important tasks. Feel free to let me know what kinds of things you are interested in seeing here.

I’ll avoid certain kinds of things. I’m not a CPA or bookkeeper. I won’t talk about payroll, for example. Please note that I am not an employee of Intuit (maker of QuickBooks), and the opinions expressed here are my own.

A short synopsis on my background: I’ve been involved in the small business software industry since the late 70’s (long before Microsoft Windows, and the IBM PC). My focus has been on inventory control and accounting software for small businesses, with a special interest in manufacturing firms. My current company provides business consulting services and develops custom and off-the-shelf software and was started in 1990. Prior to that I had another company that produced accounting and inventory control software for small manufacturers.

Since 2004 my company has focused on QuickBooks – I am a Certified Advanced QuickBooks ProAdvisor and our company is a Silver Developer in the Intuit Developer Network.

Just to confuse things we are going through somewhat of a name change – we’ve been operating as Computer Consulting Resources for 17 years, but starting in 2008 we’ll start promoting the name CCRSoftware for our software division. It will take time to make that transition.

So, feel free to leave comments here, send an email to me at charlie@ccrsoftware.com, or visit our web page at www.ccrsoftware.com. I also have a blog on our QuickBooks Compatible software products at http://ccrqblog.ccrsoftware.info/