QuickBooks Tip – Construction A/P – Tracking Subcontractor Insurance
A reader wrote to ask the following question:
I have a vendor (subcontractor) whose general liability insurance expired. In QuickBooks I was able to produce a check for them. How do I QuickBooks to notify me that their insurance has expired?
Answer:
Unlike some of the more costly construction specific software programs out there, QuickBooks wasn’t designed to prevent us from generating a check to a Vendor/Subcontractor whose General Liability or Worker’s Compensation insurance has expired.
The QuickBooks Premier (or Enterprise) Contractor edition does have a “section” in the Additional Info tab of the Vendor Record where you can enter an expiration date for both Worker’s Comp and General Liability insurance – and if you enter dates in these fields you will get a warning when using a vendor whose insurance has expired – however, it will not prevent you from writing the check, entering the bill, or creating a purchase order.
In other versions of QuickBooks Pro, Premier, or Enterprise; you can create “Custom Fields” to use in the Vendor record – but they will not produce even a warning.
There are several things that you can do – but none of them will automatically “warn” you before the Subcontractors insurance does expire OR prevent you from writing them a check after it has expired.
One thing that you can do is have your Vendors/Subcontractors request a Certificate of Insurance from their insurance company, listing you as a Certificate Holder. That way you receive a Certificate showing the policy period AND you would also be notified if the coverage was canceled or if it expired.
Even having access to this information directly from the Vendors insurance agent isn’t enough if you don’t have a policy and/or procedure in place for tracking this.
While QuickBooks won’t do anything automatically for you, it will provide you with tools (date tracking, report generation, letter creation, Reminders, and To Do Notes) to implement a good system for tracking this information.
Request our FREE eBook – “QuickBooks Tips & Techniques – Setting Up & Tracking Subcontractors Worker’s Comp Insurance”.
This FREE 13-page eBook will provide you with complete instructions for setting up and maintaining a system for tracking expiration dates of Subcontractors Worker’s Comp AND General Liability Insurance.
5 Responses to QuickBooks Tip – Construction A/P – Tracking Subcontractor Insurance
Nancy Smyth, Sunburst Software Solutions, Inc.QuickBooks Construction & Payroll Expert
I've been using and supporting QuickBooks products since the early 1990's. I've worked with thousands of contractors, assisting them with QuickBooks setup, Certified Payroll Reporting requirements, AIA Billing and Weighted-Average Overtime.
QuickBooks is a powerful product, but learning how to use it in your construction business can be difficult. I hope you find resources available here to be helpful.
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In Arizona, neither Insurance Companies or agents are required to inform us General Contractors when an insurance cert is no longer valid. For us, the Sub-Contractor decided to re-organize his business and fired all of his employees. Therefore as a Sole-Proprietor he is no longer required to have Workers Compensation. I found out in July, 3 months later, when contacting to get the next insurance cert before it expired in August. Only thing I can come up with is to either pay money for something like MyCOI.com or have our office girl call and verify insurance before every new job. RRRGGGGHHHH
What version of QuickBooks are you using? The insurance fields are only available in Premier Contractor and Enterprise Contractor. If you aren’t all using the same version that would be why.
In our QB file, only some users are able to see the insurance fields for Vendors. Is there a setting that must be changed in order for all users to see it?
Hi Misty
It took me awhile to find the Worker’s Comp expires field as well the first time I set up a vendor in QuickBooks (oh, I was ticked!).
First off, the “real” worker’s comp expiration date tracking feature is only available in the Premier or Enterprise Contractor Edition (this info is for other “version” users). Once you Edit the Vendor record -> go to the Additional Info tab and you’ll find that as well as the General Liability Insurance Expires field as well.
Like many long-time QuickBooks users, I get very annoyed when something is moved and I end up searching everywhere I can think of.
If you use the Premier or Enterprise Accountant version, you’ll need to use the “Toggle” feature (from the QuickBooks File menu) and switch to the Contractor version.
Hope this helps.
We updated to quickbooks 2013 recently and there are a lot of things that I am having trouble finding, that was very simple in previous versions. One of the most important features was the workers comp expires checkbox. Which I cannot find ANYWHERE in the 2013 version. I have already taken steps in entering new vendor, additional information, reports and modify reports. nothing. Any suggestions?