paycheck

Are Your QuickBooks Payroll & Certified Payroll Processes Efficient?

Published February 12, 2014 | By Nancy Smyth

Ask any business owner how efficient he thinks his payroll and certified payroll processes are and I'm betting he'll either say "oh they are very efficient" or "they could be better". I attended a really great webinar called "A Tale of Two Payroll Processes" a couple of weeks ago, hosted by CPA Practice Advisor and presented by TSheets. During this webinar I learned some alarming facts that immediately took me back about 15 years to a time when I was doing a ton of payroll and certified payroll processes manually and literally wanted to tear my hair out.

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How To Create a Payroll Deduction Authorization Form Using the QuickBooks Letters function

Published October 25, 2013 | By Nancy Smyth

Payroll management isn't an easy task and certainly involves more than just getting paychecks distributed in a timely manner. One area that businesses seem to have a hard time with is putting a plan in place to ensure payroll deduction authorization forms are properly collected and errors are prevented. Payroll deduction authorization forms are a must if you are taking money out of an employees paycheck for anything other than required payroll taxes. Yes, I know - more paperwork! You can implement a simple system in which the authorization forms can be numbered as they come in and a log may be maintained to help keep track of the forms. QuickBooks can help you to automate this process and even help you store this information electronically by attaching the authorization form to the employee record. Also, be sure to let employees know when the deductions will take effect. Generally, deductions would activate during the following payroll processing period after they were received.

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Recording & Tracking Employee Personal Tool Purchases

Published October 22, 2013 | By Nancy Smyth

Quite often, especially in the construction industry, an employee will purchase tools for their own personal use; either using a company credit card or through a tool vendor account. While most employers don't mind an occasional purchase such as this, it's important for you (as the bookkeeper) to track this information and make sure that the employee actually pays the company back for these purchases. This blog post will provide you with instructions on how to track this in QuickBooks and provide tips for handling this situation if you use an outside payroll service.

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Confused About Payroll Deductions and Payroll Liabilities?

Published May 8, 2013 | By Nancy Smyth

Are you confused about payroll deductions and payroll liabilities? If so, don't feel alone! They can confuse a lot of people.

As bookkeepers we see a lot of things that we feel to be "odd" when dealing with payroll deductions. From the normal employee advance and repayments, to deductions for Fed-Ex or UPS fees, tool repayments, voluntary disability payments, you name it!

The question always seems to center around - is this really a company expense and how the heck do I record these transactions?

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Entering Historical Paychecks – Payroll Taxes and the Accounts They Post To

Published April 18, 2013 | By Nancy Smyth

Setting up QuickBooks payroll and entering historical data can be quite confusing. Thankfully, there is a built in Payroll Setup Wizard that will help you through the rough spots; like creating payroll tax items and accounts and entering historical payroll data.

Still there are choices to make. Will you be processing future payrolls through QuickBooks - if so you'll need a payroll subscription. If you use an outside payroll service and just want to get that payroll data into your company file - then turning on manual payroll might be the way to go.

When it comes to entering historical data, there are a couple of ways to do it. But the method you choose should be based on how valuable job-costed payroll is.

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Job Costing Payroll When Using a Payroll Service

Published November 7, 2012 | By Nancy Smyth

Using an outside payroll service, such as Paychecx or ADP, is a popular option for many business owners. While using a payroll service often provides many benefits one of the biggest challenges or drawbacks is for the company that needs job costing. See this question submitted by a reader.

My company uses a 3rd party to do all of our payroll. We receive an itemized report back showing what we spent for the week. I am having trouble trying to get this information charged out to individual jobs. I track all of the hours separately in Excel, with estimated costs. How can I job cost this information?

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