When you get your monthly statement, reconcile it like you would your checking account. After you reconcile, a box will pop-up asking if you’d like to Enter a Bill to make a payment. Click yes and the amount you want to pay (you can always change this later).

If you want to enter it manually in Enter Bills, the account for the payment needs to be the Credit Card account NOT an expense account.

Pay your bill like you would any other, and you’re all set.

One more thing–when entering your credit card expenses in the Enter Credit Card Charges screen, if you are doing job costing (Contractors) or grant tracking (Nonprofits) use Items. Otherwise, use Expenses.

The best way to do this is to use items that point to a WIP account on the balance sheet instead of an expense account. You can do the same thing using the expense tab instead of items, but I find using items gives you better information.

When you sell the home, you’ll need to prepare a journal entry to expense the WIP associated with that home off the balance sheet and onto the P&L.

If you handle your own payroll taxes, the amount you pay your payroll provider is lower than your salary expense because of employee deductions.

If your payroll service handles your payroll taxes, the amount you pay is higher because employer-paid payroll taxes are tacked on.

The key to entering your payroll correctly is to understand the difference between gross and net payroll. Gross payroll is the total amount you pay your employees before deductions. This is your payroll expense. Net payroll is what your employees are paid after deductions. This is a mixture of payroll expense and payroll liabilities that need to be paid sometime in the future–things like state and federal payroll taxes, medical insurance, 401(k) contributions, etc. These things are not payroll expenses because your employee is paying them rather than you.

Sound too complicated? Then I highly recommend using Intuit’s Assisted or Enhanced Payroll instead. It will make these calculations for you automatically, and if you are doing any sort of job costing you’ll go crazy using an outside service.

If you have payments in undeposited funds that have already been deposited, you are probably over-reporting your income. To correct this, find the deposits and note the account you used (most likely an income account). Then go back to the Make Deposits screen and select all the Undeposited Funds that have already been deposited. Add a line at the bottom of the deposit, with a negative deposit amount using the income account that you used when you made the other deposits. This will make a $0 deposit into your account, reduce your revenue down to the correct amount, and clear out your undeposited funds.

When making deposits in the future, select each payment included in the deposit you’re about to make from the undeposited funds screen first. Then add any additional deposit items that aren’t listed to the deposit so that it matches up to the total amount of the deposit you’re making.