Categories: Job Cost Accounting, QuickBooks Accounting Software

Intuit's QuickBooks software is the job cost accounting software of choice for nearly one-fourth of construction contractors with annual revenue of $5 million or less, according to the latest CFMA Information Technology survey. Our reviews of QuickBooks software show that small contractors choose QuickBooks for a number of reasons, among them customer support and ease of use.

In every software application, though, there is a particular task that cannot be easily explained or a menu that cannot be easily located. In some cases, a co-worker may know the answer; at small construction companies, though, there may be no other co-worker to turn to.
 
In these cases, a good source of best practices is the books published by those with experience in both the use of QuickBooks software and the rigors of the industries that rely on the software. Kathy Ivens, author of QuickBooks 2008 The Official Guide, QuickBooks 2008 The Official Guide and more than 50 other computer books, is a senior contributing editor for Windows IT Pro Magazine. Cindy Fox, author of QuickBooks 2007 QuickSteps, is a small business consultant and QuickBooks software beta tester.
 
Readers of ConstructionSoftwareReview.com can download, as free PDF files, excerpts from the aforementioned titles. To download the PDFs, click on the links below -- left-click to open the documents now and right-click to save the files and read them later.
 
 
QuickBooks 2008 The Official Guide aims to show readers how to set up a financial management system for their small business and use that system for tasks such as managing payroll, processing invoices, reconciling bank accounts and logging transactions. (Along with some feature enhancements, QuickBooks 2008 is compatible with Windows Vista.)
 
Chapter 23, Budgets and Planning Tools, begins by showing readers how QuickBooks software handles budgets and balance sheets. From there, Ivens demonstrates how to configure a budget, compare a budget to actual figures (in both charts and graphs), export a budget as an Excel or .IIF file and use a budget to project cash flows. 
 
 
QuickBooks 2007 The Official Guide also focuses on setting up a financial management system for a small business. Chapter 10, Receiving and Tracking Customer Payments, covers invoices, payments (including the all-important task of depositing payments into your bank account), cash sales, statements and customer and job reports. This chapter also shows you how to apply discounts to customers who pay on time and impose finance charges to those who don't.

Finally, QuickBooks 2007 QuickSteps uses color screenshots to walk users through the process of setting up QuickBooks software. Each chapter presents shortcuts for common tasks, alternate ways of accomplishing certain tasks, pitfalls to avoid and helpful reminders.
 
Chapter 9, Paying Employees and Taxes and Tracking Time, shows users how to enter employee information into QuickBooks, track employee hours, edit paychecks, set up and pay payroll taxes and more.
 
*** Excerpted from the following books:
 
 Copyright 2006-2007. Published by McGraw-Hill Professional. Reprinted with permission.