Quick Books® 2010 All-in-One For Dummies®

Chapter 1. Invoicing Customers

In This Chapter

• Choosing an invoice form

• Customizing an invoice form

• Invoicing a customer

• Billing for time

• Recording a sales receipt

• Recording credit memos

• Receiving customer payments

• Assessing finance charges

QuickBooks provides several tools for invoicing your customers. This chapter describes these tools as well as a handful of related tools for recording customer payments and for issuing credit memos.

If you've already been invoicing customers using some manual method — perhaps you've been preparing invoices with a word processor — you'll find QuickBooks to be a godsend. Not only does QuickBooks make invoicing and related tasks easier, but it also collects invoice information, recording this information into the QuickBooks data file. Happily, this means that you get the extra benefit of recording accounting transactions simply by using QuickBooks for invoicing.

Choosing an Invoice Form

QuickBooks allows you to use an invoice form that matches the requirements of your business. For example, businesses that sell products need an invoice that includes descriptions of the product items that are sold. Businesses that sell services — such as a law firm or an architectural firm — need an invoice that appropriately describes these services. Businesses that sell both products and services need a blend of attributes.

Fortunately, QuickBooks lets you choose the invoice form that best matches your business. To choose an invoice form, display the Create Invoices window ...