QuickBooks 2005: The Missing Manual

Setting Up Payroll Items

If you've created invoices for billing your customers, you won't be surprised that the first payroll task is setting up items for each element on a payroll check. For example, you'll need payroll items for employee income: salary, wages, and additional income such as bonuses or commissions. You'll need items for each type of taxes withheld, including federal taxes, state taxes, Social Security (FICA), Medicare and so on. Finally, you must set up payroll items for other items, such as employee benefits, whether they deduct from the paycheck or not. For example, if the company pays some or all of employees' health insurance premiums, payroll items deduct the employee paid portion, but show the company-paid portion as income.

WORKAROUND WORKSHOP : Adding Payroll Transactions Without a QuickBooks Payroll Service

Lots of companies use outsourced payroll services, such as ADP or Paychex, to avoid the brain damage of figuring out tax deductions and complying wth payroll regulations. When you use a service such as these, you send payroll data to the service and receive reports about the payroll transactions that they processed. The payroll service takes care of remitting payroll taxes and other deductions to the appropriate agencies.

The problem is that none of these payroll transactions appear in your QuickBooks company file.

Fortunately, you don't have to enter the detail into QuickBooks. In fact, you can create one transaction that distributes the money from your ...