QuickBooks 2005: The Missing Manual

Generating Tax Reports

Whether your accountant has the honor of preparing your taxes or you keep that excitement for yourself, you can save accountant's fees and your own sanity by making sure your company file is ready for tax season. The key to a smooth transition from QuickBooks to tax preparation is linking each account in your Chart of Accounts to the correct tax line and tax form.

Figure 15-3. " in the Tax Line column, you'll have to assign a tax line to that account. To edit an account, press Ctrl+A to display the Chart of Accounts. Select the account and press Ctrl+E to open the Edit Account dialog box. In the Tax Line entry drop-down list, choose the tax form for that account.

Check the tax readiness of your accounts by choosing Reports → Accountant & Taxes → Income Tax Preparation. QuickBooks displays a report showing every account, its type, and the tax line to which you assigned it, as shown in Figure 15-3.

Sharing the Company File with Your Accountant

If you work with an accountant who uses QuickBooks, there are times when a tug of war over your company file is inevitable. You want to perform your day-to-day bookkeeping, but your accountant wants to review your books, correct mistakes you've made, enter journal entries to prepare your books for end-of-quarter or end-of-year reports, and so on. With a QuickBooks accountant's review copy, you and your accountant can stop ...