QuickBooks® Desktop 2019 has a variety of new and improved features:
Brand New! CUSTOMER INVOICE HISTORY TRACKER – Get real-time visibility of invoice statuses, helps to stay on top of your cash flow.
Included with: QuickBooks Pro, Premier, Accountant 2019 and Enterprise 19.0.
Access via: From a displayed Create Invoices window, click the See History link to the right of the form name (Invoice). A single, consolidated view of the invoice status includes tracking for:
- Invoice created date
- Invoice due date
- Invoice email date and customer name (if invoice is emailed from within QuickBooks using one of the supported email configurations in the Send preferences)
- Invoice viewed date – Internet connection required to see the “viewed” status
- Amount and date of customer Receive Payment recorded in QuickBooks
- Amount and date of Make Deposit recorded in QuickBooks
With real-time customer invoice history information, timely actions can be taken to improve communications with clients about their open receivables. Note: This feature does not work if the QuickBooks user is using Microsoft Outlook 2010.
Brand New! Transfer Credits between jobs of the same Customer – Simplified 1-click transfer of credits across customer jobs to enhance workflow.
Included with: QuickBooks Pro, Premier, Accountant 2019 and Enterprise 19.0.
Access via: For a customer that has open (unapplied) credits, from the main ribbon on a displayed Create Invoices window, select Apply Credits. Features: Efficiently apply customer credits across all jobs of the same selected customer. New column on the Apply Credits window displays the Customer and Job which the credit is currently assigned to. From the Apply Credits window, users can assign that credit to other jobs of the same customer record. QuickBooks records an in/out transaction through an Other Current Asset type account named “Account for Credit Transfer.” This account is added automatically by QuickBooks upon the first instance when a user assigns a credit from one job to another in the Apply Credits window. By default the automatically created account is listed as “inactive” on the Chart of Accounts to discourage users from selecting it during normal transaction entry. Cautions noted with this feature include:
- The transfer of credits from one job to another within the same customer cannot be undone. Any future corrections would need to be done manually using a separate transaction.
- Users without Chart of Accounts access cannot perform the “first” instance of the transfer of credits between jobs. QuickBooks uses the first instance to trigger the creation of the new Other Current Asset account mentioned previously.
- The Transfer of Credits and Apply Credits does not work when in an Accountant’s Copy of the client’s data.
New and Improved! User Prompt to Create a Bill Payment When Using the Write Check – You can now view unpaid bills from a vendor to easily manage payments.
Included with: QuickBooks Pro, Premier, Accountant 2019 and Enterprise 19.0.
Access via: The new “Check for Bills” dialog prompt will display when creating a Write Check for a vendor whom has an OPEN (unpaid) vendor bill(s). From the menu bar, select Banking > Write Check and in the Pay to the Order of field, enter a vendor name that currently has an unpaid vendor bill(s). Features: New and improved prompt helps users avoid using the Write Check transaction type when the proper transaction type should be a vendor Bill Payment. When a user enters a vendor name in the Pay to the Order of field on a Write Check transaction for a vendor that has open vendor bills, QuickBooks displays a NEW “Check for Bills” window. The improvement this year is to prompt users by default to go to “Pay Bills”. When selected, the Pay Bills window will launch already filtered for the selected vendor’s unpaid bills. Users can then select to continue as an option to “Write your check” (this will not assign it to an open vendor bill).
Improved! Inactive Inventory Items can be included in Inventory Report totals:
Included with: QuickBooks Pro, Premier, Accountant 2019 and Enterprise 19.0. Access via: From the menu bar, select Reports > Inventory > Inventory Valuation Summary or Inventory Valuation Detail Features: When preparing the Inventory Valuation reports, users can select to include inactive inventory items. A company’s recommended process would be that all inventory items that are made inactive do not have a quantity on hand in QuickBooks. However, often a business will make inventory items inactive despite having a quantity on hand. In QuickBooks Desktop 2019, users can choose to include inactive inventory items in the Inventory Valuation Summary or Detail report. Including all inventory items in these reports will ensure that the Inventory asset account total on the Balance Sheet and the total Asset Value on the inventory valuation reports can be reconciled.
There are a few new, and/or improved features for payroll:
New! Employee Pay Adjustment History “2018 UPGRADE” later release
Included with: QuickBooks Pro, Premier, Accountant 2018 and Enterprise 18.0 Maintenance Release R3 or newer (to determine the maintenance release of you or your client’s current QuickBooks version, open QuickBooks and from a windows keyboard select the F2 key). Note this was a slipstream release in a later maintenance release of QuickBooks 2018. Access via: From the menu bar, select Reports > Employees & Payroll > Employee Pay Adjustments History. Available in QuickBooks with an active Basic, Enhanced or Assisted payroll subscription. Feature: Track changes to employee pay rates (only hourly, salary, bonus and commission items).
Note: Rates shown on the report are based on existing paycheck data. Rates for salary items display the estimated annualized rate.
Improved! Sick and vacation pay tracking – Easily track accruals of employee sick and vacation time. Included with: QuickBooks Pro, Premier, Accountant 2019 and Enterprise 19.0 with an Enhanced Payroll Subscription.
Access via: To set an employee’s accrual limits for sick or vacation, from the menu bar select, Employees > Employee Center and with an employee selected click the pencil icon to the right. Select the Payroll Info tab and select the Sick/Vacation button to edit the details for that selected employee. Features: Easy tracking and reporting of employee sick and vacation time (sick and vacation accrual requirements vary state by state; customer is responsible for ensuring compliance with applicable laws and regulations). QuickBooks users are warned when saving a paycheck transaction when sick and/or vacation time exceeds the available time for that payroll compensation item. In addition, paystub formatting has been updated to include: Accrued, Used and Available sick and vacation time details.
Improved! Sensitive Payroll Permissions
Included with: QuickBooks Enterprise 19.0. Access via: From the menu bar, select Company > Users > Setup Users and Roles (note: only the Admin user for the file can add or modify users). Features: QuickBooks Enterprise 19.0 provides the Admin for the file with a more definitive view of any permission levels that when assigned to a user, would include access to sensitive payroll transactions.
Admin user warned when assigning a permission that grants payroll transaction access. On the role List dialog, if a role has an asterisk (*) next to the name, that Role permits access to sensitive payroll transactions.
Improved! Easy Upgrade
Included with: QuickBooks Pro (Plus), Premier (Plus) and Enterprise 18.0.
This improvement was a slipstream release in a later maintenance releases of multiple years versions of QuickBooks. Feature: Simple two-click process to install the newest version of QuickBooks Desktop. The entire upgrade processes is automated and the user has the option to retain the older version of QuickBooks (recommended). When the user opens a newly installed version of QuickBooks Desktop, the links to their data file(s) will already be included in the No Company File Open window. This is an improvement from previous year’s versions of QuickBooks when after installing a new version, the user had to browse to find their QuickBooks files for the first time.
Improved! Condense Data File Optimization – Reliably and significantly reduce file size without deleting data – on your own with confidence and ease
Included with: QuickBooks Pro, Premier, Accountant 2019 and Enterprise V 19.0. Access via: From the QuickBooks Accountant menu bar, select Accountant > Condense Data. Optionally, from a client’s version of QuickBooks from the menu bar, select File > Utilities > Condense Data. Features: Reliably reduce a QuickBooks company file size without deleting data. When choosing to condense data, there is the option to keep all transactions and only remove the audit trail. Behind the scenes QuickBooks also cleans up a few performance logs and other technical details, resulting in an estimated 32 percent file size reduction.
Improved! Move QuickBooks to another computer
Included with: QuickBooks Pro, Premier, Accountant 2018 and Enterprise 18.0. This was a slipstream release in a later maintenance release of QuickBooks 2018.
Access via: From the menu bar, select File > Utilities > Move QuickBooks to another computer. Feature: This tool moves your QuickBooks program and associated files (up to three) company data files easily to a new computer. To move the QuickBooks data file seamlessly your client will need:
- Old computer where current data file resides
- A thumb drive
- New computer with an internet connection
When the feature is launched on the old computer and the QuickBooks user plugs-in the thumb drive, the tool automatically copies the files needed to install the program and files on a new computer. The files include the QuickBooks program version, license details, attachments, templates, etc. A comprehensive list can be reviewed in this knowledge base article.
Improved! IIF (Intuit Interchange Format) List and Data Imports
Included with: QuickBooks Pro, Premier, Accountant 2019 and Enterprise 19.0.
Access via: If exporting from one QuickBooks file to another: from the menu bar, select File > Utilities > Export > Lists to IIF Files and select the Lists you wish to export to an IIF formatted file. From the new QuickBooks file, select File > Utilities > Import > IIF Files and browse to the IIF file created for import. QuickBooks users can also create an IIF formatted worksheet and manually add data for import. You can learn more about IIF export/import functionality by reading this knowledge base article. Features: Method of importing lists or data into QuickBooks that has been available for many years. Improved IIF importing, validates the data to be imported. Creates a file of records that cannot be imported, permitting the user to fix the errors and import the corrected records separately. IIF import supports both lists and transactions.
Note: Importing any data into QuickBooks requires a certain amount of knowledge about how each of the data components being imported is used by QuickBooks. In the example displayed here, there was a Payment Term assigned to vendor records in the vendor import file that was not included with the import data on the IIF formatted worksheet, resulting in the reported errors.
Improved! Intuit Data Protect
Included with: QuickBooks Pro, Premier, Accountant 2019 and Enterprise 19.0.
Access via: From the file menu, select Back Up Company > Setup / Activate Online Backup Features: Seamless and automated data backup and restore. Intuit Data Protect is an online backup service that helps you and your clients protect their data from loss or damage by automatically backing up the QuickBooks data file (Intuit Data Protect uses latest online version of data protection/backup software that optimizes backup speed. Additional fees may apply). Users may also choose to include other critical data or documents in their backup routine. This year’s release improves the user setup experience and provides options for being notified about the success and/or failure of scheduled backups.
QuickBooks for Mac 2019
New and Updated! QuickBooks Mac 2019
Included with: QuickBooks for Mac 2019.
Features: It’s back! QuickBooks for Mac has a new update for 2019 (the last update was for year 2016). Here are a few of the features released with the update:
iCloud Document Sharing – Convenient method for sharing QuickBooks for Mac file using iCloud sync. Modify your books on your work Mac computer then continue where you left off on your home Mac computer.
Bank and or Credit Card Reconcile Discrepancy Report – Identifies changes made to reconciled transactions (for newly created transactions, not those prior to this release).
Square Import – Importing sales data from Square via use of .csv file type.
Email Tracking – Track dates emails sent with a tab in the Vendor or Customer Centers.
Report Windows – Improved spacing and readability.
User Passwords – Now required. Personal information is encrypted.
***NOTE – Be sure to update regularly, as new features may be released.
Learn more about all QuickBooks products including the QBOnline versions:
https://quickbooks.intuit.com/products/
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