← All guides
Enter and pay bills
Enter a bill when it arrives so the books know what you owe; pay it when it is due. Two steps, the way QuickBooks does it, so the A/P Aging report is always right.
- Open VendorsIn Books & Payroll, click Vendors in the left rail. The buttons across the top are Enter Bill, Pay Bills, Apply Checks to Bills, Add Vendor, and 1099s.
- Enter the billClick "Enter Bill." Pick the Vendor (or "+ new vendor"), set the Date, type their invoice number in Ref. No., and set Bill Due or pick Terms (Net 30 fills the due date for you). Under Lines, enter each charge on the invoice with its account; they add up to the Amount Due at the top. Click "Save bill." No money moves yet.
- A credit from the vendorSame form, click the Credit chip instead of Bill. The credit comes off that vendor's open bills, oldest first, and anything left waits for their next bill. For a vendor that bills by monthly statement it waits as a line of its own in Pay Bills, to tick with the bills it goes with.
- Terms and early-pay discountsAdd Vendor, or the pencil beside a vendor, has Terms: Due on receipt, Net (days after the bill), or Monthly statement, with an early-pay discount where the vendor gives one. Each bill then gets its due date and its discount date by itself. In Pay Bills the Disc. Date column shows the last day for the discount; tick a bill by then and Disc. Used and Amt. To Pay take it off. The "pay" window on a single bill offers it the same way.
- Snap it instead of typing it"Snap the receipt" takes a photo or PDF of the invoice and fills the form in. Check the lines, then Save bill.
- See what is dueThe bill list filters by Vendor and by Show: Open bills, All bills, Due this month, Overdue, or a Date range, and "Dates are" switches between due date and bill date. Overdue bills are flagged.
- Pay several bills at onceClick "Pay Bills." Under "Select Bills to be Paid," show bills Due on or before a date or Show all bills, tick the ones to pay, and change Amt. To Pay for a partial payment. Under Payment, set the Date, the Method (Check, ACH / online, or Card), the Account to pay from, and for checks the first number in Assign check number. "Pay Selected Bills" writes one check per vendor and closes the bills.
- Pay a single billClick "pay" on any open bill. Enter the Amount, Date, Method, Check #, and Pay from, then click "Pay bill." If the check or charge is already in the register (it came in from the bank), use Apply Checks to Bills to tie it to the bill instead of paying it again; a vendor credit or return goes on with the credit; anything never to be paid is a write-off to an account.
- Checks you already wrotePaid at the counter, then the bill came in the mail? "Apply Checks to Bills" lists the loose checks and open bills by vendor and suggests to-the-penny matches; approve each one and the bill closes without a second check.
Good to know- Removing a payment from a bill's Pay Bill card takes its check out of the register and reopens the bill. A check that came from the bank and was tied with Apply Checks to Bills stays in the register; only the tie comes off.
- The same bill every month? Memorized, under Banking, enters it with one click.
- A/P Aging under Reports shows who you owe and how late; 1099s shows which vendors get a form at year end.