Quickbooks rant: Why can't it be user friendly?
@bagarad (14283)
Paso Robles, California
September 18, 2011 3:45am CST
I admit to hating figures and I've never learned bookkeeping skills. But I've been using and abusing Quickbooks since 2003 at least. I've been putting off my day of reckoning my sales receipts and bank deposits since June 16, and tonight was the big night to catch up. Everything went well until I downloaded my bank transactions. I had been rushing to get the deposit to the bank and accidently wrote the deposit for $224 instead of the correct sum of $222. So the bank sent me a deposit correction notice. That should be easy to fix, right? Not quite. The transactions downloaded in Quickbooks from the bank show both the $224 and the $2.00 correction, but that doesn't match the amount that Quickbooks showed on the deposit slip as I sent it to Quickbooks. I spent half and hour trying to find a way to tell Quickbooks to just add the two unmatched transactions and it would come out right. There has got to be a way to make this correction without making the transaction impossible to download again. But the way it is now, it's not going on to the register anyway. For a stupid $2.00 mistake I don't want to buy another support plan for Quickbooks so I can ask this one question. I'm hoping I can find an answer to this question without paying a fortune.
Anyone else have anything to say for or against QB being user friendly? Maybe I'm just too dumb to get it.
2 people like this
5 responses
@suspenseful (40192)
• Canada
18 Sep 11
I was thinking of trying Quickbooks but did not like it. I do not link my program with the online banking because it is from Europe and does not link to Canadian banks. I also use a spreadsheet. So cannot help you.
2 people like this
@suspenseful (40192)
• Canada
18 Sep 11
I like things nice and easy. Why I even find it difficult to make my spreadsheet. For instance it I have money left over in a category does it remain in a category or go over to as category that has a negative balance. The one I used is MoneyManager Ex and it allows you to put in your own category. REal good for me who likes to put in extra ones. And I use a spreadsheet to sort of estimate how much I pay.
1 person likes this
@flowerchilde (12529)
• United States
19 Sep 11
I've never used Quickbooks but there's been other times I've had a computer or program glitch and I've found that going away from it for a while, some times the answer of what's needed or how to do something comes to me.. and usually it's something simple, but I couldn't see it while being busy with it.. Good Luck!! wish I knew more about it..
2 people like this
@pergammano (7682)
• Canada
18 Sep 11
Can't add anything beneficial here...bagarad, as I TRULY ended up dispensing with QB two years back, mainly due to the fact that I could NOT make adjustments..like you! And the truth of the matter is I have gone back to the ways of the past, and am manually preparing my year-end, and almost enjoying it..LOL! Kinda fulfilling, but I do need to step up my game, and do a monthly reconciliation (that takes discipline--used to do it when I owned the Marina) but now I tend to be lax about it, as it is much less complicated being self-employed and paying Contract Labour to others, as I am NOT responsible for Gov't. deductions. Even teaching me to be neat and tidy again, in writing and figures, so that my accountant can decipher
! Have a great day, and I am sure some-one here will have your answers! cheers!1 person likes this
@bagarad (14283)
• Paso Robles, California
18 Sep 11
So you also found Quickbooks was not user friendly. It simply serves as a tool for me, but I could never give it to an accountant as a real set of books, since it is riddled with errors that go back years. It does help me remember who owes me money and how far overdue they are. It also helps me remember to whom I owe money and when I have paid it.
1 person likes this
@pergammano (7682)
• Canada
19 Sep 11
YES...out with Quickbooks for me! At least I can find and correct my own errors, and there isn't a little gremlin terrorizing me, and fraughting me with challenges, I have NO concept of how to irradicate. Even my accountant has assuaged me by saying...just do what you do, and forget the QB's..and I am happy with that!! LOL!
@drannhh (15219)
• United States
20 Sep 11
I am on hold from support from a phone company and have been listening to their AWFUL elevator music (screeching and cackling) almost an hour while working at the computer, and so I'[m a bit distracted and started to view your discussion as Cookbooks instead of Quickbooks. Aw shucks. Well I have never used Quickbooks, as I do my budget with a relational database that I can define myself and access either online or from a cellphone. Sounds like Quickbooks has been abusing you instead of the other way around, though.
1 person likes this
@bagarad (14283)
• Paso Robles, California
5 Oct 11
I wish I know how to use Excel or Access to do what I'd like, but I just never mastered it. I just have to accept that helps me do some jobs, and I have to ignore a lot of data that is inaccurate.
@dorannmwin (36392)
• United States
20 Sep 11
I don't use quickbooks because of the fact that I just don't think that it would work for me, and I also am a person that doesn't mind to work with numbers at all. With that said, it won't let you import a deposit correction? That is really strange because just a couple weeks ago my husband made a mistake on his deposit statement at the bank and even our bank account shows a deposit correction on the statement instead of just amending the original deposit.
1 person likes this
@bagarad (14283)
• Paso Robles, California
5 Oct 11
The deposit correction is in the bank statement I downloaded but I just wrote too much on the deposit slip. The bank showed the uncorrected amount that was written on the deposit slip as the deposit amount before it was corrected. It may be I can delete the deposit and then enter a new deposit that includes the correction in the amount on the Quickbooks deposit slip, but it's a real pain in the neck. I had actually forgotten all about this until I came back to this discussion, because I haven't gone back to that statement.
