How do I set up account to track employee's commissions-build up /reduce when paid. Cost must be charged to project to reduce profit. JE to increase/decrease?

Commissions are paid from gross $ on project.  Would I do a JE - service item "commissions" to debit customer, and same to credit commissions account?  QB online "help" is so tedious to try to get an answer from, and not much help!  I know there's a way to do it because a previous employer was able to.  

Thanks for getting back to us, @rachel12_2. 

I'll help add some information with tracking your employee's commissions and project costs. 

If you've already performed the steps provided by my colleague above and created paychecks, these will show as income on your employee's W-2. If these are regular checks, these will not appear on the form. 

Tracking your project labor costs is a two-part process. First, you'll need to calculate the hourly cost rate for each worker. Then, you’ll be able to add project timesheets using your hourly cost rates. Here's how to track your hourly time costs: 

1. Go to Plus (+) at the upper right. 
2. Select Weekly Timesheet.
3. Select your worker and the week you’re entering time for from the drop-down menus.
4. Select the project from the Choose a customer or project drop-down menu. This will tag the timesheet to the project.
5. Fill out the timesheet. 
6. You can check the Billable (/hr) and edit the billable rate (the price you’re charging your customers) if you plan to invoice your customer for specific project hours.

If you’re using TSheets, you can approve time in QuickBooks and import your timesheets directly into projects.

When you're ready, go to Workers and Select Employees tab. Then, you can run payroll for them. 

The steps above will help you track project costs and profits. You can check out this article for your useful reference: Track Income, Costs, and Profitability by Project. 

Keep in touch with me how it goes, @rachel12_2. Rest assured, the Community will always have your back. Stay positive always!