How do I add supplier invoices to the A/P and then allocate the bank payments to multiple invoices. It seems to want to assume cash accounting.. but we get invoiced

I'd be pleased to help you manage your A/P, stephen-panasl-c.

We can record the invoices or bills including the VAT in QuickBooks Online and pay them at once using the Pay bills option.

Here's how to add invoices/bills:

1. Click + New in the left panel and choose Bill. See the sample screenshots below.
   
2. Choose the Supplier's name.
3. Enter the necessary information including the VAT.
   
4. Hit Save and close.

Once saved, let's pay the invoices or bills through the Pay bills section. This process allows us to record and allocate the payments to multiple invoices. We can refer to this article for detailed instructions: Enter bills and record bill payments in QuickBooks Online.

In case you need help with managing your expenses in QuickBooks Online, check this write-up: Expenses and suppliers. This will provide us with links to how your expense transactions work in QuickBooks.

I'm always here should you have any follow-up questions or concerns, stephen-panasl-c. Wishing you and your business continued success!

Clicking that option takes me to the upgrade page.. I have Simple Start package. So does this mean that basic supplier invoices and payments are not included? Assuming this is included in the "manage suppliers" this means I need to upgrade not even to Essentials but to Plus which is going from £12->£32/mo?

Just to be able to pay suppliers.. I can't think of anything more basic than receiving invoices and making payments, or am I missing something here? I could manually split every bank payment down but thats extra work and I'd also be breaking the VAT rules which require reporting on the invoice not payment date.

thanks

Steve 

Sorry to reply to myself, but I thought of some fundamental issues in thinking if there can be a workaround, perhaps this isn't obvious to US developers but in UK/EU we have VAT and that makes for strict accounting rules as you can be audited at any time and receive fines if you don't record it correctly. Problems without normal supplier bill entry + payment:

1) Anything by direct debit - an invoice will be sent and it will usually specify when payment will be taken, this can be within a day or two but is most often most of a month later, so a big gap between invoice date and payment date (and VAT needs to be recorded at the invoice date and in the correct VAT period.

2) Anything covering multiple invoices, supplier credit. All our product suppliers provide next day delivery and invoice at that time but they take payment by direct debit later, between 2 and 4 weeks after and include all the bills outstanding on a single payment.

3) Any utility, eg my water bill, they direct debit the same amount monthly and then take a meter read and invoice every 6 months, there is always a +/- balance on the account, this is also how electricity and gas are usually billed in the UK.

4) Different VAT rates. In winter we use more gas and pay 20% VAT whereas in summer its 5% as the rate is based on the consumption for the month. You must enter the invoice and correct VAT rate, these do not correspond to the payments as per (3).

Similarly our suppliers in (2), most items are charged at 20% but essential goods eg fresh fruit, milk, meat, veg are charged 0%, these will be on the same invoice so need to be split, the payment of the invoices occurs later as mentioned.

So I think QBO approach works for cash accounting businesses, or non-VAT registered but the minute you involve VAT or a direct debit it doesn't, and since even basic utilities work this way, unless you're literally a sole trader selling accounting services say with no suppliers you're out of luck on anything but QBO highest packages, which from the package descriptions isn't what I think they intend.

Hello there, @stephen-panasl-c. I'm here to provide information about adding supplier invoices to QuickBooks Online (QBO). 

I appreciate you sharing details about your concern. Thanks also for providing a list of situations that needs to be entered correctly to align with your country's accounting rules. 

In QBO, a supplier's invoice (bill) is only available in the Essentials, Plus, and Advanced versions of QBO. To use this feature, you might want to consider upgrading your subscription. Once done, you can now refer to the steps outlined by my colleague, Rose-A in recording your A/P transactions. 

For reference, feel free to check this article: Track bills and record the payments.

I'd love to know how this goes. I'm just a post away to lend a hand if you have additional concerns about adding supplier invoices in the program. Don't hesitate to leave a comment below and I'll get back to you as soon as possible. Have a great week ahead and take care. 

Hi Divina,

 in the UK subscription options, Essentials adds tracking billable hours, you need Plus to "manage suppliers", which I'm assuming the supplier billing features are in? I'm trying to attach the screenshot to show what I see..

thanks

Steve

Thanks for coming back and bringing this one to our attention, stephen-panasl-c.

We appreciate you for providing us with a screenshot of the pricing plan. The Manage Bills feature is both available for QuickBooks Online Plus and Essentials version. You can visit this link for the updated pricing plan level and features: QuickBooks Pricing | QuickBooks Prices | QuickBooks UK (intuit.com). 

If you need to upgrade your subscription, just follow the s steps below:

1. Sign in to QuickBooks Online as a primary or company admin.
2. Click the Gear icon and then Account and settings.
3. Select the Billing & Subscription tab.
4. Make sure your payment info is up-to-date.
5. In the QuickBooks Online section, choose Upgrade your plan.
6. Review the available plans and then select Choose plan.
7. Follow the on-screen steps to upgrade your plan.

Here's an article you can refer to for more details about upgrading or downgrading your QuickBooks Online subscription. Let me share some resources that you can browse and use as a reference in managing and navigating your QuickBooks account.

• Video Tutorials for QuickBooks Online - You can watch videos that can help you perform the most vital features of the program.
• Small Business Webinars and Trainings - Join our live QuickBooks webinars for more in-depth knowledge on how you can maximize the use of QuickBooks to manage your finances.

 I can assist you with other tasks and processes in QuickBooks Online. Just leave your questions or concerns here and I'll answer them. Have a great weekend. 

Thanks for all the answers from your team.

I'll continue to trial QB, if I may give some feedback for you to pass on though - I run a small shop, hence why I have electricity and water bills and daily deliveries. If I was a self employed accountant where I need to track my time, bill my clients and collect payments with no real running costs I can see that QB is setup perfectly for this and the upgraded plans scale as that accountant hires staff and partners.

However, that working professional is earning a lot more money than someone running a small shop so it appears backwards that professionals can access the features on the basic plan, but a more traditional business like retail/shops need to go for advanced plans just to be able to input their water bills. I can understand why things like POs fall into advanced but for the reasons mentioned around VAT rules and the prevalence of credit and direct debit in the UK, to me these should really be featured in the basic plans too with the more complex things staying on the upgrades.

I hope the feedback is helpful. It will cost me more to move to QB than my accountant, unless I take the basic QB and just enter the ledger totals every quarter and file it. I'm considering that but it seems a shame to have so many nice features like the bank imports and rules there but fall down because of VAT and supplier credit accounts.

Here's how a UK utility bill looks, every single person renting a store has this, note the monthly payments don't match the total which is based on meter reads, also note the VAT is split between 0% and 20% rates:

thanks

Steve

Thanks for sharing this detailed feedback Steve, we appreciate how access to these features would be standard for any small-medium business and we'll certainly pass on recommendation for the inclusion of these in our lower plans. In the meantime, utility bills can be entered using an expense transaction (+ new > expense) split over multiple lines to allow for more than one VAT code to be assigned. If you need any further guidance on how to enter this, just get back to us below. :)