How to use custom fields

[0:00] You can use enhanced custom fields in QuickBooks Online Advanced to track anything you want, such as the sales rep responsible for a sale, customer number, or the beginning and ending dates of work on a job. You can set up custom fields for customer and vendor records, as well as on transactions.

[0:18] As an example, we'll go over setting up sales reps and then show you how to run a report to find the total sales for each sales rep. To start, select Settings and then Custom Fields, and finally Add custom field. Enter a label for the new field or choose one of the suggestions. Just call it whatever you're trying to track. Then choose the kind of information it is.

[0:42] If you want to track something like sales reps, you could choose Text, but you'd need to type the sales rep's name every time you record a sale. So instead, you can set up a new dropdown list with all of your sales reps' names. If this is something you want to assign to your customers or vendors that isn't already in QuickBooks, select Customer or Vendor.

[1:05] From now on, you'll see the new field whenever you create or edit a customer or vendor profile. Then, if you want that same information to appear on transactions or projects, you can choose which forms you want it to show up on.

[1:19] In this example, Sales Rep isn't assigned to a customer or a vendor and only needs to appear on transactions, specifically sales transactions like sales receipts and invoices. Select Print on form if you want customers or vendors to see your custom field when you print or email a transaction. Save the custom field. This is where you track your custom fields and where they appear.

[1:45] A check mark means the custom field is available on that form, and a printer means the field appears on the form when you print or email it. Just record a transaction like you normally would, and then enter the new data in the enhanced custom field.

[2:01] After recording the information a few times on transactions, QuickBooks lets you filter information on reports or reorder your reports using the new data. Let's build a report that shows the sales for each sales rep. Start with a normal sales report, like a Sales by Customer Summary or Detail report.

[2:21] Right now, this report shows every line of every sales transaction in the report's date range, and everything is totaled by the customer. But select Groups in the Customize menu, and you can organize the report using your custom sales rep field. Now the report shows the company's sales organized and totaled by sales rep.

[2:41] You can even save the customization if you want to run this report again later. Now you can set up custom fields to track anything that's important to your business