Negative showing for both bill and payment

Pleased to see you here, @seong.

Welcome to the Community! I appreciate you for sharing a screenshot of what you're seeing on your end. Allow me to share some information on why you're seeing negative amounts on your Vendor's information.

For starters, negative figures on your vendor's transactions list indicates something that you've paid to them. This will show on the Amounts column. However, if there's  negative balance in Accounts Payables can sometimes mean that bills were entered. And checks were written against it, but the original bills somehow got deleted or voided. The bill-payment checks are left “hanging” in the system, creating a negative balance in A/P.

If you notice a negative balance in A/P, or even if you have certain vendors who show a negative balance in the Vendor list, here's how to fix it:

1. Go to the Reports.
2. Select Vendors & Payables.
3. Choose the Unpaid Bills Detail report.
4. Scan through the report and look for negative amounts.
5. If you see any, double click on them.
   • Once you open the bill-payment check, look at the lower half of the screen. Possibly, there will be no bill located here, no amount at all, nothing to indicate that this check was applied to a bill.
   • If so, leave this window open, here's how:
     1. Click the Vendors menu.
     2. Choose Enter Bills.
     3. Enter a bill to the vendor you just saw on the last screen. Be sure to use the same amount you saw on the check. You will need to guess as to the correct due date – better yet, try to locate the original bill so you can get correct information off it.
     4. Click Save& Close.

If you need further help on the steps above, I’d recommend reaching out to our Customer Care Team. A specialist will be able to access your account in a secured environment and further assist you via remote access session.

Here's how to contact us:

1. Visit: https://help.quickbooks.intuit.com/en_US/contact.
2. Choose your QuickBooks Product.
3. Select your QuickBooks Version.
4. On the Contact Us page, click a topic.
5. Click on the Get Phone Number button to see the support number.

Feel free to drop a comment below if you have other questions about any unexpected behavior in QuickBooks while managing your income and expense transactions.  I’ll be here anytime you need my assistance.

In your response, even though it is "correct" because both sources are credits show as negative numbers, it is still confusing to read.  Is there a way for the bill to be a positive nd the payment of it to be a negative?

Hello there, @JSmith092653.

Let me share with you how you can make a negative amount in the expense transactions into a positive figure.

Bill transactions will show up as a negative expense if you haven't applied them to a payment yet. Once you've paid the bill, the bill-payment will display a positive amount on both Account Payable (A/P), and into the bank accounts transactions when you run vendor reports.

On the other hand, if this is an inventory item, make sure to select an asset account as the posting account and not the expense account. 

You can also verify if the bill-payment was linked to the correct bill, since it may lead to a negative expense. If not, you need to delete it and apply the payment to the accurate one so figures will appear as positive.

Additionally, I'll reference these articles to give you more details in paying bills and understanding the Chart of Accounts in QuickBooks Desktop:

• Understand the chart of accounts in QuickBooks
• Pay bills in QuickBooks Desktop

Feel free to leave a comment if you have more questions in mind. I'll reply as fast as I can. Have a great weekend!

Is this something new?? This just started happening intermittently between 2 of the systems in my office. Where an invoice shows up as a negative, a few days later goes back to a positive amount...... We have been utilizing QuickBooks for over 20 years. This has never happened prior to about 2-3 weeks ago.

Why would this all of a sudden happen, also today showed my main liabilities as a huge negative amount and some of the other liability payments an very large amounts, when the amount in reality is a $50 weekly payment amount.....Are my reports I am generating showing correct amounts? Are my liabilities and A/P reports correct? Who knows??

Thanks for joining this thread, sheylasr.

Let’s run the Verify and Rebuild Data Utilities to fix the incorrect data showing in your QuickBooks. The former identifies any potential data damage. While the Rebuild Data utility repairs damaged transactions in your company file.

Here’s how:

1. Go to the File menu at the top to choose Utilities and Rebuild Data.
2. Click OK to create a backup of the company file.
3. Press Save to keep the copy.
4. Hit the OK button once the Rebuild is completed.
5. Then, go back to the File menu to choose Utilities and Verify Data.

If it finds an issue, click Rebuild and perform Steps 2-3 in the following article: Fix damaged transactions in QuickBooks Desktop.

For additional resources, this guide provides an overview of the steps on how to resolve data issues: Fix data damage on your QuickBooks Desktop company file.

Keep me posted if you need further assistance performing with any of these steps. I’ll get back to make sure you’re taken care of.

Are you still here. I have exactly this problem now.

It started in 2021 when I paid several bills for a particular vendor and Liabilities turned -ve. This vendor does have a -ve amount in the Unpaid Bill Details - where I see a Check paid.

How can I correct this?

Thank for reaching out to us, @stockman.

My colleagues have share some helpful information to help you review where the negative entry comes from. You can also run some reports and compare the balances. Another option is to toggle the payment, by removing and applying it again.

If that doesn't fix it after the recommended troubleshooting from this thread, I do recommend reaching out to our Support Team. To get a live representative, use the following steps in your account:

1. On your QuickBooks company file, click the Help menu.
2. Tap the QuickBooks Desktop Help option.
3. Press Contact us on the pop-up box.
   
4. Click on the Search for Something else button then type your concern in the Ask us anything box.
5. Hit Search, then scroll down to get your contact options.

You can also use this link to contact us and see our support availability: Contact QuickBooks Desktop support.

I want to make sure you're taken care of, please come back here anytime for updates and additional questions. I'll be right here if you need other help.

This issue with entering a Bill is that that bill will be on the books forever and cannot be paid since it will affect the bank account balances - especially, in my case, where it was entered over 10 year ago.