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Sambrose
Level 1

Past Due Payments and Paying Bills Past the Due Date

I have problems with vendors that pay me past the due date. If I record the payment on the late date that they paid it shows up on my P&L Cash as the date paid but it shows up on my P&L Accrual as the date billed. We do our accounting as Cash but shouldn't the Cash & Accrual P&L's match?

 

Also, on bills. I enter the bill with the bill date and the due date. If we don't get paid until after the due date, I pay the bill and record the past due date as the payment date. When I print out my P&L Cash it doesn't show the transaction at all. When I print my P&L Accrual it shows up as a transaction paid late. 

 

I tried to fix it by changing my due dates to a date way in the future but that is not realistic because then I cant tell when invoices or bills are actually due. Please help.

5 Comments 5
ChristieAnn
QuickBooks Team

Past Due Payments and Paying Bills Past the Due Date

Welcome back to QuickBooks Community, Sambrose. I'll share information about the difference between Cash and Accrual in QuickBooks Online and how it works.

 

Cash and accrual are two methods of reporting income and expenses. The same report can paint a different picture depending on the method you pick.

 

When you use the Cash method in reports, your report counts income or expenses as though they happened when you got the payment or paid the bill. That's the reason the entry shows up on P&L Cash as the date paid. If you sent an invoice or got a bill but the money hasn’t changed hands yet, your report doesn’t include it in your income or expenses.

 

When you use the accrual method in reports, your report counts income and expenses as if they happened when you sent the invoice or got the bill and it includes income and expenses even if the money hasn’t changed hands yet.

 

On the other hand, when printing out P&L Cash, you'll have to make sure that the report date range is set to when you paid the bill. If the issue persists and seems to act unusual, stored cache files on your browser can sometimes cause this to happen. I recommend logging in to your QuickBooks account using a private browser. This is to rule out the possibility of a webpage issue, and private browsing doesn't store local files or cache.

 

 

Use these keyboard shortcuts based on the browser you're using.

 

  • For Firefox or Microsoft Edge, press Ctrl + Shift + P.
  • For Chrome, press Ctrl + Shift + N.
  • For Safari, hold down Command + Shift + N.

 

If it works in incognito, I recommend clearing the cache of your regular browser. This removes the history or log of sites so you can start with a clean slate. You can check this article to see the steps: Clear cache and cookies to fix issues when using QuickBooks Online.

 

If the steps above didn't work, use another supported browser as alternatives.

 

Please refer to this article to see detailed information on how you can customize different reports and to see the specific data that you'll want to view: Customize reports in QuickBooks Online.

 

Please tap me anytime if you have other questions or need further assistance with the steps. I'll be right here to help. Have a good one!

Sambrose
Level 1

Past Due Payments and Paying Bills Past the Due Date

The browser information was priceless! Thank you, that seems to be causing a lot of trouble. I appreciate how you broke down the differences between cash and accrual. I went through every single category and cleaned them up and it makes more sense now. However, I still need to know why my accrual amounts are more than my cash amounts. Shouldn't it be the other way around?

MichelleBh
Moderator

Past Due Payments and Paying Bills Past the Due Date

Thanks for following the steps above, @Sambrose.

 

Good to hear that the troubleshooting steps fixed your report concern. Let me provide additional details about Cash and Accruals in QuickBooks Online. 

 

As my peer mentioned above the Cash basis report shows the income or expenses based on the payment date of your invoices and bills. While the Accrual basis shows the income and expenses based on when you sent your invoices or got your bills.

 

Also, there are several reasons why the cash vs accrual amount has a difference:

 

  • Invoices are funded and deposited to Undeposited Funds
  • Some payments weren't applied to invoices correctly
  • Manual deposits
  • Missing purchase transaction
  • The number of paid invoice vs opened invoice varies

 

I'd recommend double-checking the report. For more details, check out this article: Choose between cash and accrual accounting methods in reports.

 

I'd also encourage you to visit these articles about how accounting methods hit sales tax.

 

 

Don't hesitate to drop a comment below if you have other questions about the accounting method. I'm happy to support you. Take care.

Sambrose
Level 1

Past Due Payments and Paying Bills Past the Due Date

I know I do have some manual deposits because we receive joint checks that basically never hit our bank but I have to do a manual deposit to record it because I have to use the manual deposit to pay the outstanding invoices that it correlates to so that my project reports will show the appropriate sales payment-invoices paid (expenses) to = our profit margin. If this is my only problem then should the difference be the sum of those joint checks? Or would it cause other problems?

 

Missing purchase transactions? How would I know if this was a problem? I don't think it is because I am able to reconcile every month. 

 

  • nvoices are funded and deposited to Undeposited Funds - I never have undeposited funds
  • Some payments weren't applied to invoices correctly - always possible - lol - but I scrubbed the reports and made corrections and still come up with accrual vs cash different
  • Manual deposits - may be the problem - see above question
  • Missing purchase transaction - not sure how this would work - please explain
  • The number of paid invoice vs opened invoice varies - not sure I understand this is always going to be the case right?

 

Sorry for so many questions - just trying to get the best handle on it

JessT
Moderator

Past Due Payments and Paying Bills Past the Due Date

Hi Sambrose,

 

 

Thanks for your response. However, I recommend contacting our Support team about this. That way, they can start with a screen-sharing session and discuss how transactions are posted to your books. It's great to discuss when you’re looking at the same page so you can ask questions as you navigate through QBO.

 

If you have other concerns, feel free to comment below.

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