Job Profitability Report

Hi there, jschneider828.

Thanks for stopping by the Community, I'm happy to clarify for you. When giving a refund in QuickBooks Desktop, you're actually going to want to make a credit memo first, then issue a check for the refund. This is because the credit memo offsets the invoice not the check issued as the check is tied to the credit memo. You can find all the details on the process below in this helpful article. If you want help going through the process click-by-click, you can reach out to our support team for guidance, they can get into a screen share with you to guide you through the process, that way you can be sure everything is just as its supposed to be. 

Thank you for your time and I hope you have a lovely day. 

Hello Nick,

Thanks for the quick response. Let me explain a bit more as to how we are using QB for this part of our business.

The school has a driver education program which runs 3 times a school year. We track individual payments in MS Access which is then used to create complex reports. In QB we create a customer called DE 2020-21 and then add 3 jobs: Fall 2020, Spring 2021, and Summer 2021.  We do not issue invoices for any job, only receive payments which are entered through sales receipts. Using a credit memo and then trying to write the check results in the check wanting to be issued to DE Spring 2020, not the customers name.

I just noticed on the report that the checks issued show up on the report as an expense which ultimately results in a correct ending balance. I was just trying to figure out a way to show the Account Revenue as an adjusted amount. When I look at the report it shows revenue as $34,000 which equals 80 students paid. We only have 78 because two dropped out.

Thank you for getting back to us, @jschneider828.

Allow me to make some clarification on recording check refunds in QuickBooks Desktop.

The possible reason why the check you created showing as an expense in the report is that you choose an expense account. You'll want to associate a revenue account to offset the income. Here's how:

1. Go to the Banking menu, then select Write Checks.
2. Choose the Bank account from the drop-down.
3. In the Expenses tab, select an income account from the Account drop-down.
4. Enter the amount and choose the customer.
5. Click Save & Close.

I'm adding this article for more details: Give your customer a credit or refund in QuickBooks Desktop for Windows.

Most importantly, I recommend seeking help from your accountant to add suggestions based on what's more suitable for your business and to your books.

Keep in touch if you need any more assistance with this, or there's something else I can do for you. I've got your back. Have a good day.

Hello Mark,

Thanks for the possible solution but I do not think that is the problem. The Item that I used when I wrote the check is called DE Refunds. It maps to the same income account that the item called DE Income maps to because I want it to offset the income received. DE Income is the item to I use when recording income using a sales receipt to the customer DE Spring 2021. All sales receipts for the Spring 2021 session are inputted into QB using the DE Spring 2021 job. The check that was written had to be made out to the customer receiving the refund (not the DE Spring 2021 job) but I did put the job in the item row. Still not sure what I'm doing wrong.

Hello there, @jschneider828.

Based on your description of the issue above, it seems that you've written a refund check (DE Refunds) without a credit memo transaction. You'll first have to create a credit memo transaction, then use the credit to issue a refund. This way, you're able to reduce the income that shows under the Account Revenue column of your Job Profitability report. Let me guide you how.

1. Go to the Customers menu.
2. Select Create Credit Memos/Refunds.
3. From the Customer: Job drop-down, select the appropriate job name.
4. Enter the items you're giving credit for, then select Save & Close.

After that, you can refer to this article on how QuickBooks generally process a refund check after creating a credit memo transaction: Give credit or refund in QuickBooks Desktop for Windows.

Once done, pull up the Job Profitability report again. From there, you're able to verify that the update is successfully implemented and reduced the income accordingly.

Also, I'm adding this article to learn more on how QBDT generates reports: Understand reports. It also includes the complete list of available reports in QBDT along with their description.

Let me know if you have other concerns about the Job Profitability report and managing income transactions for a specific job in QuickBooks. I'm just around to help. Take care always.

Hello Rea,

Even if I use a Credit Memo, when applying the credit as a refund, it wants to use the job: DE Spring 2021, not the actual customers name. We do not enter each individual parent who signs up for DE into QB as this would mean entering over 1000 new customers each year. We track individual customers for the Driver Education program in MS Access. That program allows us to create the complex reports needed to submit to the state. We enter sales receipts into QB for the DE Spring 2021 job as bulk transactions. If 10 people pay $425 each on Monday, we enter a sales receipt for $4250.00. But if one of those 10 customers drops out, we then have to write a check for $425 to them ie. Mrs. Smith, but a Credit memo wants to send the check to: DE Spring 2021.

I use  Items called DE Income and DE Refunds which both map to the same income account. I use the DE Income on all sales receipts that record the income using Job name: DE Spring 2021. Then I write a check to: Mrs. Smith for $425 using the Item DE Refunds but then for the customer on the same line item I put the job: DE Spring 2021. IT doesn't matter if I check or uncheck the Billable box. The refund appears as an expense on the job profitability report which still makes the balance. It would be nice if I could pull up the report, see $34000 as revenue and divide by $425 to find that we have 80 students registered. Unfortunately, this is not correct because we then have to go to the Expense side and see the we had 2 refunds which means we only have 78 students, not 80.

Hope this clarifies the issue and thanks for all of the input. If there is something I can do differently I would love to make the changes so that the report does what I would like it to do.

Hello @jschneider828,

Let me clarify a few things about writing a check from a credit memo and how it affects the data of your report.

To start with, the check from a credit memo may be confusing as it shows the name of your customer along with the job. Don't worry, if you look at the detailed display of your job transactions, the revenue is correct.

However, if you wish the accuracy of the name on the check without creating a credit memo, you can use a clearing account to accomplish this. For the steps, you can use this article for guidance: Set up a clearing account.

In addition, I'd also recommend consulting your account if you wish to proceed with using the clearing account. If you haven't yet, here's a link you can use to find one near you: Find an accountant or bookkeeper.

Lastly, I've also included this reference for a compilation of articles you can use while working with us: Sales and Customer for QuickBooks Desktop.

If you have any other questions, please let us know in the comments below. Stay safe!