I avoid the 'Dividends Payable', and only post to the Dividends equity account when a dividend has actually been paid. 'Dividends Payable' as @impossible mentioned, is only another liability account and you're just shuffling money between liability accounts (if you're moving it from S/H Loan). The original entry for paid dividends is:
DR Dividends (equity)
CR Bank (or S/H Loan if you have a positive S/H Loan and are tracking through that account)
All Dividends paid in this manner are going to show up on your Balance Sheet as a (-) number, underneath Retained Earnings in the year in which you paid them.
Next year, you will take the previous year's Dividend amount and make the following adjustment:
DR Retained Earnings
CR Dividends (equity)
Of course QB will warn you that you're posting to Retained Earnings and that you're going to wreck everything, but don't worry. As long as this is the only manual transaction you make to Retained Earnings, you're good. :smileyhappy:
You can make this entry any time in the next fiscal year. Then at the end of next fiscal year, the only dividends showing on your balance sheet will be Dividends paid in that fiscal year.
