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January 8, 2021
Question

How do I use Quickbooks Manufacturing once it is set up? What is the workflow? Who does what when?

  • January 8, 2021
  • 1 reply
  • 0 views

Version: Quickbooks Enterprise Desktop for Manufacturing

I am starting to get very frustrated. I can find a ton of videos by Hector Garcia explaining how to set up inventory items and assemblies, but I CANNOT FIND ANY INFORMATION ABOUT HOW TO USE QUICKBOOKS ONCE IT IS SET UP.

What is the workflow?

What do we do if we pre-pay for inventory with a credit card?

What if the customer pays in advance for their order?

If I want to use EIR, how does this impact inventory counts?

How do people scan in items to up-count inventory once it's received?

What is an inventory part is damaged and the shop has to pull another one? How do they do that? How do they mark the damaged part?

 

What is the workflow for getting an order, ordering the parts we don't have in stock, building the finished goods, and sending them to the customer? What do we click and in which order? 

 

 

1 reply

January 9, 2021

Hello, raes88.

 

I also get frustrated when I'm in the dark when I start using a software. That said, I'll be providing you with the steps and the correct workflow for processing your orders. I'll also throw in some of the most important articles to answer your other questions. 

 

I see that you've already set up your inventory and assemblies from watching Hector Garcia's videos. In this case, let's take care of the of the order workflow. 

 

Getting an order for the customer is done through sales order. The general idea for this is to prepare a sale for an item that you don't have in stock. Then, order the item from your vendor to be shipped to your customer. 

 

When you're ready, here's how to create a sales order:

 

  1. Click the Customer menu, then choose Create Sales Orders.
  2. Select the customer who ordered the item. 
  3. Under the table section, choose the out-stock-item.
  4. Enter the ordered quantity, then add other important information.
  5. Once done, click the Save button. 

 

 

Next, you'll want to order the out-of-stock item from your vendor:

 

  1. On the Sales order screen, you'll want to click the Create Purchase Order button.
  2. This will take you to the Purchase Order creation screen. Simply select the vendor you want to order the items from.
  3. Add other important details for the purchase order.
  4. Once done, click Save

 

 

From here, you can create an item receipt or a bill. Either way, this will add quantities to your ordered item. 

 

Finally, go back to the sales order and create an invoice for your customer. 

 

 

For customer deposits and advance payments, you can do that by creating a sales receipt and setting the payment method to credit card. The full details and guide can be found in this aritcle: Manage upfront deposits or retainers.

 

There are two ways to prepay your vendor. This can be done through a check or using an asset account

 

Enhanced Inventory Receiving impacts how you receive your inventory quantities. This also change how the accounting works on inventory. For more details, please check this article: Turn on Enhanced Inventory Receiving (EIR).

 

In regards to the scanning part, are you referring to the barcode scanning? QuickBooks Enterprise has a feature called Barcode Scanning. This article can tell you more about it: Set up and use barcode scanning in QuickBooks Desktop.

 

Recording a damaged inventory shop is done through inventory adjustment. You can track the damaged item manually. I do recommend reading this article for the steps: Adjust your inventory quantity or value in QuickBooks Desktop.

 

We have a number of articles to help you familiarize and navigate the features in QuickBooks Desktop. You can browse a topic in our general help page, then look for an article. 

 

Do you have any other questions for the features and processes in QuickBooks? Let me know the details down below. I'd be glad to provide guides and the steps. 

raes88Author
January 11, 2021

Thank you for your detailed reply. I suspected this was the workflow.

 

The problem I am running into is if I try to create POs from a Sales Order, it wants us to create a PO for one of our assembly items. However, we are a "Just In Time" manufacturer, so we have to order the inventory parts at this point. Is there a way to do this from the Sales Order?

I'm finding I have to jump over to Build Assemblies, try to build something with out stick, click on pending, then make the auto POs from there.

THEN, because we purchase them with a credit card, we have to bill it to a prepay expense account, then when we receive the inventory, make a negative number in the prepay account to set it to 0. This seems REALLY convoluted. Plus, we have a different person receiving the inventory, so how do they know what dollar amount to put in as a negative against the pre-pay account. What if the bill amount is different than the PO amount because of a price increase or shipping? The PO auto generates from the numbers we have for each item in the system, but could be different than the bill. The person receiving the inventory has no way of knowing this and we can end up with money left over in this Pre-pay account?

January 11, 2021

Hi there, raes88.

 

Thanks for clarifying exactly what you were looking for. Unfortunately, the process provided by my colleague above is the only current workflow to achieve what you're looking for. You can keep an eye on our blog for information and potential changes made in product with future updates as I can see this feature being beneficial to Users such as yourself, so I'll be suggesting this to the product developers to see about getting it implemented in the future.

 

You can also reach out to our support team if you have a more specific question. To reach them, you can follow the steps found here

 

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