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How do I enter an invoice after it has already been paid?

Forum|Forum|7 years ago
April 2, 2019
3 replies
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While I was on vacation, my company received our property tax bill and the owner used "Write Checks" to pay it but didn't enter the actual bill into QuickBooks.

The check has been marked as cleared and the account (checking) has been reconciled.

We obviously want a record of the tax bill but how can I enter it without having it show as unpaid?

I've only been using QuickBooks for a couple of years so any advice would be welcome!

QuickBooks Desktop

Best answer by IamjuViel

Glad to have you here, @csoffice.

I’d be glad to provide you with details on how you can enter and pay bills in QuickBooks Desktop.

When paying a bill, it should be done via the Pay Bill option. If you write a check to pay a bill, there’s a possibility the bill will remain as unpaid.

To link the check to your bill, here’s how:

Open the written check.
Go to the Expense tab.
Change the account associated to the check to Accounts Payable.
In the Customer: Job column, select the name of the vendor or agency where you paid the Property Tax bill.
Click Save and Close.

Once you save the check, you can now create the bill. Now, let’s pay the bill by applying the written check.

Here’s how:

Go to Vendors.
Choose Pay Bills.
Select the bill you want the payments to be applied to.
Click Set Credits.
Go to Credits tab.
Put a check mark on the check.
Hit Done.
Click on Pay Selected Bills.

That should do it! This will allow you to enter and pay your bill using the check created in QuickBooks.

For additional insights, you may check out this article: Bill shows as unpaid after writing a check.

Feel free to visit us here in the Community if you have other questions about entering and paying bills. I’m always here to help.

IamjuVielAnswer

Glad to have you here, @csoffice.

I’d be glad to provide you with details on how you can enter and pay bills in QuickBooks Desktop.

When paying a bill, it should be done via the Pay Bill option. If you write a check to pay a bill, there’s a possibility the bill will remain as unpaid.

To link the check to your bill, here’s how:

Open the written check.
Go to the Expense tab.
Change the account associated to the check to Accounts Payable.
In the Customer: Job column, select the name of the vendor or agency where you paid the Property Tax bill.
Click Save and Close.

Once you save the check, you can now create the bill. Now, let’s pay the bill by applying the written check.

Here’s how:

Go to Vendors.
Choose Pay Bills.
Select the bill you want the payments to be applied to.
Click Set Credits.
Go to Credits tab.
Put a check mark on the check.
Hit Done.
Click on Pay Selected Bills.

That should do it! This will allow you to enter and pay your bill using the check created in QuickBooks.

For additional insights, you may check out this article: Bill shows as unpaid after writing a check.

Feel free to visit us here in the Community if you have other questions about entering and paying bills. I’m always here to help.

C

csoffice 11Author

Hello,

Thank you for your response.

I followed the directions you gave (changed the expense account to Accounts Payable and entered the County Treasurer as the Customer, saved and closed) but it did not create a bill.

What did I do wrong?

A

Alessandra_B

Thank you for getting back to us, @csoffice.

Allow me to chime in and add some details about paying your bills to help you further.

You need to enter your County Treasurer as a vendor since you're paying them for the Property Tax.

Also, after editing the check, you can now create the bill for your tax. Let me show you how:

Click on Vendor from the menu tab.
Select Enter Bills.
Enter the vendor name.
Under the Expenses tab, select the Property Tax.
Click on Save & Close.

Once done, you can now pay the bill using the Pay Bills feature and following the steps provided by my colleague above.

I've provided some screenshots to better help you in paying the bill.

That's it! Please let me know if you have any other questions about paying your bills. I'll be here to provide you further assistance.

G

Gigih

My situation was to find a way to add an old Bill that was already paid far in the past (by direct debit), to a current Project in QB in order to see the project costs. I merely wanted to mark the Bill as paid, without affecting our bank account.

We could not link the Online banking payment to the Bill because those bank transactions were older than 90 days and could not be linked to QB (we recently started using QB). I tried everything, but no check or credit note payment method would prevent the Cash and Cash Equivalents Account from decreasing, however I needed the Project Expense Account to increase in order to show that those Materials-Cost of Sales were part of the Project expenditure. So finally, this is what I discovered that works:

QB online:

Click New

Click Bill

In Category details enter a one-liner with the Description as the Supplier Bill Number. Then enter the total bill amount as a negative amount.

Now, in Item details, enter all the products/services for the invoice as the actual amounts.

Make the products in item details Billable, so that the Project can see those expenditures and they can be taken into account when billing the Customer for the Project.

Save and Close, and, voila! Balance is 0 and status is Paid, and you have a record of the billable items, and a record of the Bill.

Hoooray!

G

Gigih

Just to add:

Inside the Bill in Item Details the Account for my Products (which I selected when creating my Products) is the same as the Account I select in Category Details. If these differ, you will have to add the products in Category Detail line for line, not just a single one-liner with the Total Bill amount.

Also:

I add a note in Memo to give the past Date that payment of the Bill actually went off the bank account. Plus I leave a message to the Accountant in Memo giving the VAT amount to take into consideration for the VAT output recon.

S

SallyA1

I know this is an old thread but I've been using this a work around for several transactions every month. One thing QB does after following these steps is create a zero dollar transaction in the Check Register with a Memo: "Quickbooks generated zero amount transaction for bill payment stub".

These transactions clutter the check Register. If I delete them will it cause a problem? PLease advise.

Thank you

DivinaMercy_N

It's nice to see you here in the Community, @SallyA1. I'm here to provide details on how you can remove the zero-dollar transaction you see in the check register.

I appreciate you sharing details about your concern. Let me discuss some info about deleting the zero-dollar transaction.

Before performing the process, I recommend reviewing if there's a transaction attached to that zero-dollar entry. To do so, simply press the Ctrl + H keys on your keyboard. If none, create a backup copy of your company file first before deleting the entry. This is to ensure you have the original data that you can restore in case of accidental data loss or damage.

Additionally, I've added this helpful resource that you can use as a guide in making sure that your account balance matches your real-life bank statement: Learn the reconcile workflow in QuickBooks.

Let me know how this goes. I'd be glad to hear any updates about this. If you have further questions about managing transactions in QuickBooks, please don't hesitate to post again here. I'm always willing to lend a hand to ensure your success. Have a great week ahead.

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