In Quickbooks online, if a customer short pays an invoice by a smal amount that you would just like to write off, what is the easiest way to do this?

Hi ADB85,

Welcome to Community!  QuickBooks Online is a powerful program that helps you get ahead with your work. Ensuring that you're able to record an underpayment by your customer is essential in keeping your books aligned.  I'll be happy to share more information and provide the support you need so you're on the right track with your work.

QuickBooks has you covered when things like this happen and allows you to record the uncollected portion of an invoice as bad debt, to ensure your net income and accounts receivables are balanced.  The first step is to check other invoices or receivables that should be considered as bad debt.  Here's how:

1. Open Reports from the left menu 

2. In the search field type Accounts Receivable Aging Detail

3. Make note of which outstanding accounts receivable should be written off

Next, you'll need to create an expense account for the bad debts by following these steps:

1. Go to the Gear icon ⚙ and select Chart of Accounts

2. Click on New to create an account

3. Use the Account Type ▼ dropdown, and select Expenses

4. From the Detail Type ▼ dropdown, choose Bad debts

5. When finished, hit Save and Close

Your next step is to create a non-inventory item just to balance the accounting.  It's not a real item, it's just a place holder for the bad debt.

1. Go to Settings ⚙ and open Products and Services

2. Select New, and then Non-inventory

3. In the Name field, enter “Bad debts”

4. From the Income account ▼ drop-down, select Bad debts

5. Hit Save and Close when done

Create a credit memo for the bad debt that will be applied to the invoice by following these steps:

1. From the left menu select + New

2. Choose Credit memo

3.Select the customer from the Customer ▼ drop-down

4. In the Product/Service section, select Bad debts

5. In the Amount column, enter the amount you want to write off

6. Enter a 'Bad Debt' In the Message displayed on statement box

7. Select Save and Close.

Now you're ready to apply the credit  memo to the invoice.  Here's how:

1.Select + New from the left menu

2. Under Customers, select Receive payment

3. Select the appropriate customer using the Customer ▼ dropdown

4. In the Outstanding Transactions section, select the invoice

5. From the Credits section, select the credit memo

6. Select Save and Close.

The uncollectible receivable now appears on your Profit and Loss report under the Bad Debts expense account.  You can run an account QuickReport to see all the receivables tagged as bad debt by going to the Gear > Chart of Accounts > Run Report, in the Action column of the bad debts account.

Here's a helpful article for future reference:  Write off bad debt in QuickBooks Online.

Please don't hesitate to reach back out with any other questions.  We're happy to assist!