Surcharge on sales total

Hello Vish,

This is a great question and I can see you have some specific needs in mind when it comes to your surcharge item in QuickBooks Enterprise. There are a couple of ways you might be able to approach creating such an item, and I'll go over both in my response.

The first thing you can try is creating a new item in your Item List. The specific item type I tried in this case was Other charge. With this, you can name the item what you'd like, set it up as an amount or percentage (just use the % sign for the percentage), choose the account, choose the a default sales tax code, and add other details as you'd like, such as to the description. After hitting OK, the item will then be available for you to use on your forms. Here's an example of what the end result would look like.

If you'd like to try out this method for yourself, here are the steps.

1. Select Lists from the top menu.
2. Click Item List.
3. Choose the Item button at the bottom of the list window.
4. Choose New.
5. Select Other charge from the Type drop-down.
6. Set up your item.
7. Click OK.

Here's an article that can shed more list on managing items in Desktop: Add, edit, and delete items. With this option, you can insert the surcharge item after the line items to which it applies. If you need it to apply to a number of items, I recommend also using the Subtotal item to first get the subtotal amount for each of the items impacted, then add the Surcharge item. Otherwise, the charge will only apply to the line directly above it. Here's what that would look like with the Subtotal item included.

Since you say that you'd like the surcharge to calculate on the total of items added to the invoice, this may be the best option for you. However, I do have another idea that you're welcome to consider to see if it works for you.

The other idea I had was to use Price Levels, or, for even more control Price Rules if you have the Advanced Pricing add-on package. Both give you the opportunity to change the price of the item. For Price Levels, all it would mean is selecting the Price Each or Rate drop-down for the line item and then choosing the Surcharge rate, which will then be the new rate for your item.

With Price Rules, you can step it up a notch to predetermine in the rule's settings which item or items it applies to. This takes out some of the manual work you'd need to do when working with the item on your form (although you can always alter the rate on the form if you'd like). This article touches on both Price Levels and Price Rules and how to use them: Use Advanced Pricing. Note that Price Levels is available without the Advanced Pricing add-on.

I invite you to review each of those options to see which works best for you. I'll be here if you had further questions about them. Take care!