The Sleeter Group - A Message from Doug Sleeter, Tuning Performance of QuickBooks on a Network, 2007 Sleeter Group's Annual Conference Update, Meet John King - Fishbowl Inventory VAR Manager, Tricks of the Trade

I’m pleased to announce that we are now accepting registrations for our 2007 Accounting Software Consulting Conference. This year, we’re very pleased to have several new sponsor/exhibitors with the latest technologies for small businesses. With over 40 exhibitors and hundreds of consultants to network with, you can’t afford to miss this event.

then this conference is exactly right for you. This annual conference is the premier event of the year for the small business accounting consulting and add-on developer community. Register today!

If you use QuickBooks 2006 or higher on a network, here are some best practices for “tuning” your environment to provide the best performance. The issues discussed in this article apply to QuickBooks Pro, Premier, and Enterprise, regardless of the edition you are running. The recommendations apply to anyone who is hosting more than 5 simultaneous “sessions” between a server (or peer) computer and other clients on the network. It may even apply if these sessions are not multi-user access to the same data file. This also applies to Windows XP and/or Windows 2003 server, and has not yet been tested in a Windows Vista environment.

Thanks to Joanie Mann of CPAASP.com for her contribution to this article. She and her team discovered the issues as they went about resolving performance issues for their customers.

In related news, CPAASP has recently obtained a license from Intuit to host QuickBooks on their ASP portal. Details of the arrangement have not been released, but this really helps legitimize CPAASPs hosting business since Intuit had not previously granted a license to any ASP hosting company.

As many of you know, The Sleeter Group and Fishbowl Inventory have partnered together to deliver an industrial strength inventory control system for QuickBooks users and other small business owners.

John David King is the Value Added Reseller Manager at Fishbowl Inventory and has been assigned the task of developing a professional group of resellers across the country to represent Fishbowl Inventory. He has been thrilled with the amazing new members that have joined the Fishbowl VAR program since the alliance with The Sleeter Group. He has received many great ideas and he welcomes the professionalism the Sleeter members bring to the reseller group. Please feel free to email John David if you are interested in joining the Fishbowl VAR program.

I recently asked John to answer a few questions that will help consultants who need inventory solutions for their clients. We all know there is no one-size-fits-all solution, so I asked John David to help us learn how to approach the process of identifying and qualifying whether Fishbowl Inventory is the right choice.

Every day, members of The Sleeter Group’s Consultants Network tackle the day-to-day problems of their clients in the real world. The following is an example problem and solution that surfaced this month on our "Sleeter Group’s Consultants Network Yahoo Group".

I have a QuickBooks client (Wholesale/Distribution edition) who receives payment on a current due invoice, but the customer deducts from the payment a shortage received amount on a different invoice due at a future date. The deduction may be in dispute and may or may not be resolved by the time the disputed invoice is due and its payment received.

My client wants to clear in full the invoice being paid and show disputed amount on the open invoice not yet due. It is not a true credit on the future-due invoice because the amount is in dispute and not resolved.

This is common in the wholesale/distribution world, there must be someone who has all ready figured this out.
Thanks in advance. – Barbara

Mike Responded:
I am probably missing something here. If the client did not receive the full payment for the current due invoice, why on earth would he want to show it as being paid in full? – Mike

Jason Responded:
This is probably a sign of a much bigger problem. That would be your real opportunity to help your client, with more than a band aid.

I don’t think there is any great way to do it. If they are insistent on the band aid, then a credit memo that you apply to the earlier invoice would be your only choice. But I know that they will have customers that will then dispute the over invoiced amount on the latter invoice, and unless everything is well documented and the client religiously uses the notes in its collections and dispute resolution, they will give more money away.

I think it is best to resolve the disputed amount in a much more expeditious manner and to leave the open balance on the invoice. – Jason

Barbara Clarified:
Thank you Jason & Mike.
Good point, the issue really isn’t A/R per se, it’s tracking which invoices have contested amounts.

It’s the open invoice and A/R aging reports that create a problem from client’s perspective. Open items should either be current or there is a disputed amount still to be resolved. When an undisputed invoice shows up with an open balance the reports become useless for that purpose.

So what report and process could become a productive tool? Has someone else dealt with this issue? – Barbara

Wendy Responded:
I needed a couple of days to digest this situation before I chimed in with some comments that will hopefully be of value.

When the customer deducted for a shortage, assuming there was a shortage, and since he did not pay the invoice which was short, if you issue a credit memo you will clear the deduction. What happens when this invoice becomes due? Since the customer has already been issued and taken the credit, the customer must now pay the invoice in full, including the amount previously deducted. I guarantee that the customer will deduct for the shortage again, and then you will be in a real mess. The customer relationship will probably be damaged.

A very LONG time ago, I worked in AR at a consumer electronics company which sold radios to retailers. This type of situation was very common.

When a check was received from a customer which paid an invoice in full with a deduction for something, the company would issue a debit memo back to the customer for the short payment. This would then be investigated and either credit issued to offset the debit memo, or request for payment would be made with an explanation substantiating the amount due.

In QuickBooks, there is no way to issue a "Debit Memo" back to the customer. The only way to bill the customer is through an invoice. You could make a separate numbering system for debit memos, but I haven’t really put down on paper a process that would effectively handle all the issues that complicate this process. – Wendy

Mary Responded:
I use two A/R accounts when I need to screen out invoices that are in dispute. You can filter the A/R reports to only show the current invoices in the regular A/R. You can filter and run a separate report for the disputed invoices that have been assigned to the second "A/R Disputes" account. Be aware that having two A/R accounts means that the amounts will be shown separately on the Balance Sheet.

When you add the second A/R account to the Chart of Accounts all of the sales forms will have a new selection box that asks you which A/R account you want to use for the transaction. You would always use the original A/R account when creating transactions, and if a dispute arose, you would go back to the original transaction and change the A/R account to "A/R Disputes". If you have trouble with people not paying attention to which A/R account they are assigning when creating transactions, just make the "A/R Disputes" account inactive so it isn’t available as a selection on the drop down list.

You can also have multiple A/P accounts in QB, if you need them for a similar purpose.

I hope this helps! -Mary

Mario Responded:
To expand on this, if you need the multiple A/R or A/P accounts to show as one on the Bal Sheet, use the Financial Statement Designer to tweak the Bal Sheet and show how you want it. – Mario

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