Reports communicate.
We talk a lot about the proper way of getting information into QuickBooks Online (QBO). Entering the transactions creates a record. A permanent file where financial events of a company’s history can be found if questions arise.
Employees. Vendors. Customers. Government agencies.
They all come to us from time to time asking us to look up – something.
The way we really communicate though, is with reports.
Today we want to look at the Management Reports section in QBO. These reports create a package of information and try to present it in a professional way. These reports would be shared with business partners and other stakeholders.
We find these by navigating to the Reports section.
Note there are three reports, or actually, report packages, already listed in the graphic. As one arrow shows, you can change the date range right here before creating the reports. The other arrows points to the column that contains commands used to tell QBO what you want to do with the report package.
Edit is the command showing on the rows in the screenshot. The other options are to view, send, create pdf, create docx (Word document), or copy.
Send would allow you to enter email addresses for recipients and QBO would send out the report package to each address entered.
Copy allows the duplication of the report templates in the package to be customized. We will look at customization at some point in the future. Today, let’s examine what’s in the report packages.
In the above screenshot, we selected the Company Overview for the last fiscal quarter. Then, from the right-hand column, we selected View.
The page shown in the graphic is the table of contents. A cover sheet precedes it. You can see that a Profit and Loss report and a Balance Sheet are in the body of the report package.
The cover page looks something like below:
The financial reports look very similar to the standard reports you may have used many times from QBO. They are ‘dressed up’ a bit in that the footer and other components do have a more professional look.
All in all, these are reports you can use when appearance matters. Business associates, banks or other lenders, and similar stakeholders will appreciate a document that looks like the company cares about its communications.
Hector Garcia, CPA
Certified Advanced QuickBooks ProAdvisor
7791 NW 46th St. Suite 109
Doral, FL 33166
954-414-1524
hector@garciacpa.com
