Quickbooks Support

Stereotypical accountants need not apply!

 We are looking for a PART TIME staff accountant who has experience reviewing financial records, identifying problems and fixing them. 

 The following is required (if you don't have these, don't waste your time applying):

• Bachelors in accounting (or associates and comparable experience)
• Job costing
• General ledger
• Accounts payable
• Accounts receivable
• Bank/account reconciliation
• Payroll and payroll taxes (no using ADP doesn't count)
• Sales tax
• Property tax
• Month end closing and financial reporting
• QuickBooks experience
• Experience working with on-line banking
• Flexibility
• Ability to multitask
• Ability to work in sometimes chaotic environment
• Communication skills (training experience is a plus)
• Ability to work with various types of people
• Understanding that even though it's accounting, it's not always black and white
• MOST IMPORTANT - Positive attitude, desire to grow and develop and a sense of humor

 If you meet these requirements, please continue reading this ad.

 We are Foster Results (http://www.fosterresults.com/).  We provide bookkeeping services to small business, personal money management to individuals and families, QuickBooks training, and part-time Controller/CFO services.  We are a fast growing business in Westfield.

 PLEASE NOTE:  We do not currently offer insurance benefits or a 401(k) plan.  Position offers a competitive salary, bonus potential based on performance and paid time off.

 If you're interested in being a key member of a team that works hard, has ambitious goals, understands the importance of family and has fun, submit your resume to hr@fosterresults.com (in Word format please.)

QuickBooks Online Users beware: A recent notice from Intuit suggests that the phishing continues.

Intuit continues to receive reports of different versions of the phishing email we alerted you about on 11/12/ 09. They continue to investigate the fraudulent emails that were sent to some QuickBooks Online and Intuit Online Payroll users. The email requests users to download a plug-in or windows update to secure your data.

Intuit did not send this email and QuickBooks Online and Intuit Online Payroll will never use emails to request personal information or update security of our service.

What should you do?
To protect yourself from fraudulent emails and websites, here’s what you can do:
    •Do not click any links in a suspicious email.
    •Do not download any plug-ins or tools from an email
    •Be suspicious of any email that asks for personal information, requires you to download anything or 
     requests your authentication information to access your online account.
    •Delete any suspicious email from your inbox and your trash bin immediately.
    •You can report any incidents, see examples of phishing emails, get more security information and
     recommendations on securing your computer at http://security.intuit.com/.

If you think you’ve provided personal information such as your login name and password through a fraudulent website, or if you have recently downloaded the plug-in or windows update suggested in the mail below, here’s what you should do:
    •If you have downloaded the tool, please delete it. You should scan your system using an anti-virus
     program from a respected Security vendor, for example Trend Micro, McAfee, Symantec or Microsoft, to
     remove any viruses that may now be on your computer. Several of these vendors also offer free online
     security tools.
    •Change your password to prevent unauthorized users from logging into your account.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact us.

Intuit, makers of Quicken, QuickBooks and TurboTax, will shut down its free Quicken Online personal  finance site in six to nine months and put all its chips in with newly-bought Mint.com.

The company closed on its $170 million acquisition of Mint yesterday. That made Mint founder and CEO Aaron Patzer the new vice president and general manager of Intuit's Personal Finance Group, heading up Mint.com, Quicken Online and Quicken desktop products.

His first decision? Quicken Online must die.

"Over the next 6 to 9 months," he said to TechCrunch, "we will end-of-life Quicken Online and their customer's data will be migrated over to Mint."

That's a startling reversal for a company that bashed Mint before acquiring it. It's also a shock that a new Web 2.0 upstart so definitively trumped an established brand with far more customers.

But like the acquisition, the move is smart. Quicken and Mint couldn't coexist for too long because they serve the same purpose. Quicken has about 1.5 million users, but only 100,000 are active each month. In comparison, Mint's got 1.7 million users, and 700,000 are active each month.

So Quicken's throwing in the towel on its brand extension and going with the more engaging site.

The question remains how the company will manage two brands that are distinct from each other. Mint has a very glossy, light feel; Quicken's very red-and-gray, with style to match.

But it makes sense - Mint took off thanks to adoption by young professionals who weren't scared of putting financial data into the cloud. Quicken Online only bulked up after seeing Mint fly past it.

So what should users expect? Like Quicken Online, Intuit can cross-promote Mint from its Quicken desktop products and TurboTax software. But some customers still want their finances on their desktops, so Mint may explore how to store data locally for that group.

But leveraging the personal finance software with Intuit's tax software is where the move really shines: TurboTax may eventually suggest tax deductions to you based on what you've entered in Mint (401k, stocks, etc.).

Expect to see more moves on the mobile front, too. Mint's popular iPhone app will continue development, and perhaps we'll see desktop apps and mobile apps on other platforms. With Intuit's backing, there's also much more hope for international scaling, including Canada, which has been left out of Mint, much to Canadians' disappointment.

November 5th, 2009
Posted by Andrew Nusca @ 8:03 am http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=26936

October 14, 2009 by The Wise One 

Business is composed of a set of interrelated systems that ensure the smooth flow of business processes and convert capital to revenue efficiently. It is important for a business owner to consider each component as if it is just the existing system inside the process. Thus, utmost importance and consideration must be given to each process component, which includes the accounting process.

That is why we have tax lawyers. That is why we have public accountants. That is why we have financial managers.

It is because of the accounting process.

It is the measurement and the disclosure of essential financial information that will help public accountants, financial managers, tax authorities, investors, and other decision-makers to effectively allocate their financial resources to each business process, thus maximizing the conversion of a business' working capital to huge revenues.

Accounting involves processes in which important financial information of a particular business is recorded, summarized, evaluated, and interpreted. Furthermore, since money is one of the biggest factors that may affect the existence of a business in a certain market, accounting is given utmost attention and consideration at all times.

In accounting alone, there are several aspects that a business owner must consider. There you have the cost accounting, the cash-basis accounting, financial accounting, internal fund accounting, management accounting, project accounting, and others.

And the list continues to expand.

In other words, you might conclude that accounting is a serious and a critical matter that must be handled by a group of people who have the technical expertise in dealing with the accounting as well as financial issues. Realizing this reality, more and more business organizations hand the accounting aspects of their business process to third-party organizations, or most commonly known as accounting outsourcing.

Accounting outsourcing is considered to be one of the more effective management tools, thus many companies often incorporate outsourcing as one of their strategies in business planning. As a matter of fact, the Outsourcing Institute reported that the concept of a CRO (Chief Resource Officer), a professional outsourcing executive manager, is widely-acceptable in larger corporate organizations.

However, you need not be a large corporation to benefit from accounting outsourcing. Even small and medium-sized enterprises can provide better service and produce high-quality products in a more cost-efficient way if they outsource their non-core business processes. This includes the accounting aspect.

By decreasing the demands on your administrative personnel, you will be able to free them from additional responsibilities and they will be able to support areas directly to your sales, clients, and to the marketing task of your business.

Accounting outsourcing firms can execute your accounting and bookkeeping tasks in all frequencies (monthly, quarterly, and annually) or can supplement your present administrative staff to lessen the responsibility. Here is a summary of the services you can acquire from outsourcing your company's accounting process:

- Preparing cash disbursement checks;
- Preparing input credits and bank deposits;
- Preparing company payroll;
- Preparing tax deposits and bank reconciliation;
- Preparing financial statements;
- Preparing payroll tax returns; and
- Evaluation and review of financial results on different frequencies.

With accounting outsourcing, you will be able to see the benefits of having a cost-efficient business operation. With your accounting process at the hands of outsourcing professionals, you can focus to the core of your business and convert every cent of your working capital into hundreds to thousands of dollars in generated revenues and profits.
Premier solution for outsource graphics, marketing and web services

Source:  http://www.wisdompost.com/2198/outsource-accounting-to-boost-your-bottom-line-5/

So what’s new for Quickbooks users in 2010? Intuit says it has streamlined the install process from 15 screens to only six for small businesses with simple accounting needs. You will be able to edit multiple items in the lists of items/customers/vendors at one time in a spreadsheet-style screen, and data can be pasted into those lists from Excel. There are new form templates, and more form customization options, including decorative backgrounds. For more advanced customization, there is integrated access to design services. Quickbooks 2010 users will also have the ability to put their signature on their checks directly within the program without printing them.

Some of the more useful-sounding new features are the additions to the Company Snapshot screen that was introduced in Quickbooks 2009. This screen can now be personalized to display the data most relevant to the user’s particular business. If this works half as well as described it will be a great improvement to what was already one of my favorite features in the 2009 version. This is the most promising sounding of the newly announced features, but also reminds me of iPhone cut-and-paste: something that should have been there from the beginning.

Another promising area of improvement is in the reporting. According to Intuit, it’s been “radically redesigned” to make it easier to find reports. The redesign includes a carousel view, a list view, and a search function, as well as a favorites view to show your most frequently used reports. As a Quickbooks user who gets annoyed by having to wade through a massive library of irrelevant reports to get to the few that I use regularly, the ability to go directly to a favorites list of reports sounds very helpful.

The most common complaint about Quickbooks has long been its heavy-handed marketing of add-on services inside what is already an expensive software package. Unfortunately, most of the new features being advertised for Quickbooks 2010 appear to simply be an extension of Intuit’s philosophy of aggressively generating add-on sales. Popular personal finance management app Mint.com, recently purchased by Intuit, also operates under a business model based on selling add-on services through its software. But there is a major difference between Mint and Quickbooks: Mint is free.

The features that fall under what Intuit calls its “Connected Services Strategy” include:

• Document Management Services: These services allow attaching of documents to transactions, accounts or people in Quickbooks. The documents are stored online and can be accessed remotely and shared with others.
• Check Deposit Services: With Intuit Check Solutions for Quickbooks, users can deposit check payments into their bank account. For companies not already using Quickbooks merchant services, the check service starts at $19.95 per month plus per-transaction fees.
• Marketing Center: Quickbooks’ integrated email marketing service (currently in beta) offers customizable templates for creating email marketing campaigns and then allows for tracking the results of those campaigns through Quickbooks data.
• App Center: Everyone has to have apps these days, and Quickbooks is no exception. The App Center contains about 25 programs in four categories. The apps cover topics from task management to project management to online storage. Most are only peripherally related to the core accounting functions, and all but a few require a monthly subscription (although free trials are available).

Quickbooks Pro 2010 will have a single-user MSRP of $199.99, or $179.99 for an upgrade. Pre-order street price for the full version Quickbooks Accounting Pro on Amazon.com is currently $149.99. Quickbooks Premier 2010 will have a single-user MSRP of $399.99, or $349.99 for upgrade buyers. The pre-order street price on Amazon.com is $249.99 for the full version of that program.

If you bought Quickbooks 2009 in the 60 days before the 2010 product announcement on Sept. 28, you will likely be happy to know about the existence of a little-advertised “migration upgrade” program that provides free upgrades to the 2010 version. To get the upgrade if you qualify, make sure you have your 2009 product’s information and sales receipt and call 888-246-8848. Stay on the line after the menu options to reach customer service.

We will review your 2009 QuickBooks file for errors, discrepancies, and missing information.  We will present you with a report outlining our recommendations for corrections you need to make before your tax return can be prepared.

Benefits
- Save money on tax preparation
- File your taxes on time because your file is ready for your tax preparer (get your tax refund faster)
- More accurate tax return
- Accurate financials for the first three quarters of the year (you will have time to make changes and adjustments to your business to improve your profitability before Dec. 31, 2009

Limited time offer $100 
 
Offer expires October 31, 2009

Most QuickBooks^® Merchant Services customers will pay more to accept credit card payments as of October 1, 2009, it was announced today by agent relations for Intuit-owned Innovative Merchant Solutions.

According to the release, fee increases to take effect October 1, 2009 are as follows:

Existing IMS accounts and QuickBooks Merchant Service for PC accounts:

• Transaction fee Increased by $.04

New Intuit QuickBooks Merchant Service for PC Transaction Fee:

• Qualified and Mid Qualified: $0.27
• Non Qualified: $0.34