Setting Up a Customer List in QuickBooks

In QuickBooks, a Customer List keeps track of all your customers and your customer information. For example, the Customer List keeps track of billing addresses and shipping addresses for customers. Follow these steps to add a customer to the Customer List:

1. Choose the Lists --> Customer Job List command.

QuickBooks displays the Customer:Job List window.

The Customer:Job button, besides letting you create new customers, provides a menu of commands for editing customer information, deleting customers, printing a customer list, and so forth.

2. To add a new customer, click the Customer:Job button and then choose the New command.

QuickBooks displays the New Customer window.

3. Use the Customer Name box to give the customer a short name.

You don't need to enter the customer's full name into the Customer Name box. That information can go into the Company Name box shown on the Address Info tab. You just want some abbreviated version of the customer name that you can use to refer to the customer within the QuickBooks accounting system.

4. Ignore the Opening Balance and As Of boxes.

You don't want to set the customer's opening balance by using the Opening Balance and As Of boxes. That's not the right way to set your new customer accounts receivable balance. If you do this, you are essentially setting up the debit part of an entry without the corresponding credit part. Later, you'll have to go in and enter crazy, wacky journal entries in order to fix your incomplete bookkeeping.

5. Fill in the boxes of the Address Info tab.

Supply the company name, including contact information, billing and shipping addresses, contact name, contact phone number, fax number, and so on.

6. Supply a bit of additional information about the customer.

If you click the Additional Info tab, QuickBooks displays several other boxes that you can use to collect and store customer information.

You can use the

• Type drop-down list box to categorize a customer as fitting into a particular "customer type"

• Terms drop-down list box to identify the customer's default payment terms.

• Rep drop-down list box to identify the customer's default sales rep.

• Preferred Send Method to select the default method for transmitting the customer's invoices and credit memos.

You can also record a resale number, specify a default price level, and even click the Define Fields button to specify additional fields that you want to collect and report for the customer.

7. Click the Payment Info tab.

A set of boxes appears, where you can record the customer's account number, his or her credit limit, and the preferred payment method.

8. (Optional) Click the Job Info tab to describe the customer job.

The Job Info tab lets you describe information associated with a particular job being performed for a customer. You use the Job Info tab if you not only set up a customer but also set up a job for that customer.