The Magic and Mystery of Items

The first QuickBooks list you need to finish setting up is the Item list – the list of stuff you buy and sell. Before you start adding to your Item list, however, you need to know that QuickBooks isn’t very smart about its view of what you buy and sell. It thinks that anything you stick on a sales invoice or a purchase order is something you’re selling.

If you sell colourful coffee mugs, for example, you probably figure (and correctly so) that you need to add descriptions of each of these items to the Item list. However, if you add delivery charges to an invoice, QuickBooks thinks that you’re adding another mug. And if you add a discount to an invoice, well, guess what? QuickBooks again thinks that you’re adding another mug.