Computersight -

I am currently employed for a small corporation that operates with customers/vendors across the world. Even with the large volume of products we ship from our Las Vegas location, we employ no more than 7 individuals. This leaves myself running a large portion of the company in the purchasing, logistics, inventory control, and sales processing fields. The software we use, Intuit QuickBooks. I, myself, am only familiar with a handful of accounting software; QuickBooks, however, proves to be extremely beneficial for the small business owner.

I am vaguely familiar with nearly all QuickBooks components and tools. This user-friendly software also includes a help menu that details each step in a transaction. The steps are simple as clicking your mouse and inserting the necessary data relevant to that transaction. For instance, I receive a purchase order from a customer and simply insert the information into a sales order. The printed order goes to the warehouse for packaging, then back to me. The invoice module includes a shipping tool that will allow you to set up FedEx accounts and print labels directly from QuickBooks. The tracking number will be pasted to the invoice and set aside until payment is received.

Other features that QuickBooks offers are inventory control, purchasing, customer/vendor set up, and accounting options. It really is proficient enough to run a company. If a new business was to open and begin receiving inventory, QB’s allows you to create item receipts from open purchase orders that will add directly to the inventory under its specified line number. If you were to use that inventory to assemble a finished good, you can simply build an assembly that will subtract all components necessary and add to the finished product’s line number. In the future, maintain these proper steps and the inventory basically runs itself (unless human mistakes are involved).

The simplicity of such software has a great advantage for individuals lacking accounting skills. It will basically do the bookkeeping for you and keep your assets, liabilities, and equity in check. As I do not have much background in accounting, I find this program a sufficient aid in reconciling my accounting problems. I can easily view previous transactions and locate a mistake if one was made. QB’s also includes tools such as a search engine to help recover transactions, and a multitude of reports that allow you to view sales, open sales, receivables, and many more! For other first time business operators, I definitely recommend QuickBooks.