QuickBooks Simple Start For Dummies

by Stephen L. Nelson

The Barnes & Noble Review
Seventeen million U.S. businesses have between one and five employees. That s 75 percent of all businesses. For many of them, Quicken s not quite enough, but QuickBooks is too much. Hence, Intuit s new QuickBooks Simple Start. It s easier, yes. But you ll still benefit mightily from the guidance of Stephen L. Nelson, one of the nation s top small business financial experts.

Nelson s new QuickBooks Simple Start for Dummies is the latest in his series of guides that have helped several hundred thousand businesspeople learn QuickBooks. Nobody knows more than him about the issues small businesses encounter as they move to QuickBooks.

Here, he walks through the entire process, beginning with Simple Start s streamlined Setup interview. There s a full section covering your first day s experience: billing and collecting from customers; editing, printing, mailing, and emailing invoices; recording payments and refunds; paying bills with cash, checks, or credit cards; managing cash and transactions; and, of course, basic housekeeping.

Then, it s on to monthly tasks, such as bank account reconciliation (and what to do when you can t). There s a full chapter on paying sales tax; another on running P&Ls and measuring your profits. (Nelson even shows how to benchmark your results against industry averages. Boy, can that be an eye-opener.)

Last but not least, Nelson pulls everything together in four chapter-length case studies: accounting for fixed assets and payroll and using the software in service and retail businesses. Want to make the most of QuickBooks Simple Start? Start with Nelson. Bill Camarda

Bill Camarda is a consultant, writer, and web/multimedia content developer. His 15 books include Special Edition Using Word 2003 and Upgrading & Fixing Networks for Dummies, Second Edition.

384 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2004

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author on goodreads by this name.

Stephen L. Nelson (b. 1959) is the author of more than 160 books about using personal computers, including Quicken for Dummies, QuickBooks for Dummies, MBA's Guide to Microsoft Excel, and Excel Data Analysis for Dummies. The Wall Street Journal once called him the Louis L'Amour of computer books because at the time (December 2000), he had written more computer books than any other author.

-Wikipedia

Reviews

[Mark Yoshida]

OK, I never read this from cover to cover, but used it as a reference to find help I needed w/ Simple Start. It was somewhat helpful, but I figured out most of the stuff I needed to know on my own. Not that I'm an expert in accounting programs; I think it was just that Simple Start was simple enough for anyone who has some familiarity w/ a check register, basic bookkeeping procedures, and simple financial reports to figure out.

[Niama Perrotte]

A good review..very detailed. The portion towards the end after skimming...I recognized!