Learn the QuickBooks Interface in QuickBooks Pro 2017

During this QuickBooks Pro 2017 tutorial video, you will get familiar with how the homescreen is setup and learn some of the terminologies in QB. We also will show you how to change some of the options according to your preference and usage.

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Video Transcript

We’re working in module 2 which is the Getting Started module and we’re all the way down now to section 4, Identifying the Components of the QuickBooks Environment.

I wanted to take a few moments in this section and talk to you a little bit about how the Home screen is set up, talk to you about maybe changing some options so that QuickBooks works a little easier for you, get you familiar with some terminology and that sort of thing before we actually jump right in and start using our new QuickBooks file. So let’s go ahead and flip over and we’ll get started.

This is what we call the Home screen right here. You’ll notice on your Home screen that it’s actually divided into five sections. The first section I want to mention up here where it says Vendors, all of this. This is your accounts payable. Meaning anything having to do with the bills that come in the mail that you have to pay. This section where it says Customers, this is your accounts receivable. That means anything having to do with customers that buy from you is going to be in this section.

And down here where it says Employees, this is the payroll section. You’ll notice I don’t really have any icons in the Employees section and that’s because I told it in the EasyStep Interview that I did not do payroll. If I had said that I do it would have turned on icons here for me to go ahead and set up the payroll. So Employees and payroll this section right here.

This little section is the Company section. And the options you’ll see here really have nothing to do with particular customers or particular vendors. They have to do with the file itself. The most important thing in QuickBooks is going to be right here, this Chart of Accounts. So get really, really familiar at that because we’re going to be looking at that in module 3.

There’s also a Banking section down here. So think about things that have to do with the bank. You would record deposits, maybe reconcile the checkbook, maybe you want to look at a check register. So you get the idea that these are banking options right here.

Now a couple of things I want you to notice over on the left. This over here is where you have your options. If you would like to move these to the top like you’re more familiar with like an icon bar you can do that. The way you do that is you click on the menu here where it says View and you choose Top Icon Bar. Notice left is chosen automatically. Now you’ll see your icons at the top. So it gives you a lot more room to work with here.

I did that because I wanted to show you this section which is part of your Home screen. Right here where it says Account Balances once you get your checking account set up, your savings, etcetera you’re going to see these in the list. And one way to get to the checking register, for example, would be to double click on it and go to it that way.

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Here are some other things that if you wanted to purchase from Intuit you could. Here’s Payroll, Credit Cards, some financing options. So this section here is all sales. If you don’t want to see this just hit the little arrow and that’ll kind of hide those options.

Also notice the Backup Status. It is important to back up your file. We will talk about that in a later module but I wanted you to notice that one of the additional things that you can purchase from Intuit is the Intuit Data Protect. They will actually for a fee and I believe it’s around $5 a month, they’ll actually back up your file for you. So just know that’s an option as well. Again if you don’t want to see that you can hit the little arrow and kind of hide that.

Now the other thing that I wanted to point out that will make life a lot easier for you is this. Right now these are icons and when you click on one you actually open a window. So I just opened the Invoice window, for example. Now if I had the window maximized and let’s say I wanted to flip back to another window that is currently open I really don’t have a way to do that other than to go up to a window here and choose it from the list this way. So you can turn on something on the left called the Open Windows List. You do that by clicking View on the menu and Open Windows List and there you’ll see it. So now what happens is any window that’s open you can click on it from the Open Windows list to flip back and forth. So that makes like a whole lot easier. I do not know how people work without that. So again that’s under View and it’s the first one, Open Windows List.

You might have noticed that you have a menu here and you’re very familiar with using menus from using other programs. A couple of things I’ll point out. Under Edit you need to know where this Find feature is because you’re always going to be looking for something, whether it’s the amount of money, a person’s name. We’ll go through Find a little bit later and also the preferences that we’re going to look at over module 3. So just kind of know where those are for now.

Also notice this word Vendor, this word Customers, this word Employees. If I wanted to look at all of my customers I’m going to click right here and that takes me to what’s called the Customer Center. So those are called Centers. Notice how I can now flip back to Home if I wanted to show you the Vendor Center. All the centers are set up just alike. So once we get some information in here a little bit later you can see how these are set up. But I wanted you to know what those were when they use the term Centers.

Now I’m going to use the X at the top of the window but the bottom one. Not the top X because I don’t want to close QuickBooks. And now I’ll get back to my Home screen.

If I didn’t know these were centers and that I could click there I could also go up to here where it says Customers or here where it says Vendors and that’s the same option. Also notice there’s a Customer menu which has Customer Center at the top and a Vendor menu which has Vendor Center at the top. So just like in any software program there is multiple ways to do the same option.

So I just wanted you to know that that’s how your Home screen is set up. Now also notice that the Home screen has a flow chart to it. So it tells you what to do. For example, when you’re working with customers usually you estimate a job first, then you invoice the customer, then you receive the payment, and then you make the deposit. So it actually tells you what to do as the next step.

Also I wanted you to notice one more thing here. See the tab that says Insights. If I click on that it’s just going to give me some information about my company file. Now obviously we have nothing set up yet so we have no data but I’ll be able to see if I have any open invoices, invoices that aren’t paid, anything overdue. I can see a chart or a graph up here and you’ll have different options for the information you’d like to see as far as filtering in your particular chart that you’re looking at. So there’s a lot of options here.

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I’m going to go back to the Home page and that’s pretty much how your Home screen is set up. So now that you know some of the different components of the QuickBooks environment let’s go ahead and go to the last section in this module, Converting Your QuickBooks Desktop to the Online Version.

Cindy McGuckin

Cindy McGuckin is an IT trainer with over 20 years of experience. Cindy currently manages the IT Training Department at Trident Technical College, she's a Member of the Association of IT Professionals, Charleston, SC chapter and the Treasurer of the South Carolina Association of Continuing Higher Education. Cindy is a Microsoft Office and QuickBooks expert and her online courses have received hundreds of 5-star reviews. Her no-nonsense approach to teaching complicated topics makes her classes engaging and interesting.