OT:Printing checks

Posted by Frank on November 19, 2008, 9:08 pm

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HI-I have inheited a task at work. Printing Employee Holiday bonus
checks(donated by residents of retirement home I work at). The previous
payroll person used ezxcel then imported as vendors the 325 employees with
check amounts, names and one of 2 company divisions. I can do the excel
part, but is it possibe(reasonable) to do this type of import into
quickbooks (now 2008 pro) and print these checks? The reason this came to be
is the the previous employee had an accounting background (I do not) so they
bought the program, now updated to 2008.
Possible? Feasible?
Thanks for any ideas. Even other options.
Luke

Posted by Laura on November 20, 2008, 8:02 am

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> HI-I have inheited a task at work. Printing Employee Holiday bonus

> checks(donated by residents of retirement home I work at). The previous

> payroll person used ezxcel then imported as vendors the 325 employees with

> check amounts, names and one of 2 company divisions. I can do the excel

> part, but is it possibe(reasonable) to do this type of import into

> quickbooks (now 2008 pro) and print these checks? The reason this came to

> be is the the previous employee had an accounting background (I do not) so

> they bought the program, now updated to 2008.

> Possible? Feasible?

> Thanks for any ideas. Even other options.

> Luke

You can not directly import transactions from excel into QuickBooks so I
suspect the previous person used another program to create the import file.

Do you have access to last year's imported file? You could start there to
determine how this was accomplished.

There are a number of 3rd party excel add-ons that can convert excel files
into IIF files that can be imported into QuickBooks. Check out some options
at Big Red Consulting
http://www.bigredconsulting.com/tools_for_quickbooks.htm. I have the IIF
transaction creator but I am not sure if it has the option to mark a check
as "to be printed" which is what you will need to do batch printing of the
checks.

And before someone jumps down my throat, may I suggest you also consult with
the company's accountant to make sure that there are no payroll tax issues
being ignored by issuing these as vendor checks. Under most circumstances
these bonuses are taxable wages to the employees and need to be run through
the payroll module.

Posted by dpb on November 20, 2008, 8:55 am

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Laura wrote:

>> ... task at work... [of] Printing Employee Holiday bonus

>> checks(donated by residents of retirement home ...

> You can not directly import transactions from excel into QuickBooks so I

> suspect the previous person used another program to create the import file.

> Do you have access to last year's imported file? You could start there

> to determine how this was accomplished.

...

> And before someone jumps down my throat, may I suggest you also consult

> with the company's accountant to make sure that there are no payroll tax

> issues being ignored by issuing these as vendor checks. Under most

> circumstances these bonuses are taxable wages to the employees and need

> to be run through the payroll module.

Agree looking at the previous year's file is way to go. Since IIF files
are simply text, it's relatively easy to create them manually in Excel
so that's not a real problem other than some tedium. But, if the
previous person was clever and wrote some macro's maybe tools are there,
too, who knows...

From the OP's original question doesn't sound like these are bonuses
since it says they are pass-thru of donations from residents. That
wouldn't be a payroll item if so.

--

Posted by Laura on November 20, 2008, 10:03 pm

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> Laura wrote:

>>> ... task at work... [of] Printing Employee Holiday bonus checks(donated

>>> by residents of retirement home ...

>> You can not directly import transactions from excel into QuickBooks so I

>> suspect the previous person used another program to create the import

>> file.

>> Do you have access to last year's imported file? You could start there to

>> determine how this was accomplished.

> ...

>> And before someone jumps down my throat, may I suggest you also consult

>> with the company's accountant to make sure that there are no payroll tax

>> issues being ignored by issuing these as vendor checks. Under most

>> circumstances these bonuses are taxable wages to the employees and need

>> to be run through the payroll module.

> Agree looking at the previous year's file is way to go. Since IIF files

> are simply text, it's relatively easy to create them manually in Excel so

> that's not a real problem other than some tedium. But, if the previous

> person was clever and wrote some macro's maybe tools are there, too, who

> knows...

> From the OP's original question doesn't sound like these are bonuses since

> it says they are pass-thru of donations from residents. That wouldn't be

> a payroll item if so.

Not knowing the actual dollars involved this could be a non tax issue which
is why I suggested checking with the accountant. I have seen this being
declared as income to the nursing home and wages to the workers because the
home added their own dollars to the kitty.

Posted by Haskel LaPort on November 21, 2008, 10:36 am

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>> Laura wrote:

>>>> ... task at work... [of] Printing Employee Holiday bonus checks(donated

>>>> by residents of retirement home ...

>>>

>>> You can not directly import transactions from excel into QuickBooks so I

>>> suspect the previous person used another program to create the import

>>> file.

>>>

>>> Do you have access to last year's imported file? You could start there

>>> to determine how this was accomplished.

>>>

>> ...

>>> And before someone jumps down my throat, may I suggest you also consult

>>> with the company's accountant to make sure that there are no payroll tax

>>> issues being ignored by issuing these as vendor checks. Under most

>>> circumstances these bonuses are taxable wages to the employees and need

>>> to be run through the payroll module.

>> Agree looking at the previous year's file is way to go. Since IIF files

>> are simply text, it's relatively easy to create them manually in Excel so

>> that's not a real problem other than some tedium. But, if the previous

>> person was clever and wrote some macro's maybe tools are there, too, who

>> knows...

>> From the OP's original question doesn't sound like these are bonuses

>> since it says they are pass-thru of donations from residents. That

>> wouldn't be a payroll item if so.

> Not knowing the actual dollars involved this could be a non tax issue

> which is why I suggested checking with the accountant. I have seen this

> being declared as income to the nursing home and wages to the workers

> because the home added their own dollars to the kitty.

Agreed, checking with the accountant seems prudent. On the one hand the OP
uses ther term bonus which implies payroll which should be handled through
the outside payroll service. It is reasonable to assume that with a staff of
325 QB is not being used for payroll. On the other hand being paid by
donated funds implies a tip.