When paying a client’s sales tax online recently, I found myself very frustrated by a $200 error I just couldn’t find. Since I had paid a sales tax estimate only the previous month, I was frustrated by what should have been an easy report and payment. I eventually compared the sales tax register from a previous QuickBooks file month by month until I found that the client had entered an invoice in December, but entered it with a June date, thus throwing off the quarterly total. This got me thinking, couldn’t we just balance the sales tax register, like a bank account or credit card register? The answer is yes, you can.

Just open the actual register and chose “reconcile”. Enter the date as the end of the previous quarter, the balance should be the last amount you paid, just like a credit card balance would be. Now, the next time something is off, you can find it by choosing “reconcile” again and looking at what items haven’t been reconciled, no matter the date. Sometimes I just love QuickBooks.