would you like to understand what sales tax really is
and how it is managed in quickbooks online well then you should stay tuned to this video
introduction and setup to quickbooks sales tax in quickbooks online
if you have any questions about this topic you can leave them in the comments section below and
i'll do my best to help you and of course if you feel the video helped you i hope you will click
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now you may well ask what is sales tax well we know the price you charge is the
income that you earn from the sale and the extra money you collect is the sales tax for example if
you charge a hundred dollars for your merchandise and the sales tax percent is eight percent
that means the sales tax amount would be eight dollars and the customer would pay a hundred
and eight dollars and the hundred dollars would be recorded as income earned to you
and then the other eight dollars you would owe to the government for sales tax
in fact that eight dollars might be owed to two separate departments of government if you sold
in two separate states and that's what you have to keep track of using quickbooks online
you may also ask when do we pay sales tax well the time period that you make sales and accumulate
sales tax could be called the accrual period or the sales tax period it's the time period that the
sales tax is accumulating for sales that you made for that time period for example a typical sales
tax accrual period would be all the sales that you recorded from january 1 to march 31 then after the
accrual period is over the time period that you are in is the period called tax due and then this
is the time period that the prior periods tax is payable to the government and in this example it
would be from april 1 to april 20. so all the sales you made between the beginning of january
and the end of march have sales tax accumulated that you have to send into the government
within 20 days of the end of the sales tax period if you're using this example and of course if you
pay after the time period is over that sales tax is designated as overdue in quickbooks online
now all the tax that accumulates from sales is in one tax period and each sales tax period due
is represented as a rectangle in the sales tax center in quickbooks online
the sales tax center is a window that shows the status of each sales tax period that you
are responsible for any tax period that you made a taxable sale will show up in this window as a
rectangle representing a sales tax period whose accumulated amount you would have to send in
for example you would make some sales during an accrual period and the bottom of the sales
tax center window would show each tax that you accumulated and it would say accruing in
the bottom right then after that period is over that very same sales tax periods tax and payment
would then move to the sales tax due section of the sales tax center which means it comes up a
little higher on the page and it would tell you the total amount accumulated in the prior period
and the amount you have to send in and if you wait too long before paying that sales tax
rectangle for that time period will move up to a higher section on the page the section of overdue
sales tax and it would tell you the date that it was due and the amount you were supposed to pay
don't worry at the moment you record the sales tax payment for each of these rectangles that
represent a different tax period for a different department of government once you pay the payment
is permanently listed in the very top section of the page that represents the sales tax center
you may also notice at the top of the sales tax center is a date range pull down where you can
choose the sales tax periods that you want to see the status of and thereby isolating the specific
accrual periods that you would like to see if they are paid overdue or accruing believe it or not
it takes less than 60 seconds to set up sales tax in quickbooks online because ninety percent
of the quickbooks users who need to collect sales tax only have one sales tax to collect
and they do it based on the location of their company so it will take less than 60 seconds
to set up but first let's set you up for the course now you can learn this course just by
watching you do not need to follow step by step in order to learn some people prefer this however
and if that's you first you must have a quickbooks online plus version account
you must also be able to input the three basic quickbooks online lists
accounts customers and products and services and you should have some basic understanding
and some small experience with quickbooks online before you start learning in this course
you don't need much experience and you don't need much knowledge in quickbooks online
but you at least have to be able to manage the three lists and it would be nice if you previously
recorded one or two transactions and looked at the results in one or two of the quickbooks reports
so what's to come after this video well i will try to help you get the software for free but i
cannot promise the next video will show you how to sign up for the trial version of quickbooks online
because that's free for 30 days it also shows how to navigate the quickbooks online interface
so even if you are not following step by step it might be worth it to watch the next video
it will give you the lists that you need to input to set up your empty blank account so that you'll
be able to follow step by step if you want to now that video is part of another quickbooks
online course so i ask you to be patient and be flexible and watch it and do what's necessary
then we will set up sales tax together in the video that follows i thank you very much and i
know you will be an expert in quickbooks online sales tax when you are finished with this course
you