11Jul 2012 by Nancy Smyth
Email Etiquette eBook

Email Etiquette eBook

Business Productivity Tips & Training
Email etiquette is vital to your success. We only get one chance to meet someone for the first time and “WOW” them with our products and/or services, so, it’s important to really put your best foot forward when composing an email to a customer, client, vendor or potential business partner.   With advances in technology, we are no longer limited to meeting prospective customers, clients, or referral partners face-to-face like we used to.  Technology now allows us to meet these same prospects via email, phone, or our websites. With these advances, and the ever increasing fast-paced world that we live in, are we sacrificing good old fashioned common sense etiquette protocols? Are we still making a good first impression? Are we identifying ourselves as professionals? Are we clearly stating the reason…
Read More
16May 2012 by Nancy Smyth
ARTICLE: What to Look for in a Construction CPA

ARTICLE: What to Look for in a Construction CPA

Business Productivity Tips & Training
  Hiring a CPA or tax accountant for you construction business is as critical as hiring a supervisor on the job site.  Not all CPA's or tax preparers understand construction and when they don't your books could be in as much of a mess as your job site would be if you hired a supervisor with no experience! In that perfect world, your company wouldn’t need a CPA.  We would all just pack up our adding machines, green eyeshades, and armbands and move on to other professions. But, that isn’t going to happen, is it? In fact, the regulatory environment is headed in the other direction.  States are looking for revenue, there are three or four new federal tax acts each year, and GAAP is going global.  These current and…
Read More
26Apr 2012 by Nancy Smyth

Project Information Worksheet-Keep Your Contract Info Organized

Business Productivity Tips & Training
  A project information worksheet will help you keep your contract info organized. One of the best ways to stay organized is by using a Project Information sheet, it will help you to keep your project paperwork organized. We've developed a Project Information worksheet, with the help of several contractors; it summarizes important aspects of a particular job and keeps essential information handy, it's also a great thing to give to your key office staff. When you are working on multiple projects, you do not want to have to stop to re-read a lengthy contract in order to find a single piece of information. The simple practice of recording important detailed information for each contract will make everyone's life easier when you need to complete progress requisitions and/or make collection…
Read More
24Apr 2012 by Nancy Smyth

VIDEO: How to Calculate Equipment Costs per Hour

Business Productivity Tips & Training
  How to Calculate Equipment Costs per hour.  What does it cost your company, on an hourly basis, to have equipment on the jobsite? Whether you have a mower, a compact tractor, or an excavator on the jobsite, learning how to calculate the cost-per-hour for each piece of machinery that your company owns and uses on a job site is a great tool for understanding, and even eventually, recouping the actual cost of the machine itself. Most contractors have a rough idea of these costs - but these days is a rough idea good enough?  We don't think so. Equipment cost-per-hour rates are calculated by adding together three (3) distinct pieces of information. Watch this YouTube video to learn how to calculate the cost of your equipment.     Once…
Read More
16Apr 2012 by Nancy Smyth

VIDEO: How to Create a QuickBooks Portable Company File

QuickBooks Training
  A QuickBooks Portable company file (.qbm) is a compact version of your company data file that contains ONLY your financial data, and because it is much smaller than a backup (.qbw) it can be sent by email or saved to portable media. A QuickBooks portable company file contains only the financial data for your company.  Unlike a backup file, it doesn't contain related files such as letters, logos, images, and templates.  It also doesn't contain a transaction log (.tlg file), which can be used to restore transaction data with the help of Intuit Technical Support if damage or loss occurs. You can use a portable company file whenever you need to move your company financial data to another computer or location or send it to another person. Another benefit…
Read More
09Apr 2012 by Nancy Smyth
VIDEO: QuickBooks Setting up/Creating a Scheduled Payroll Liability

VIDEO: QuickBooks Setting up/Creating a Scheduled Payroll Liability

QuickBooks Training
Setting up/Creating a scheduled Payroll Liability will help you keep track of when your payroll liabilities are due to be paid. However, it is often the step that we skip. Payroll taxes, child support deductions, union dues deductions, health insurance - both employee deductions and company contributions are just a few of the items that are run through the QuickBooks payroll feature.  The money for these items must be sent to a 3rd party on behalf of the company or the employee and they all have a different date that they must be paid by. The QuickBooks Payroll Center provides you with a "Pay Scheduled Liabilities" section to help you keep track of these important due date - but what if it's not showing anything there?  It could be that…
Read More
09Apr 2012 by Nancy Smyth

Welcome to Learn to use QuickBooks in your construction business

Announcements, eBooks, Free Stuff, Live Webinars, Videos
  Welcome to the initial launch of the Learn to use QuickBooks in your construction business - QuickBooks for Contractors Bookkeeping Tips & Training website!  Today is our initial launch and you won't find much here yet, but we will be rolling out content beginning today with much more to follow this week and in the coming months. Enter your email address below to be notified via email each time we add something new to this site: Email Delivered by FeedBurner If you find this post to be helpful, please take a moment to leave a comment or share it with others on your favorite social networking site(s).
Read More
30Dec 2011 by Nancy Smyth
Calculating Company Paid Health Insurance & The Affordable Care Act

Calculating Company Paid Health Insurance & The Affordable Care Act

Business Productivity Tips & Training
The Affordable Care Act was enacted on March 23, 2010. It contains some tax provisions that are in effect and more that will be implemented during the next several years. One of the requirements of the Affordable Care Act that will effect all business owners who provide employee health insurance, is that you now must report employer provided health coverage on Form W-2.  Below is information copied directly from the IRS website. The Affordable Care Act requires employers to report the cost of coverage under an employer-sponsored group health plan on an employee’s Form W-2, Wage and Tax Statement, in Box 12, using Code DD. Many employers are eligible for transition relief for tax-year 2012 and beyond, until the IRS issues final guidance for this reporting requirement. The amount reported…
Read More
21Oct 2010 by Nancy Smyth

What’s New in QuickBooks 2011 – A Comprehensive Overview

QuickBooks Resources & Reviews
A 142-page comprehensive overview of the new features and functions included in QuickBooks Pro/Premier 2011 and Enterprise Solutions 11.0 for QuickBooks Users and the Accounting Professionals who support them. Our FREE "What's New in QuickBooks 2011" answers such questions as: Which QuickBooks version is right for me? Is QuickBooks 2011 compatible with Microsoft Office 2010? Will QuickBooks 2011 run on Windows 7? Should I upgrade? Do you have any suggestions for a successful upgrade from an older version of QuickBooks? What is new in QuickBooks 2011? [purchase_link id="915" text="Add this item to your shopping cart" style="button" color="blue"]
Read More