WSW - Podcast QBO Accountant User Interface Changes
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[00:00:00]
Introduction and Greetings
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Dan DeLong: Oh, welcome everybody to another workshop Wednesday. All about casual conversations for serious workflows, which is brought to you by school bookkeeping.com, where you can learn QuickBooks your way. And for those of you watching you may notice that Rachel looks a little different today.
Hi Sharrin. How are you? Ra. [00:01:00]
Sharrin Fuller: Rachel had a bad night last night and she looks, I'm sorry, that Ira, Rachel, I was trying to say that Rachel normally looks better than I do. I, so anyhow, I'm great. How are you Dan? I feel like I just saw you and talked with you yesterday.
Rachel's Absence and Upcoming Series
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Dan DeLong: I know, And so I made a mistake and, and, 'cause it never happens never makes mistake, but, we are going to be doing a series with Shauna Quinn in November, and Rachel's gonna take a hiatus when we do this series coming November. But I gave the impression that's starting this week. And she had a conflict. Rachel has a conflict, so fortunately Sharrin being the flexible ninja that she is, and I
Sharrin Fuller: was gonna put my head, my leg behind my head, but might not be appropriate for this.
Dan DeLong: We're not that casual on this. I was
Sharrin Fuller: wearing pants, if you saw [00:02:00] though.
Dan DeLong: I did see that. So yes.
Sharrin Fuller: It's not
Dan DeLong: a pants optional workshop. So any who so today and the funny part was, is that Rachel was gonna lead. This workshop because she had opted into the beta for the new accountant user interface.
And I can't, a, I can't access it because the beta opt-in period is over. So when I went to go, oh I'll just handle it. And I was like, oh no, I can't even show what it is that we show today.
Sharrin Fuller: So it's a Take your word for it.
Dan DeLong: No, It's I'm,
Sharrin Fuller: no, you've got it figured out
Dan DeLong: like a good person. I've been able to pivot.
QuickBooks Accountant User Interface Changes
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Dan DeLong: So our topic is not gonna be on the QuickBooks Accountant user interface, but the accountant tools that are in the new user interface. So we're just gonna tweaking the topic a little bit because, [00:03:00] if there's any type of individual that loves change, it's accountants Sharrin?
Sharrin Fuller: Yes, daily. We prefer it.
Dan DeLong: When software's a service not, just QuickBooks, but anything changes. As an accounting professional and preemptive, oCD is built into creatures of habit as accounting and bookkeeping professionals. The 10 key itself is is just that thing where you have that built in muscle memory of how to do things faster.
How frustrating is that when you when, things change, like where did it go Like that, sort of thing.
Sharrin Fuller: I feel like we're talking about QuickBooks.
Dan DeLong: We are talking. I'm not even,
Sharrin Fuller: I don't even know what I'm on right [00:04:00] now or what, I haven't read anything. But you immediate, you said that. I immediately thought, oh, you mean QuickBooks online?
I just logged in for the first time the other day 'cause I don't really, I know quick, I know QuickBooks, I'm a top pro advisor or whatever for forever. But and I've been I know it, but man, I logged in the other day and I went. No, I'm giving this back to my team. I don't have time. I don't have time.
Where did my reclass tool go? Where's my toolbox? Like I had chat GPT open to my left. I'm like, can you please tell me where this went? Oh, this is missing too ridiculous. But it's yeah and then of course, right at a text line, do have between 10 16 and like April or February,
Dan DeLong: yeah.
'cause there's never a great time. To make changes, especially for No, for accountants. And I
Sharrin Fuller: think Intuit forgets who a majority of their clientele are is accountants, and we go insane. We don't like it. We don't like it. It's [00:05:00] terrible.
Dan DeLong: What I mean is that your Your. response is not for me today.
Not today, not
Sharrin Fuller: today. Yeah. So when I do something, Dan, I do it. I do it. I don't just oh, I'm in. I'm like, I am in full force everything. So I know if I look, I'm gonna go down that rabbit hole. I'm gonna relearn QuickBooks. I'm gonna write into seven ways, write to them and tell them seven ways they could do it better and how they should have done it.
I'm gonna do videos for my team, so I just know that I had to, I'm like. All I needed to do was intern and invoice. So I'm gonna just email my assistant, say, Hey, go do this. I can't even be in this program at the moment. So I am nervous 'cause I have to review a couple of my CFO client. Re financials today.
I think I'm gonna do it through my third party because I, they're the one with the third party softwares. 'cause I'm really afraid that I'm gonna get in and OCD about it,
Dan DeLong: as we, we've talked a lot on prior workshops of the [00:06:00] impending new user interface that, that Intuit had rolled out in July and, as of October 1st, you don't have the ability to go back to the new, the old user interface. So now we're in this phase of, okay, now I gotta use this, new user interface. And where did it go?
Navigating the New QuickBooks Interface
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Dan DeLong: So that's what this workshop is all about. For the, those folks that were in the that use the accounting tools the little briefcase icon that's up at the top with with QuickBooks and has all the accountant functionality or the, core accountant functionality that's in that little briefcase drop dropdown.
It's not there anymore. Because where the briefcase go, they moved it to the side. So we have a new, okay where'd it go? I gotta share my screen here. So we created a [00:07:00] blog of the QuickBooks Online, where to find and customize the accountant tools.
Sharrin Fuller: Oh, yay. Just survey knows.
I did not get a preview of this deck, so anything you're hearing is me going Dan, it'd be really nice if I knew, and here he is just answering my question. So I'm gonna learn and. Cohot. Learn
Dan DeLong: and learn and respond.
Sharrin Fuller: Yes.
Dan DeLong: Or react, I should say. Yes. All right. The this is and I'm actually pleasantly surprised on where things went and what.
It is, it does seem to be a step forward, as the, case may be, but, and unfortunately you have to take a step back in order to learn some of these things.
Customizing the New Interface
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Dan DeLong: The main thing here's where the accountant tools were. Up at the top you had this dropdown of a briefcase at the top and you're able to [00:08:00] just choose these favorite tools that you had.
And, a common thing was I like to use this new window. But of course never, nobody ever used it that I talked to, but then. No, I
Sharrin Fuller: click, right click. New window,
Dan DeLong: yeah. I think you can duplicate your tabs. You can do all sorts of things in the browser to do the exact same thing, but as soon as they removed it from the new menu, which is called my menu, here at the, top, there's this little tiny brief here.
Lemme make this a little better. Oh, good. So I
Sharrin Fuller: get to re customize my menu for every single one of my clients, all hundred. Plus of them. That sounds amazing. That's a great idea. Or did
Dan DeLong: this
Sharrin Fuller: customize across the board? Sorry
Dan DeLong: That's a really good question. I'm
Sharrin Fuller: asking the things that I know people are going to wanna ask.
Dan DeLong: I, was, I customized it earlier today and, [00:09:00] I gotta pop into another company and see if that customization holds or not. But that would be a great. A great thing if it has the same functionality across Yeah, multiple clients, all the
Sharrin Fuller: things that they fix. And all we want is to be able to have one report template that we can push across all of our clients so I don't have to recreate my report template for every single client when a new one comes on solve, give us what we want into stop changing the stuff that dries us insane.
I love my briefcase, but go ahead. It's in my menu.
Dan DeLong: So there's a, my menu, which has the same option as the. Or at least the same icon as the briefcase icon up at the, for the accountant tools. But now everybody has a, my menu, not just accountants. It's broken down into three major, we're no
Sharrin Fuller: longer important.
Sorry.
Dan DeLong: So it's broken down into [00:10:00] three major areas. So there's a bookmark section. And then. Tools or create, and then, actually create and then tools, right? So those are three main areas of the menu. And then to customize it because
Sharrin Fuller: it makes sense. At least it makes sense, right?
Like it's not before the briefcase was there and there was no rhyme or reason, they weren't even alphabetical. At least that makes some sense. So I'm right. I approve. They can keep that in.
Dan DeLong: And then to customize it is, an interesting thing because I was like, I was reading an article that, Intuit created.
It's just click the customize button. And I was like, you click the, min, the my menu button or hover over it and you don't have this customized button, you actually have to click it. Which then minimizes it. So you gotta expand it again in order to see [00:11:00] this little slider bar settings, customization option.
But once you're finally able to sneak up on the customized button here are the options that you have. You have the different sections so you can reorganize the different sections. So whatever you. Feel is, should be prioritized at the top, that section. So we're talking about this bookmarks create or tools section can be reorganized.
The bookmarks themselves there's a selection of of bookmarks to select. Incidentally, if you. Bookmark any other page inside of QuickBooks online, it automatically goes in and bookmarks it here for you so you don't have to go into there's a section here for bookmarks on the left side.
So you can go into your bookmarks or you can go into my menu and your bookmarks will be there. [00:12:00] And they can be collapsed within that side menu that my menu as well. And so you've got your create options and then your tools. And this is where I. Oh my goodness. We can see the option to add the new window back in there because who shouted the loudest when they removed the, my, the new menu was people that were using the new window menu item, so responding to feedback as intuit typically does but not realizing who was using it until they removed it.
So now you have the option to add your new window back in there. So this blog article is really just an idea of, how to use these tools. We have in school bookkeeping, we have, a whole course and mini course on these tools and how to [00:13:00] actually use them.
Chairman, what is your.
Favorite Accountant Tools
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Dan DeLong: Favorite tool, I guess for as a, as an accountant user inside of re
Sharrin Fuller: reclassify. I and I try to tell my team too, I do love reclassify, and then I, love how you can also do it within the vendor now as well. So if I'm looking at financials, I'm like, oh, this needs to be the wrong place.
I use that reclassify transactions like crazy. It's definitely a. Yeah, they've they've added, there's four different ways to do things now, but that's my immediately go, my immediate go-to in a separate screen. Knock it out real quick and have it done. Someone, people will be like, how did you redo those financials in five minutes?
If you have to ask me that, you need to go learn QuickBooks because there's an entire tool there. And what am I paying you that I'm so glad they're not hourly, but anyhow. Just kidding. Not my team. My team's amazing. It was other people.
Dan DeLong: Exactly. So yeah, that's a great tool. I'm not a big fan of the write off invoices tool [00:14:00] because of the way that it handles.
Yeah. Writing off the invoices, it puts it as a discount on the, original invoice. And yeah. If that's in a different. Especially if it's in a closed period, that's, I prefer
Sharrin Fuller: to journal it to bad debt. Yeah. And, I want it very clear, and I always feel like, like even when, if somebody like NSFs, I don't like how QuickBooks handles that either.
It's such a pain in the butt. It's always, even though it's paid, it's always got this notification. There's just like a weird quirk about it. But yeah, I don't use the, fortunately I don't have to do that because I don't do the work until I get paid. So if anything, I avoid it because I'm like, we didn't even start.
But yeah, I do a journal entry for sure.
Dan DeLong: Yeah those are, some interesting and good, tools. But of course the way that these things are actually handled inside of QuickBooks could determine whether you actually want to use them or not. And that's some of the things that we talk about in our, course [00:15:00] there.
But the big thing is where did it go?
Sharrin Fuller: Yeah. I was gonna say, and for accountants, and I'm speaking from experience, so whenever I say these things, I, it's because I am this way. And then I've met other people that are the same way. So I'm like, oh, good. I'm not my own level of crazy. I, it's a shared level of accounting crazy.
And how our brains work, right? So I think the issue is that when we get into something, we learn it. We use it for what we need. At that point, we make workarounds to make it work the way we need to, but then the software changes and it upgrades, but we don't have the time to adjust our habits and our process.
So we're still doing something in the very, very old way when it could be new. So it's really about taking the time to stop and go, oh, shoot, I can do that now. It's getting out of our old habits and changing. So I, honestly think that this is a great thing that you'll have because. It forces us to actually stop and look and go, oh, oops, I could be saving so much time with these new [00:16:00] options.
Yeah.
Challenges with QuickBooks Online vs Desktop
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Dan DeLong: And I think that probably even begets the, question of accountants who are very familiar with the way things are handled in desktop, and resisting the change to QuickBooks online.
Sharrin Fuller: That's a hard one.
Dan DeLong: I always compare. QuickBooks Online and desktop to a dog and a cat, right?
So yeah,
Sharrin Fuller: QuickBooks
Dan DeLong: Desktop. When did you make the jump?
I, what did you
Sharrin Fuller: ever make?
Dan DeLong: I am, I'm always whatever works
Sharrin Fuller: Yeah. Because of what you're doing, but I, so we did, we made the complete jump from desktop to online, I think in 2014. And the struggle was real. 'cause online was not at all what it is now, but we started a remote firm and we needed that and remoting into the servers was just getting it.
It, the lag was bad. So we made that jump, and I remember in the beginning it didn't have inventory, so it was just, it [00:17:00] was crazy. Yeah. Because desktop, you know it, and it does everything. And QuickBooks online, it's just, it's, I go back to desktop now. I'm like, I, for, I forget how to function in here. But yeah, it's just in there learning curve.
It's same but different. So you're right. It's
Dan DeLong: yeah.
Comparing QuickBooks Desktop and Online
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Dan DeLong: And, I would always compare that desktop is a dog and QuickBooks online as a cat. And if you're a cat person. Yeah. You don't particularly care for dogs, and if you're a dog person, you don't particularly care for cats. If you're an animal lover, it really doesn't matter.
Yeah.
But like a cat, the experience that you have with a cat is really just sharing the space, yeah. With, with QuickBooks, whereas. A dog a dog's over here, where a dog is somewhat trainable. You can make it do tricks and fetch and when you.
No, the,
Sharrin Fuller: I need to get a different dog. [00:18:00]
Dan DeLong: You
Sharrin Fuller: don't have that. I just sleeps. You don't have
Dan DeLong: that kind of dog.
Sharrin Fuller: I have a dog that thinks he's a cat. He identifies as a cat ah,
Dan DeLong: there
Sharrin Fuller: you go. I guess that's how I get the best of both worlds down.
Dan DeLong: Good. But like a cat QuickBooks Online is gonna sit there at your feet, look up at you with those, put some boots, eyes Hey, pick me up.
And then it says,
Sharrin Fuller: slap you.
Dan DeLong: Exactly. Walk
Sharrin Fuller: out. It's Hey, you're amazing. Thanks for feeding me. I love you purse slap. Scratch my sofa. And what do You can't get rid of the cat. You love the cat. You're the cat's, your thing, you've put time and effort into this little turd, so you're like, I'm just gonna figure out how to not let the cat slap me anymore or learn how, when it slaps me to duck.
Is that the metaphor we were getting at? I think it was
Dan DeLong: exactly. It It can hurt you. It can scratch you. And the question is, do you [00:19:00] run back to the dog or do you opt in for being. A cat person.
Sharrin Fuller: You're a cat lover now, man. QuickBooks is, I am. People say no, you're wrong, Sharrin. But in the next five years, I am telling you, you're all gonna be forced to be cat people.
So that's learn this stuff or learn a whole entire different software. And I've done a lot of work and I haven't found any. That's the main reason I don't leave into it. 'cause I know it, right? I know it. I can get in, in, in two seconds, the gl, but, and to learn a whole new piece of software and then to move everything over sounds like a nightmare.
So for me it's like a. What am I gonna do? I don't have a choice.
The Love-Hate Relationship with QuickBooks
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Sharrin Fuller: It's, a love hate, I think everybody, right? I think it's a very generalized feeling through accountants right now with Intuit. It's very, it's a love hate. We love the product, but God, we hate what they're doing and the what? They're messing our world up, but we're loyal.
Dan DeLong: Yeah.
Sharrin Fuller: Or lazy.
Dan DeLong: And it's, much more [00:20:00] difficult to learn a, an entire. New piece of software. Yeah. Then I think the saying that I hear a lot it's the devil, yeah. It's, it, at least you know what you're in for. Yeah. And if you can keep that that, that distance at, I think that makes sense.
Until it gets to the point. And, a lot of people are getting to that point of, okay, this is enough. And most of those folks are coming from the desktop world of some I love my dog.
Sharrin Fuller: That's the time to change in my opinion. If you're gonna get off a desktop and go somewhere online, I'm a QuickBooks girl and I don't know that will ever change regardless of what comes outta my mouth. Again, you only hurt the ones you love, right? Yeah. But I think if I was gonna tell anybody that when I look, it's when you are going to hop off of QuickBooks Desktop, because that is when, that's when you're [00:21:00] gonna have to relearn your processes and rehook everything up anyways.
Challenges of Switching Software
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Sharrin Fuller: But honestly, in my opinion, Dan, I haven't, some people love Xero. Bookkeepers love Xero. I don't. I haven't, I'm not a fan. They're not a sponsor, right? No. It's QuickBooks.
Dan DeLong: No.
Sharrin Fuller: I haven't found anything that compares and a lot of things have really tried and they've, but that's what QuickBooks is, number one for a reason on.
Again the, devil,
Dan DeLong: and it's not like you could say I'm just gonna put everything in Excel and then do everything No that way. Oh my God. If you're expecting Excel not to change,
Sharrin Fuller: yeah, that's, and you can't trans, you transition, your clients open, you lose all the, or over, you lose all your detailed data.
'cause you're just pulling over a large journal entry to adjust, to move to zero or something like that. So it's really, you really look into it and it's nope, this company lives in QuickBooks. It's gonna die in QuickBooks. I'll start new ones over here. But then you're, [00:22:00] then, to me it's inefficient.
You have to get like a, team that's on QuickBooks, A team that's on zero. Yeah. It's just it's gonna be, I think it's gonna be the battle that we have for the next, until all of us now retire. Yeah. And the new people coming in decide what they're gonna use. So
The Future of QuickBooks and Accountants
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Dan DeLong: I think what would be, good for the QuickBook space is if they had.
A, I guess I what I'm trying to understand is all of these changes that they're making, I Is it required, right? Yeah. If there was just a like an accountant's view I hate to say the accountant's view business view because we've already been down this road, but if there was a, an accountant's view that didn't change or at least could be customized to the way that you want
to keep it. And change the business view for new [00:23:00] people and get things. The challenge is, I just don't know if there is a reason that everybody has to be on the new user interface, like the invoice experience, right? So yeah they had to have everybody get on this new experience before they could make changes.
Yeah. And updates to it, right? So is that one of the reasons? Because there's this terminology option of, QuickBooks on the Intuit platform, right? So this homogenized QuickBooks and MailChimp maybe that's one of the reasons that.
Sharrin Fuller: Yeah, that is
Dan DeLong: driving all of this
Sharrin Fuller: all the third party, and honestly, we only use QuickBooks for the gl.
I won't, I ref, like we won't. I, when my clients come, I'm like, Nope, let's get you on some, a third party plugin of something. But I, because I don't. [00:24:00] It. I'm convinced the new CEO has never met an accountant in their life because that's when everything started. They're just a total software person and they're taking into it to a great place, but definitely not thinking about accountants at this point, i when I go to connect I'm always like, do I approach people and give them my opinion? I did that once to Ted at API camp. And ever since then, he hasn't really loved me, so I dunno that my approach has been the right way and I'm not speaking again into it this year. So I think they hear me.
They hear me? I am. I am happy to fall on that sword for everybody down. I will do it. There you go. Because it's coming from a place of love. I'm like, hey, what you did sucks. What? Keep in mind I'm a QuickBooks only company. I'm only won't take a client unless you're QuickBooks. So you know, don't come for me.
Dan DeLong: That's it's catch 22, right? Yeah.
Sharrin Fuller: I'm in a really unhealthy relationship with Intuit. It's [00:25:00] very unhealthy and I refuse to get a divorce because I've been in it for so long that I'm not starting over, and that is where I am in life.
Dan DeLong: You're in it for your children.
Sharrin Fuller: I will complain about that spouse every day and how terrible they are, but I am not going anywhere, so they got me.
Dan DeLong: Because you're, because your children, your clients are being served by, because I
Sharrin Fuller: committed Dan.
Dan DeLong: There you go. I told my
Sharrin Fuller: clients this is what's it, and I can't be like, oh, by the way, I was wrong. I'm, in, for it. I'm in,
Dan DeLong: in, for, in, for the long haul until I
Sharrin Fuller: sell my firm. And then I don't care anymore, which is coming up real soon here.
Then it's the next person's problem.
Dan DeLong: Yeah. I'm always of the mindset that the grass is greener where you water it. If you, want to go somewhere else, not if you live
Sharrin Fuller: in Nevada.
Dan DeLong: Yeah. That's, the grass is expensive where you water it. In Nevada, they don't let
Sharrin Fuller: us have grass.
They're like, you get rock [00:26:00] or turf.
Dan DeLong: There we go. But in that regard, it is, it, you could go over to zero and then of course you have to water that and live with Yeah. The,
Sharrin Fuller: it's a different view, the confines
Dan DeLong: of that.
Sharrin Fuller: You can't journal for accountants and CPAs. You can't journal like you do in quite, that's my number one reason I didn't, that I got off of Xero is the reconciliation.
And honestly, I haven't used Xero in right seven or eight years, so it might not be different, but that's the last time I was there, the reconciliation, I was like, Nope. And I couldn't journal. Like I do on QuickBooks. I just wanna, I know how to journal correctly. I can I don't need, I don't need roadblocks.
So that's the main reason I'm like, it takes me five steps to do what takes me one and, Intuit. So into a GL I think is amazing. I have no problem with the gl. Exactly.
Clone and Conquer: Streamlining Accounting Processes
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Dan DeLong: So talk a little bit about your, clone and conquer because I love the what you're [00:27:00] doing for the accountant community,
Sharrin Fuller: besides the fact that it's covering over your shoulder.
How this is straight, but this is backwards. So on my zoom, I cannot stand when I'm, I can't mirror me. 'cause if I go to my right, I wanna see myself go to my right. Otherwise I'm like, so this is actually, if I look at it, it is. Backwards to me. So people walk in my office, they're like, what? My husband's what is wrong with you?
I'm like, I know, but it's straight to them. But now I just realized that my Golden Knights are backwards. So anyhow, yes. So it the same type of thing, right? Like it's a matter of we are accountants, we get in our ways, we need to get things done. But the problem is, we get stuck so much in the minutia that it's a matter of deciding.
What can be documented or replicated? Documented and passed along and getting into that mindset of being able to do that. So you are not working in your business instead on your business. 'cause they're some people. There's nothing wrong if you wanna work in your business, that is [00:28:00] amazing. Some people love it.
They're solopreneurs. That's what they wanna do. But for the ones that wanna scale, add more talent, grow their clients tell and they can't. This is where I come in. This is where we identify. I have a, community. It's free to join through the end of the year, and then I think you still get 90 days after you join because I want you guys to tell me what I, we need to fix.
But really it's, let's identify those problems. Let's figure it out. I'm creating content and videos to actually teach people how I do it. Keep in mind that I run three companies right now. I'm the chair and running the Women Who Count Conference, even though our Google workspace just went down and I'm on the board of the A FWA and the Treasurer, and we're completely redi redoing that.
So I am running a lot of things right now, three days a week, eight hours a day. That's really all I give myself. And the rest of the time, I'm on my couch. Plane on my phone and wa it's hockey back season. So I do that, but I can only do that because of the processes, the documentation, and the efficiencies that I set up and the automations to keep it going.
So that is [00:29:00] what I teach you. That was a really long elevator pitch.
Dan DeLong: In Las Vegas the elevators are much longer. Oh man, that's
Sharrin Fuller: true. So that was a stratosphere elevator pitch.
Dan DeLong: There we go.
Closing Remarks and Community Invitation
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Dan DeLong: And I did put a link for your community in the, comments, and you have a We have a QR code for those that are asking or watching this later.
Because as we were about to go live, I noticed that I somehow didn't hook up my YouTube channel. Anybody who's waiting for, for. For the, co, the workshop to be on YouTube. I'm sorry I didn't click the little toggle button to put it, push it to YouTube, but we'll get it, we'll get it up there.
Sharrin Fuller: I'll, write you up a process for that. It'll automate, automatically do it for you so you never have to think about it again.
Dan DeLong: Alright. I'll be able to clone and conquer my
Sharrin Fuller: everything. Everything. Fantastic. [00:30:00]
Dan DeLong: Sharrin, I appreciate you joining us today. Filling in on such short notice for of course, my own problems of shooing Rachel away even though she wasn't supposed to.
Sharrin Fuller: It's okay. She don't mind. She'll be happy. I was, I filled her shoes. I think. Exactly. She like she likes me. We're all right.
Dan DeLong: Yeah. We're, all friends here. Yes. All right. So appreciate you joining us all and watching it later on, on earmark and the blog article and Sharrin's cohort or community is listed in the comments.
So you can always check those out later. And we appreciate you joining us and we'll see you next time on the workshop Wednesday.
Sharrin Fuller: Bye everyone.
[00:31:00]
