Welcome to the Fit Small Business QuickBooks Online training course! In this lesson, we’re going to cover how to manually enter business credit card transactions in QuickBooks Online.

You can follow along on your own QuickBooks Online account. If you don’t have one already, click here to sign up for a free 30-day trial and follow along below.

To complete this lesson, you can either watch the video below, read through the step-by-step instructions, or do both. Let’s begin!

If you’d like to learn more about managing income, expenses and reporting in QuickBooks download our free 39 course QuickBooks tutorial here.

Download Our Free Quickbooks Course

When to Manually Enter Business Credit Card Transactions in QuickBooks Online

The most efficient way to import your credit card transactions into QuickBooks is by using one of the following methods:

• Automatically connect your credit card account to QuickBooks
• Import your credit card transactions from an Excel CSV file

If you are unable to do this because your credit card company does not offer either of these options, you will need to manually enter your credit card transactions into QuickBooks. We will cover how to do this in this lesson.

How Do I Manually Enter My Business Credit Card Transactions?

Before you can manually enter your credit card transactions into QuickBooks, you need to set up the credit card in QuickBooks.

Step 1 – Display the chart of accounts list

To start, navigate to the chart of accounts list by clicking on the gear icon to the left of your company name. Below the Your Company column, select Chart of Accounts as indicated below.

Step 2 – Create credit card

The chart of accounts will display. Click on the New button in the upper right hand corner and complete the fields as indicated below.

1. Category Type: Select the type of account you are downloading transactions for.
2. Detail Type: This field automatically populates with Credit Card based on the selection made in the Category Type field.
3. Name: This is how the account name will show up in QuickBooks.  
4. Description: Put the name of your credit card and the last 4 digits of the account number.
   TIP: If you’ve got more than one business credit card that you plan to connect to QuickBooks, including the name of the card and the last 4 digits of the card number allows you to easily tell one credit card account from another when you are entering transactions and reconciling these accounts.
5. Balance: In order for you to successfully reconcile your credit card accounts, you need to indicate the ending balance on your credit card statement in this field.
   TIP: The credit card statement that you use will be determined by the date that you start using QuickBooks. For example, if you start using QuickBooks as of January 1 then you want to use the ending balance on your December credit card statements.
6. As of Date: This is going to be the ending date on the credit statement. (i.e. 12/31/XX).
7. Double check to make sure that you have made the correct selections in all fields. Click the Save and Close button.

Step 3 – Review updated chart of accounts

The new credit card account will appear on the chart of accounts list, as indicated below.

Step 4 – Navigate to credit card register

From the chart of accounts list, click on the View register link in the far right column as indicated below.

The credit card register should display on your screen as indicated below. Below you will find a brief description of what information appears in each field.

1. Credit Card Register: You can determine what credit card register you are in.  You can easily switch between credit card registers by clicking the drop down arrow.
2. Ending Balance: This is the current balance of the credit card account.
   TIP: When you enter credit card transactions in QuickBooks, the credit card balance is immediately updated.
3. Reconcile: In the reconciling credit card accounts lesson, we will walk through step by step how to reconcile credit card accounts. You do not need to click on this right now.
4. Date: This will be the transaction date of the credit card charge or credit.
5. Ref No/Type: If you have a reference number that will help you to identify this transaction in the future, you can enter that number in this field. The transaction type (i.e. CC expense or CC credit) will appear in this field right below the reference number.
6. Payee/Account: For charges, this field will include the payee and the expense account the purchase was categorized to. For credits or payments, this field will include the vendor the credit was received from along with the expense account it was categorized to.
7. Memo: Typically, you would include some additional information about the transaction (i.e. the charge was to buy plumbing supplies)
8. Charge: Enter the amount charged to your credit card in this field.
9. Payment: Enter the payments (or credits) that appear on your credit card statement.

Step 5 – Enter a credit card transaction

To enter a credit card transaction, once you are in the register, click on the drop down arrow and select one of the following transaction types from the list as indicated below.

Complete all of the necessary fields and save the credit card transaction as indicated below. The fields are the same that appeared when you were reviewing your credit card register in the previous step.

How Do I Modify Credit Card Transactions?

If you need to make changes to a transaction that was previously entered into the credit card register, you can do so by following the steps below:

Step 1 – Navigate to the credit card register

From the chart of accounts list, click on the View register link in the far right column as indicated below.

Step 2 – Select the credit card transaction that you need to edit

Once you are in the register, click on the transaction that needs editing, and make your changes. Don’t forget to save your changes.

Wrap Up

That wraps up the section on How to Manually Enter Business Credit Card Transactions in QuickBooks Online. The next lesson in our QuickBooks Online Training Course will be how to manage downloaded business credit card transactions. In this lesson, we will walk you through what to do after you have imported your credit card transactions into QuickBooks.

To access this lesson or any of the others in the series, click here. Or, click here for a free 30-day trial of QuickBooks Online.

Our Recommended QuickBooks Apps