How To Enter Credit Card Transactions in QuickBooks Online

QuickBooks will bring up the expense input screen, asking you to change the payment account to your credit card and the payment method to your type of credit card. If you need to set up an account for a new credit card, see our tutorial on how to set up the chart of accounts.

Select your payment method and account in QuickBooks Online

Enter the remaining transaction details on the expense input screen. Depending on the settings you selected in how to set up advanced settings, you may not have all the fields displayed.

Enter expense details in QuickBooks Online

If you’ve been completing our tutorials in order, the information required to create an expense transaction should be familiar as it’s the same as creating a bill or writing and printing a check.

A. Payee: Choose the vendor you’re paying or select Add new from the drop-down menu to set up a new vendor.

B. Payment date: Enter the date you’re making the credit card charge.

C. Category: Assign a category that describes your expense transaction, such as office supplies. Choose from the drop-down list or click Add new to set up a new account.

D. Description: Provide a description of the credit card charge.

E. Amount: Enter the amount of the expense.

F. Billable: You can make a credit card expense billable to a customer by placing a checkmark here. However, it’s better to create product or service items that can be used to assign billable expenses to customers more easily.

G. Tax: Place a checkmark here if you’re required to collect sales tax from your customer when billing them for this expense.

H. Customer/Project: Select the customer or project you wish to bill for this expense, if any. If you wish to bill a new customer or project, select Add new to set up a customer or project.

• If, for example, you need to itemize expenses under your “Utility Expenses” category, such as create two items: “telephone” and “electric bills,”, then you need to complete the Item field, discussed below.

I. Product/Service Item: If you haven’t already created the necessary inventory or service items, click Add new to set up a new product/service item. Once you select a product/service item, the fields for Description, Rate, Billable, Tax, and Class will populate automatically. Note that:

• Goods that are purchased for sale to customers should be assigned an inventory item
• Services and other expenses purchased that will be billed to customers should be assigned a service item

J. Qty: Enter the quantity of goods or hours of services purchased. After you add it, the amount and sales amount will be calculated.

K. Customer/Project: Add the customer or project you want to bill for the specific item or service you’ve entered. It should be the same customer you entered in the Category field.

When you’re finished entering the transaction details, click on the green Save and close button in the bottom right corner of the screen.

The credit card register will provide a list of all transactions in your credit card account. You can modify the fields that appear in your register by clicking on the gear icon immediately above the far right column.

Modify credit card register settings in QuickBooks Online

To modify a credit card transaction that appears in the register, click anywhere on the transaction. This will open to allow you to edit any fields in the register. However, not all fields that are available when inputting transactions appear in the register. To edit fields that aren’t shown, click the Edit button immediately below the transaction to get to the original expense input screen.

Click Edit to open the transaction input screen

Be sure to save your changes when you’re finished making changes directly in the register or editing the original input screen.