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See the Red!

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As you can imagine I look at a lot of reports on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis.  I want to scan the various reports quickly and easily and have certain things just pop right out. I LOVE the Red report preference! It seems many people are not aware of the QuickBooks preference that allows you to configure how the reports display automatically.

This one tip is a must do in my opinion. J  This change makes it so easy to scan your reports and have items pop out within seconds.  Some balances showing in red will be correct; while others are probably something you need to review further. For instance if you know you haven’t prepaid your vendors, then your accounts payable should not be a negative number.  If you’re looking at your Balance Sheet and your PayPal balance is showing a negative balance, you quickly know it’s something you need to investigate.

To change this preference you must be logged in as the Admin, and the file must be in single-user mode.  I can hear a few people sighing right now, however this only needs to be done one time, and it’s really quick.  Any preference set through the ‘Company Preference’ tab will be a global setting – affecting all users.

  • Once you are in single user mode and logged in as Admin, go to Edit>Preference

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  • Scroll down to the Reports & Graphs section and select the Company Preferences tab 
    • Click on Format

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  • On the next screen, select the Fonts & Numbers tab
    • Put a checkmark in the box beside ‘In Bright Red’ 
    • Click OK to save this setting

 

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Once the preference is saved negative numbers on ANY report will now show up in Red.

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I typically select the ‘normal’ setting for the red font (what you see above); however you can also elect to have the parenthesis show if you prefer.

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When I’m working on a client file and this preference hasn’t been set, it’s one of the first things that I do before I start working. This one change really helps my efficiency and accuracy.

Enjoy the red!

Rox 🙂