Using QuickBooks Desktop Connector

This article is the second in the QuickBooks Desktop Connector (QDC) series, and will walk you through both General Information about QDC and specific information about using QDC to sync Customers, Assays, Panels, Invoices, and Payments.

REMINDER: Make sure to link your existing data in QuickBooks data with your data in QBench BEFORE completing your first sync. If you need assistance, QBench support is here to help.

General Information

QDC allows for unidirectional syncing from QBench to QuickBooks Desktop, and is designed assuming QBench will be your master place of record. While you can update data on your Customers, Service Items, Invoices, etc. in QuickBooks, this information will be overwritten with whatever data is in QBench on the next sync (though some of this functionality can be disabled for Customers -- see the Customers Addresses section).

Other Constraints

• Synced fields cannot have special characters (e.g. ñ, á)
• Only up to 30 characters of a syncable field will be synced to QuickBooks. If a field has more than 30 characters in it, the synced data will be truncated at 30 characters
• In order to sync Assays, Invoices, and Payments, the company file must have an account where service items can be saved to called “Sales”
• Only certain core fields can be synced via QDC at this time. No additional fields are supported
• QDC syncs data in a set order. When a sync starts, QDC will first check for and sync changes to Customers and billing Contacts, then Assays, then Panels, then Invoices, and then Payments. If a sync fails, nothing after the point of failure will sync (e.g. if an Assay fails to sync because a “Sales” account is not configured, no Panels, Invoices, or Payments will be synced)
• QDC syncs data from QBench to QuickBooks, but not vice versa. Changes made to a Customer, Assay, Panel, Invoice, or Payment in QuickBooks will NOT sync to the corresponding item in QBench

New Fields

Once QDC has been enabled in your instance, you will see the following four new core fields in Fields and Data Types for Customers, Assays, Panels, Invoices, and Payments (“objects”):

• QuickBooks Desktop ID - the internal ID generated by QuickBooks for the object
• QuickBooks Desktop Edit Sequence - the token that verifies the integrity of this object within QuickBooks
• QuickBooks Desktop Last Synced - updates each time the specific object is synced from QBench. After the initial sync, QDC synced changes made to object after the timestamp in Last Synced
• QuickBooks Desktop Response Log - captures messages from QuickBooks after a sync has been completed. If a sync fails or object does not update, an error message will appear in this field

These read-only fields do not need to be displayed to use QDC, but can provide useful information for troubleshooting in the event a sync fails. The Troubleshooting section in the Setting Up QuickBooks Desktop Connector article refers to data in these fields.

Customers

When a new Customer is created or updated in QBench, QDC will sync the following information about the Customer to QuickBooks Desktop:

• Name
• Address
• City
• State
• Zip / Postal
• Country
• Phone
• Fax
• Comments (appear as Notes)

Additionally, for each Customer, the name and email address of one billing Contact will be synced to QuickBooks. This Contact’s information will appear as the Customer’s “Full Name” and “Primary Email Address” in QuickBooks.

If syncing a Customer from QBench to a Customer that already exists in QuickBooks and the Customer in QuickBooks has existing Notes, the contents of the very first Note created for the Customer and their Comment in QBench will be merged in both QBench and QuickBooks. After this initial sync, updates to the Customer's Comment in QBench will always overwrite the contents of this first Notes in QuickBooks.

If you have multiple Customers with the same name in QBench, be aware that QuickBooks does not support multiple Customers with the same name. As mentioned in the previous article, we encourage QDC users to turn on Enforce Unique Customer Name in the QBench General Settings while using QDC.

Addresses

Due to how QuickBooks processes Customer addresses, certain addresses may be formatted incorrectly when they are synced to QuickBooks.

• Addresses of less than 30 characters that are entered in the "Address" field will be formatted correctly
  
  
• If an Address includes "City", "State", "Zip / Postal", or "Country" entries, data in non-"Address" fields may be duplicated
  
  

If your Customer addresses are not appearing correctly in QuickBooks, you may check the "Do not sync address to QuickBooks" option per Customer, which will allow you to format your Customer's address in QuickBooks without the data being overwritten by address information stored in QBench.

Assays

QDC syncs the following information about Assays to QuickBooks Desktop:

• Title
• Base Price

Panels

When a Panel is first added to QuickBooks, QDC will sync the Panel's name and base price. If you group items by Panel on your Invoices, only one service item will appear for the Panel in QuickBooks.

If you do not group items by Panel on your Invoices, a service item will be created for each Assay on each Panel that is Invoiced. These service items will include:

• Title (as it appears on the Invoice in QBench)
• Base Price

Invoices

QDC will sync the following information about newly created or updated Invoices in the "APPROVED" or “INVOICED” status (or custom "APPROVED" or "INVOICED" statuses) to QuickBooks Desktop:

• Invoice Date
• Invoice Due Date
• Customer Address
• QBench Invoice ID (in a Description at the top of each Invoice. The Invoice ID in the “Num” column in QuickBooks is the number of the Invoice in QuickBooks, and therefore likely will NOT match the Invoice’s ID in QBench)
• For each line item:
  • Item Name
  • Rate
  • Quantity
  • Discount
  • Surcharge
  • Amount
• Total Invoice amount

If any Assay, Panel, or other line item has an in-line Discount or Surcharge, the total amount after the Discount or Surcharge is synced over to QuickBooks. Information about what Discounts or Surcharges were applied appear in the line item in QuickBooks.

Standalone Discounts and Surcharges are synced to QuickBooks as service items. The amount for each of these services items is also the total amount displayed in QBench after the Discount or Surcharge is applied; as such, the same percentage Discount or Surcharge will create different service items in QuickBooks if the dollar amount of the Discount or Surcharge varies between Invoices.

Payments

When a Payment is applied to at least one Invoice, QDC will sync the following information about the Payment to QuickBooks Desktop:

• Payment Amount
• Type
• Payment Date
• Check #