Fund Accounting in QuickBooks: What is it and How to Set it up within QuickBooks

Before delving into fund accounting, it is very important to understand what it is in the first place. This will make it really easy to follow the steps along.

What is Fund Accounting in QuickBooks

It’s an organization that when meets section 501 of USIRC becomes a nonprofit organization. When the business becomes nonprofit then all the rules and regulations are guarded by FASB. As per standards set by FASB, all the financial info. is required to be submitted in separate categories. They are also required to make use of standardized reports to report their funds. Such are the guidelines that need to be met by an organization that does fund accounting.

QuickBooks Chart of Accounts Setting

If you are just starting out with fund accounting within your accounting software then you will have to initially set up a Chart of accounts. This you can do through the following steps:

• Within the program, click on the Transactions tab.
• Here choose the chart of the accounts menu.
• A new window will appear, here you will have to select the type of category you want to define under your COA.
• Click on the detailed type and feed in your name.
• When all is done, save the info and close the window to set up fund accounting.

How to Set up Fund Accounting in QuickBooks

If you are running an organization or is handling clients running it, then here is what you need to do to track fund accounting within Quickbooks. Follow the steps to make the process a bit simpler.

Turn on Class Tracking

The very first thing you would need to do is turn on the class tracking feature if it is not turned on:

• Login to your Quickbooks accounting program and click on the settings
• Choose Company settings from the drop-down menu and then click on the Companies
• From the dialogue box that appears choose the Edit option from the categories
• Here you will see a list of options.
• Click on the option that says Track classes.
• This will enable your class tracking ability within Quickbooks.
• Hit Save and finish.

Tracking Class per fund

• Hit the all lists tab within the Settings icon in the top navigation bar.
• Now choose the classes
• Choose the new option and you will be asked to give a name to your fund.
• Save the changes made.

Since now you have defined a separate class thus every fund entry you make, would need to be entered in the most appropriate fund class.

How to Track Fund Income and Expenses

When you are done with all the entries and then here is how you can watch out for fund income and its expenses.

• From the left side navigation bar, you would need to click on the reports tab.
• Within the reports section, search for P&L by class.
• Click on the relevant option from the list that appears.
• You will now see a list of all the entries with the total income and expenses that happened in the current fiscal year. If you want to check out profits for the previous year then you would have to change the data from the all-date option and run the report.