Sending/deleting allocation transactions to/from QuickBooks

This topic provides technical details on how ManagePLUS Gold manages allocation transactions in QuickBooks.

When you click on the Send button, ManagePLUS Gold performs all of the following steps:

This assures no old allocation transactions exist in QuickBooks within the active accounting period, to interfere with your current allocations. Transactions dated outside of the active accounting period are ignored.

When you add or change allocation formulas, ManagePLUS Gold builds a new set of allocation transactions. But before doing this, it creates accounts in the Chart of Accounts window, as needed, to mimic the cost center and profit center classes involved in the allocations. These ManagePLUS Gold-created accounts must be added to the QuickBooks Chart of Accounts before transactions are sent—this is actually the most complex part of the process.

This is the simplest part of the process. With old transactions deleted and the proper set of accounts in place in QuickBooks, ManagePLUS Gold just sends the transactions.

Do not use "MP~" in the Reference Number and Memo fields of your own transactions, or ManagePLUS Gold may delete them as part of managing its own transactions in QuickBooks.

•	ManagePLUS Gold handles updating of the QuickBooks Chart of Accounts automatically, as part of sending allocation transactions to QuickBooks.

•	ManagePLUS Gold creates, renames, and manages a group of Other Expense type accounts, with an account named Allocated Expense (MP) as the main account, and a single level of subaccounts below it.

Do not create the Allocated Expense (MP) account on your own. If you do, then when ManagePLUS Gold tries to add its own account it will add one with a slightly different name, by appending a numeral to it, such as Allocated Expense (MP)_2, Allocated Expense (MP)_3, etc.

Do not post transactions to Allocated Expense (MP) or any of its subaccounts, because ManagePLUS Gold may rename those accounts at any time.

•	ManagePLUS Gold manages the names of Allocated Expense (MP)'s subaccounts. It may rename them at any time, to keep their names corresponding to the classes which they represent.

While you may rename these subaccounts' if you wish, understand that your renaming may be temporary. If you later make changes in the class names, and those classes are involved in allocation, ManagePLUS Gold may overwrite your subaccount names with new ones corresponding to the classes they represent.

•	You may freely rename the the Allocated Expense (MP) account after ManagePLUS Gold creates it, and ManagePLUS Gold will leave the new name unchanged.

•	New subaccounts are added to the end of the list. If you don't like that order, you can rearrange them in the QuickBooks Chart of Accounts list, then refresh accounts in ManagePLUS Gold.

The names of Allocated Expense (MP)'s subaccounts are built to mimic the "path" to the class they represent. So if you have a class named:

Note that the an underscore (_) is simply substituted for the colon (:) which separates the class name levels.

If you rename a class, then refresh classes in ManagePLUS Gold, that class' corresponding subaccount will be renamed in ManagePLUS Gold. If you then send allocation transactions to QuickBooks, ManagePLUS Gold will update the subaccount's name in the QuickBooks Chart of Accounts as well.

The only way to make the renaming of an allocation subaccount permanent, is to rename the class on which the subaccount is based, in the QuickBooks, then refresh classes in ManagePLUS Gold, and send allocation transactions to QuickBooks.

QuickBooks has a limited number of characters available for account names. So when a subaccount name would be over this limit, ManagePLUS Gold must create a shorter version. This could potentially lead to having two subaccounts with the same name, but since QuickBooks won't allow two subaccounts of the same main account to have identical names. When this situation arises, ManagePLUS Gold varies the names by appending different numerals to the name until a unique name is found.

By the way, when ManagePLUS Gold creates such similarly-named accounts, it attempts to put the full class "path" in the account's Description field. So you can edit an account and look at its Description to learn exactly which class it represents.

•	ManagePLUS Gold automatically deletes its old transactions from QuickBooks before sending new transactions for the same accounting period.

•	Normally there should be no need for you to manually delete ManagePLUS Gold's transactions from QuickBooks. However if you want to delete them, a Delete button in the ManagePLUS Gold main window automates that task.

•	When ManagePLUS Gold deletes allocation transactions from QuickBooks it only deletes those within the date range of the active accounting period. Transactions in other periods are ignored.

•	ManagePLUS Gold uses several means to verify that it is the creator of a transaction before deleting it. Specifically, it only deletes transactions which have "MP~" in the Reference Number and Memo fields.

Do not remove the "MP~" from any ManagePLUS Gold transactions by editing them in QuickBooks, or ManagePLUS Gold will be unable to find or delete them.

Do not use "MP~" in the Reference Number and Memo fields of your own transactions, or ManagePLUS Gold will delete them from QuickBooks when it deletes its own transactions there.

If you use passwords and the closing date feature in QuickBooks you need to take a simple precaution to allow ManagePLUS Gold to always delete its transactions: be sure the password ManagePLUS uses for logging into QuickBooks has permission to change transactions prior to the closing date. If that password has lesser permissions, and you've closed period which falls within the active accounting period, ManagePLUS Gold may not be able to delete all of its old allocation transactions for that period.

When ManagePLUS Gold cannot delete transactions from QuickBooks, it should display message warning you about the situation.

Before sending new allocation transactions to QuickBooks, ManagePLUS Gold deletes all of its old ones from QuickBooks within the date range of the active accounting period. If you sometimes work with different-length accounting periods, it's important to understand what this means.

Suppose you've been preparing a cost analysis in ManagePLUS Gold quarterly, and have sent allocation transactions to QuickBooks each time to allow doing some additional reporting.

But at the end of the year you decide to do a cost analysis which spans the entire year. When you send allocation transactions to QuickBooks then, what happens? The allocation transactions you sent for each quarter will be deleted by ManagePLUS Gold, because their dates fall within the active accounting period—which spans the entire year, not just one quarter.

This is unavoidable, because if the quarterly allocation transactions were left in place it would result in double counting of allocated amounts on QuickBooks reports.

•	If doing a quarterly or monthly cost analysis is important to your business, be sure you've completed all of the necessary reporting for them in QuickBooks before sending transactions for overlapping periods, such as the entire year.

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Don't send transactions to QuickBooks unless it's really necessary. For instance, you might need to send quarterly allocation transactions to QuickBooks for some specialized reporting purpose. But if you don't need the same kind of reports when you do an annual cost analysis, simply don't send the annual analysis' transactions to QuickBooks. Instead, rely on the Profit Analysis report in ManagePLUS Gold.

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You could make a separate backup copy of your QuickBooks data file each month or quarter, to keep allocation transactions "live" in QuickBooks. If your QuickBooks file is myfile.QBW, name the backup something like myfile2012q1.QBW (a backup for the 1st quarter of 2012). The problem with this approach is that if you change any 1st quarter 2012 transactions in your main QuickBooks file, myfile.QBW, your backup will no longer be current/correct.

•	What if you need to restore quarterly or monthly allocation transactions in QuickBooks, after deleting them by sending transactions for a longer, overlapping period? Simply open each of those periods in ManagePLUS Gold, in succession, and send their allocation transactions to QuickBooks.