QuickBooks® 2010 For Dummies®

Chapter 2. Answering Mr. Wizard

In This Chapter

• Getting ready to do the big interview

• Not getting discouraged about the big interview

• Surviving the big interview

• Telling your friends all sorts of war stories about the big interview

I know that you're eager to get started. After all, you have a business to run. But before you can start using QuickBooks, you need to do some up-front work. Specifically, you need to prepare for the QuickBooks EasyStep Interview, and then you need to walk through the EasyStep Interview. (The EasyStep Interview is just a thorough question-and-answer session that QuickBooks uses to set itself up for you.) In this chapter, I describe how you do all this stuff.

Note

I assume that you know how Windows works. If you don't, take the time to read Chapter 1 of your Windows User's Guide, or try the appropriate edition of Windows For Dummies, by Andy Rathbone (Wiley).

Getting Ready for the Big Interview

You need to complete three tasks to get ready for the EasyStep Interview:

• Make an important decision about your conversion date (the date you convert from your old accounting system to QuickBooks).

• Prepare a trial balance as of the conversion date.

• Go on a scavenger hunt to collect a bunch of stuff that you'll need or find handy for the interview.

The big decision

Before you start fiddling with your computer or the QuickBooks software, you need to choose the date — the so-called conversion date — on which you want to begin using QuickBooks for your financial record keeping.