n-How to Add a Vendor in QuickBooks
Go to Expenses > Vendors, click New vendor, enter their name and contact details, and save. You can also add one on the fly from inside a bill you're entering, without leaving that screen. Here's the full walkthrough, including the 1099 checkbox that's easy to miss the first time around.
The full walkthrough
1. Open the Vendors list under Expenses. Click New vendor in the top right. (+ New > Vendor under the Vendors column gets you the same form.)
2. Enter their display name and company name. The display name is what shows up everywhere, dropdowns, bills, reports, so make it something you'll recognize months from now, not just this week.
3. Add their contact details and address. Email and address matter more here than they do for a customer record; you'll want them on file if you ever mail a check or need to send a 1099.
4. Enter their tax ID and check Track payments for 1099, if it applies. This is the step people skip and regret in January. If this vendor is a contractor or business you'll likely pay over the 1099 threshold within the year, flip this on now instead of hunting down their tax ID months later.
5. Set default payment terms, if you know them. Net 30, due on receipt, whatever's standard for this vendor. It pre-fills on every bill you enter for them from here on.
6. Save. They're immediately available in the vendor dropdown on bills, expenses, and checks.
Why the vendor list gets messy faster than the customer list
Multiple people entering bills means multiple chances to type the same supplier's name a little differently each time, 'ABC Supply' one week, 'ABC Supply Co.' the next, until nobody's sure which record actually has the full history.
The 1099 checkbox causes its own version of this problem on a yearly cycle. It gets missed quietly all year, then shows up as a scramble every January when someone realizes a contractor's tax ID was never captured and now has to be chased down after the fact instead of at the moment the vendor was first added.
What we've built on top of QuickBooks vendor records
Vendor records pulled in from wherever the relationship starts
A supplier approved in a procurement or project tool creates the matching QuickBooks vendor automatically, with the contact details already filled in, instead of getting retyped from an email or a business card.
1099 status checked as spend happens, not discovered in January
Vendor spend gets tracked against the 1099 threshold as bills come in, so nobody finds out in January that a contractor's tracking was never turned on to begin with.
Vendor list getting harder to trust than it should be?
Tell us how vendors get added in your business right now, and we'll tell you whether the duplicates and the missed 1099 setups can be caught automatically.
Scrambling every January to fix missing 1099 details?
Tell us how vendors actually get added in your business today, and we'll tell you if the tax ID and tracking checkbox can get caught at creation instead of months later. Vendor setup is one example; n-frames automates whatever's manual in a business, any tool, any process.
Let's talk