QuickBooks Online 2026: How to Pay Bills (Accounts Payable)

0:00 If you pay contractors rent or any recurring bills,

0:03 this video will save you hours every month.

0:05 I'll show you how to get bills into QuickBooks Online automatically.

0:09 Pay them on a schedule and never miss a due date again.

0:13 I'm David.

0:14 I've partnered with Intuit to bring you this tutorial,

0:16 so if you don't have QuickBooks yet,

0:18 head to the link in the description below to set up an account.

0:22 Let's dive in.

0:23 So here we are on the QuickBooks homepage.

0:25 This tutorial works with any QuickBooks accounting plan.

0:28 So there are three ways you can get bills into QuickBooks.

0:30 We'll start with the one you'll use most.

0:32 Head over to the All Apps button and then

0:35 go to Expenses and Bills and then Bills.

0:37 In most cases, you'll get Bills and invoices emailed to you.

0:40 So the best approach is to forward them to the email

0:43 address you see at the top of this screen.

0:46 Fortunately, we've got a fresh bill in our inbox.

0:48 So let's use this copy button and then head over to Outlook.

0:52 So Alex here has sent us a tax preparation bill for the year.

0:56 We can go ahead and forward that to the email address that QuickBooks provided.

1:00 And when you head back to the bill page,

1:02 you'll see it processing in the bottom right.

1:05 It's going to extract that attachment and then read the invoice for you.

1:08 It takes about a minute, but once it's done,

1:11 you'll see it pop up in the For Review tab.

1:14 Now this table is pretty nice.

1:15 QuickBooks was able to extract several properties

1:17 of the bill and you can see those here.

1:20 It's easy to miss though that you could actually

1:22 preview the PDF by moving your mouse over this icon.

1:25 But as with any AI process, you should verify that it got the correct info.

1:29 So you can do that by clicking review.

1:31 The original bill is on the left and the extracted data is here on the right.

1:35 Of course, you want to get the due date right,

1:38 the amounts right, and also the vendor right.

1:41 If it's a new vendor, which this one is,

1:43 it's easy to click add them by clicking add new.

1:45 Since we're working on Bills right now,

1:47 I'll just fill in the name quickly and move on.

1:49 We'll set up vendors properly in the next section.

1:52 Everything looks okay so far, but if we scroll down,

1:55 we'll see a spurious expense was picked up.

1:57 You can just click the trash can icon to delete it.

1:59 Once you're satisfied with this data,

2:01 you can click save and close to move it to the unpaid state.

2:04 That means it's no longer accessible on this For Review tab.

2:08 You'd need to go to unpaid.

2:09 This leads us to method two for creating

2:11 a bill and that's uploading it directly.

2:13 That starts from the Add Bill button in the top right.

2:16 Click it and then click Create Bill.

2:18 Grab the invoice file from your desktop.

2:20 It can be a PDF or an image file and then drag it into this left section.

2:25 After about 30 seconds to a minute,

2:27 QuickBooks's AI will break down your invoice into line items,

2:31 including the amounts, descriptions and inferred categories.

2:35 Definitely check on those categories, especially for first time vendors.

2:37 It might not get it quite correct.

2:39 Now, just like last time, we still have to add a vendor.

2:43 But this time, let's add more information so we can actually pay them.

2:47 That definitely includes the email address.

2:49 So make sure you add that first.

2:51 If you intend to pay them with a check, fill in their address down below.

2:55 If you're using good old fashioned ACH, though,

2:57 you can fill in that account info down here.

2:59 This time, when we save the vendor, we can actually schedule the payment.

3:03 This pop -up is fine.

3:04 We do want to keep our attachment here.

3:06 Now we've got this bill squared away.

3:07 Let's schedule the payment.

3:08 This is where Bill Pay kicks in.

3:10 The first time you try to pay a vendor, you got to choose a Bill Pay plan.

3:13 The main difference between Basic and Premium is

3:16 how many free ACH transfers you get a month.

3:18 Basic gives you five and Premium gives you 40.

3:21 If you go over those limits,

3:22 you pay a per transaction cost, which you can see here.

3:25 The value of the Elite plan is if you're with a larger

3:28 company and you need bill approvers or payment release approver workflows.

3:31 I'm going to choose Basic for this video, because it's free.

3:35 And I know you guys like free stuff too.

3:37 To complete your enrollment,

3:38 you will need to verify your business information and provide a bank account.

3:43 This is pretty straightforward.

3:44 So come join me when you're done.

3:46 Once you're subscribed, you'll come to the schedule bill payment screen.

3:49 First, make sure your bank account is set up properly.

3:52 We see this warning up in the top left.

3:53 So let's click on it and then click manage.

3:55 It wants us to map our actual checking account to an account.

4:00 In case you don't have this set up, click add new.

4:03 Name your account something like checking account,

4:05 select bank from the account type,

4:07 and then choose the detail type, which makes most sense.

4:10 Make sure the opening balance is set up correctly.

4:13 Otherwise, you'll run into reconciliation problems later.

4:15 When you're done, click save.

4:17 But I'm going to click cancel since I already

4:19 have this set up and then click save again.

4:22 We'll go through the rest of this line pretty quickly.

4:24 First up is payment method.

4:25 If you click edit here,

4:27 you see there are two options, paper check and bank payment.

4:30 When you pre-fill the vendor information, it gets filled in here automatically.

4:34 And in case you missed it earlier, paper checks cost $1.50 per bill.

4:38 So while it's convenient, if that's all the vendor accepts,

4:40 just make sure you're aware of it.

4:42 You can also configure when the funds will be

4:44 withdrawn from your account by selecting the withdrawal date.

4:47 Two other quick things to know, you can change the amount that you pay.

4:51 So if you want to do a partial payment, that's possible here.

4:53 And you can also include what's called a remittance with your payment.

4:57 So vendors will already get a notice of the bill that you're paying.

5:00 Just use this if you need to send more information.

5:03 When you're done, click on continue to view the payment.

5:06 When you're ready, click schedule payment.

5:07 So one quick tip is to give yourself a buffer the first time you pay a vendor.

5:12 Processing for those can sometimes take longer than expected.

5:15 We'll save and close this.

5:16 You can find that under the arrow in the bottom right.

5:19 And here we are back on our bills page,

5:21 but I haven't showed you method number three

5:23 to enter a bill and that's to create it manually.

5:27 To do that, head back to Add Bill and then Create Bill.

5:30 The only difference here is that you don't upload anything.

5:32 You just fill in all of this by hand.

5:35 Because it's basically the same process after

5:36 that, we won't walk through it again.

5:38 That's a bill entered and paid.

5:40 But if any of your vendors or contractors,

5:43 there's one check box you need to flip now or you'll be scrambling in January.

5:48 Let's go to the vendors page and set them up properly.

5:50 That vendor's page is under expenses and bills.

5:52 So let's click it and see who we've got there.

5:55 You can create a new vendor using this button in the top right,

5:58 but let's take a look at an existing vendor.

6:00 Grady here is a great example because he's a contractor.

6:03 Here you'll see all of your vendors details

6:05 and how much money you still owe them.

6:07 Grady's probably not happy with us right now.

6:09 You can also edit their info using the dialog we saw earlier.

6:13 Let's walk through a couple more details you may want to set.

6:15 First up is tracking payments for 1099.

6:18 You'll find this under the ACH info card.

6:21 This check box is a huge bonus.

6:23 Not only does it track how much you've paid this contractor,

6:26 but in January next year,

6:27 it'll file the 1099 with the IRS as well as email a copy to the contractor.

6:33 This additional info card can also save you time later by choosing

6:37 default payment terms and the default expense category for this contractor.

6:42 A rare but useful setting is the opening balance.

6:45 Basically, this is an amount you already owe a vendor before you set

6:48 them up so you can pay a bill against it if you need to.

6:52 If you fill this in when you create a new vendor,

6:54 it would create a bill which you can pay immediately.

6:57 Once you set up your vendors, you can pay a whole batch of bills in one go.

7:01 That's where accounts payable becomes a real process.

7:05 So to do that, let's head back to the bills

7:07 area by going to expenses and bills and then bills.

7:09 QuickBooks makes this really easy to run an accounts payable process every week.

7:13 You'll first come to this page and see all of your open bills at once.

7:17 Then you'll click Pay Bills in the top right to start a pay run.

7:20 You'll select the bills that you want

7:21 to pay here and then click schedule payment.

7:23 As of filming, you set up partial payments

7:25 on the next screen, not on this screen.

7:28 You'll get to the same bill screen we saw before.

7:30 This time you just have multiple bills you can pay.

7:32 That covers paying the bills that you have now,

7:35 but rent, subscription, utilities, those come back every month.

7:38 QuickBooks can create those bills for you automatically.

7:41 These are called recurring bills and you can access them by going

7:45 back to the bills page and then clicking on the Recurring tab.

7:49 We don't have any yet,

7:50 but we can create one by clicking Add Bill and then Create Recurring Bill.

7:54 There are three modes for a recurring bill

7:56 and here's a simple table to run through them.

7:59 Scheduled bills have a predictable date and a predictable amount.

8:02 Think of things like rent or fixed price subscriptions.

8:05 Reminders can be good when you have

8:08 a predictable date but an unpredictable amount like utilities.

8:11 An unscheduled means an unpredictable date and an unpredictable amount.

8:15 These are just templates that you can reuse.

8:18 Let's build examples of each of these so you can see how they work.

8:21 First up is scheduled.

8:22 This is going to be for our monthly rent.

8:24 This is just like creating a bill so

8:26 I filled in the information we've already looked at.

8:28 Now down in this section we set the bill issue date.

8:31 You have quite some flexibility in the intervals.

8:33 You can go from daily all the way to yearly.

8:36 You can make this bi-monthly and you can change

8:38 the exact day of the month that hits on.

8:40 You can also choose the start and end dates for this bill.

8:42 If you leave them blank it assumes it starts automatically.

8:46 You can also create this bill before the bill date

8:48 by filling in the create blank days and advance field.

8:51 Now I'll make this show up as early

8:53 as possible by setting it to tomorrow's date.

8:56 That completes a scheduled bill so let's

8:58 save the template and move on to reminders.

9:00 You'll see the bill show up in the recurring list so let's add our next bill.

9:04 This one is the reminder.

9:06 The setup is very similar to the scheduled recurring bills.

9:09 Note that because the amount is unpredictable I've left

9:12 it blank but I've still included the line item.

9:15 Let's save this template and then finish up with the unscheduled bill.

9:18 Unscheduled bills are literally just templates so

9:20 we don't have any timetables to worry about.

9:23 Now we've created each of these three types.

9:25 Let's see how you actually use them.

9:26 Now scheduled bills are created as unpaid bills but the catch is they

9:30 won't be created for at least 24 hours after you set them up.

9:35 So I've just come back a day later to show you how each of these bills appear.

9:38 We'll start with the scheduled bill.

9:40 Remember that's for our shop's rent.

9:42 You'll see it's automatically created under the unpaid tab.

9:45 Here it is at the bottom of the list.

9:47 You see the bill amount and the due date have been automatically set.

9:50 Next up I'll show you the unscheduled bill.

9:53 That is for David's donut den.

9:55 Remember this is just a template for a bill that you can use anytime.

9:59 So to do that go over to Pay Bills and then click on Manage Recurring Bills.

10:03 The unscheduled bill here in the first row has an action called use.

10:07 When you click it it fills in all the fields

10:09 from the template and then you can fill in the rest.

10:12 Bills that are reminders are a different story.

10:14 Unfortunately you won't get an email notification about them.

10:18 To find them you'll need to go to your Reminder List.

10:20 Personally I prefer the scheduled option to the reminders

10:23 because I can always modify it if the amount changes.

10:27 That way the bill is always in the unpaid section waiting for me.

10:32 Here's the thing about the accounts payable process.

10:34 The setup takes 20 minutes but it pays you back every single month.

10:39 Forward your next bill to your QuickBooks email

10:41 and see how fast it gets picked up for you.

10:43 And if you haven't started with QuickBooks yet,

10:45 check out the link in the description below to get going.

10:47 I'm David and I'll see you in the next video.