Preparing a Payroll Liability Report

If you use QuickBooks to prepare your payroll, QuickBooks can also produce your federal and state payroll tax forms, or if you use an outside payroll service it produces the forms for you. If you prepare your own payroll, you need to obtain information for filling out state and local payroll tax forms. This payroll tax report should give you everything you need. In this example, we look at the detail behind the company's liability for state unemployment tax.

Select Employees & Payroll from the Reports menu.

Select Payroll Liability Balances from the side menu.

Did You Know?

QuickBooks advertises its special offers in pop-up windows. A Take The Hassle Out Of Payday pop-up window might appear when you request this report. This window describes certain payroll services you can purchase from Intuit. Click Remind Me Later or No to close the window, or click Yes to read more about the payroll services. Checking the Do Not Display Message In The Future box keeps this window from appearing the next time you request this report.

Set the dates at the top of the report for the period for which you are paying payroll taxes.

Double-click any amount to get the detail behind that amount.

Examine the detail so you understand the source of the tax liability.

For Your Information

The Transactions by Payroll Liability Item report that appears when you double-click on a payroll liability amount shows you a list of each paycheck written in the time period and the amount of the particular tax liability that relates to each check. Double-clicking on an amount from this report takes you to the individual checks where the liability was generated.