How do I Print Withholding & FICA Quickbooks Without Payroll?

Printing withholding reports without a QuickBooks payroll subscription is possible.

The QuickBooks accounting software has the option available for small business owners to calculate payroll taxes manually. Once this feature is activated, the business owner can print reports for withholding and Federal Insurance Contributions Act (FICA) taxes without a payroll subscription. Because calculating payroll manually is not easy and can involve many hours of calculation and entering data, doing so is discouraged. However, for those who don't mind putting in the time to complete this task, following these steps may get the result that they need.

Things You'll Need

• IRS 2010 Publication 15 (Circular E)
• W-4 forms for each employee

Instructions

1. Activate the manual payroll feature. A QuickBooks company file without a payroll subscription will not have the icons or accounts in the Chart of Accounts needed to complete payroll. To do so, open up the "Help" feature. Type in "Manually enter payroll" into the search box and click the arrow button.

2. Click on the "Process Payroll Manually." You will see a small window pop up recommending that you get at least the basic level of payroll service. Below that is the blue link to create manual payroll calculations. Click on that link and open the next window. Halfway down the list select "Set my company file to use manual calculations."

3. Use the tax tables for withholding found in the 2010 Publication15 (Circular E) on the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) website (see the Resources section). You will need to calculate the proper amount of federal withholding based on each employee's income.

4. Find the employees' W-4 Forms and use the number of exemptions that they filled out to calculate the proper amount of withholding to take from each check. If the employee is participating in the Advanced Earned Income Credit program use the EIC tables to calculate the amount to be paid for Advanced Earned Income Credits.

5. Calculate the FICA taxes. Social Security and Medicare tax payments are made in two parts, employer contribution and employee contribution. Together the two payments are known as FICA payments. Social Security contributions for 2010 will be 6.2 percent of the wages paid from employee earnings. Another 6.2 percent will be paid by the employer. Deduct 1.45 percent of wages from employee earnings for Medicare and another 1.45 percent from employer contributions.

6. Open the "Payroll Item List" and make sure that you have the following payroll items: Federal Withholding, Medicare Company Contribution, Medicare Employee Contribution, Social Security Company Contribution and Social Security Employee Contribution. These accounts are automatically generated when the manual payroll is activated correctly or you have started the QuickBooks payroll subscription.

7. Create the report to print. Go up to the "Reports" tab and scroll down to "Payroll Summary." When the window opens, look at the top of the report to modify the dates for the withholding and FICA information that you want printed. Use the "From" and "To" boxes to specify these dates and click the "Refresh" button. Click on the "Print" button when the report reflects the dates that you want.

References

• Intuit QuickBooks Support: Set up Manual Payroll

Resources

• Internal Revenue Service: Publication 15: (Circular E), Employer's Payroll Tax Guide