QuickBooks: Items

Use this type	For
Service	Services you charge for or purchase. Examples include specialized labor, consulting hours, and professional fees.
Inventory part	Goods you purchase, track as inventory, and resell.
Inventory assembly (Premier and Enterprise editions only)	Assembled goods you build or purchase, track as inventory, and resell. Note:QuickBooks cannot track the costs associated with the manufacturing process itself. In other words, the cost of a built assembly item depends only on the cost of its components.
Non-inventory part	Goods you buy but don’t track (such as office supplies), or materials you buy for a specific job that you charge back to your customer.
Fixed asset	An asset you do not expect to convert to cash during one year of normal operations. A fixed asset is usually something that is necessary for the operation of your business—such as a truck, cash register, or computer.
Other charge	Miscellaneous labor, material, or part charges such as delivery charges, setup fees, and service charges, bounced checks, late fees, opening balance, reimbursable expenses, retainers, surcharges, gift certificates, prepayments, retainers, sales tax, and shipping and handling fees.
Subtotal	Totals all items above it on a form, up to the last subtotal. Useful for applying a percentage discount or surcharge to many items.
Group	A way of associating individual items that often appear together on invoices, purchase orders, and so on, so that all items in the group can be added to the form at one time.
Discount	Subtracts a percentage or fixed amount from a total or subtotal. Do not use this item type for an early payment discount.
Payment	Records a partial payment you received at the time of the sale. It reduces the amount owed on an invoice.
sales tax item	Calculates a single sales tax item at a specific rate that you pay to a single tax agency.
Sales tax group	Calculates and individually tracks two or more sales tax items that apply to the same sale. The customer sees only the total sales tax.

When creating your item list one of the most confusing things can be which item type to choose. 

 Here is a breakdown of each type that will help you decide. 

If after reading this you still need help, feel free to give us a call!