Search and Find
Ever need to find that check you wrote for someone sometime a few months ago for $70.00 or maybe it was $700.00? In QuickBooks, you can search for it.
See how Search works in this video.
Note: Versions of QuickBooks before 2012 had a Find feature which we kept when we added the Search feature. With Search, you can find anything in your company file. With Find, you can search for transactions only. Both are described here.
To search in QuickBooks:
- Choose Edit > Find.
- In the Search window, enter what you want to search for in the Search box. QuickBooks finds anything in your company file that matches what you searched for.
- Use the left sidebar to see the search results for the different areas of your company file that include your search results. Each area of the sidebar shows how many search results QuickBooks finds for that area.
- Double-click any search result to open it.
Tip: QuickBooks is pretty literal. If you type “12” in the search field, you’ll get transactions from December, from 2012, and with 12 in the amount, among other things. If you want to search for transactions dated in December, and your dates appear as mm/dd/yy, you could type “12/” in the search field.
Other things you can do in Search:
- Save a search. After you run a search, click Save. The search is saved in the Saved Searches area. You can click on it any time to run the search again.
- Filter a search. You can filter down the search results by using filters. Click Filter and select the filters you want to apply to the search. If you save the search, the filters are saved as well.
To find transactions:
- Choose Edit > Find, and click Find on on the Search window.
- In the Filter column of the Find window, click the type of information you want to search for.
- Enter your search criteria in the fields QuickBooks displays to the right of the list of filters. You can select as many filters as you want. The more you select, the fewer matching transactions QuickBooks finds.
- Click More Options to further limit search results using report filters.
- Click Find.
- Select the transaction you want to see and click Go To.
- (Optional) To print a report showing the transactions QuickBooks found, click Report. When the report appears, press
P.
To find transactions using record numbers:
Record numbers are useful for locating the errors that QuickBooks finds when you verify your company file (File > Utilities > Verify). If you verify your company file and it contains errors, QuickBooks will provide you with a button that opens a QuickBooks.log file. This file contains a list of errors in your company file.
Note: You can also access the QuickBooks.log file at any time by holding down the command key and choosing Go > Library in the Finder, followed by double-clicking on the Logs folder and then double-clicking on the QuickBooks.log file.
Inside the QuickBooks.log file, you may see references to "RecNum" and "RefNum." These are internal record numbers used by QuickBooks. For example, say you get an error that says "Verify Employee YTD Bal : ytd out of balance. Name = Dan T. Miller. Ref = 55." The record number is 55 in this case. Though you also have the name of the employee in this example, QuickBooks won't always include names that you can use to search for this error. This is where record numbers come in handy. You can use them to find transactions in QuickBooks. Here's how:
- Choose Edit > Find.
- In the Search field, type "@recnum" followed by the record number. If you were using the previously used example for your search, you would type "@recnum 55".
- QuickBooks will find all records containing the record number that you've entered. Record numbers are unique for each type of data, but the same number may be used to describe more than one thing. For example, the number 55 may be a record number for both an employee and an item.
- Look through the results. Sometimes modifying or reentering the data can correct the problem. On the other hand, sometimes problems are not user correctable. If this is the case, you may need to contact Intuit support.