How to Make a Basic Bookkeeping Spreadsheet in Excel

1. Examine your personal or business finances to determine the best way to use Excel. Different options are keeping track of accounts receivable and payable, including payroll, rent or utilities and any raw materials used in the production process.
2. Open Excel on your computer and create a new spreadsheet by clicking on the blank page icon at the top left of your screen.
3. Orient yourself with Excel's format. The page is made up of a grid which creates boxes. Information can be typed into each box.
4. Title the headings for your spreadsheet's rows and columns. For example, you may choose to use the first column to list all the dates in a given month, the second column to list any accounts receivable transactions and the third column to list any accounts payable transactions.
5. Fill in the information into the appropriate boxes. For example, if you or your company paid out $15,000 in payroll checks on the first of the month, you would write '15,000' in the corresponding box.
6. Add the total dollar amounts from each column -- in our example, you'd have a total for accounts receivable and a total for accounts payable. You can also calculate average expenditures and profits by selecting the 'Subtotals' option from the drop-down box under the 'Data' tab.
7. Sort information from high to low or low to high by clicking on the 'Sort' option from the drop-down box under the 'Data' tab; this gives you the option of seeing which entries had the highest or lowest values.