An Expense is a document type in QuickBooks Online which represents a purchase that has already been paid via a selected Payment Method and the payment has been allocated against the respective Payment Account (Category of specific types) at the moment of entering the transaction. In contrast, Bills are entered as Awaiting Payment.
There are three types of Expenses based on the payment type: cash, cheque, credit card:
• Cash – the purchase contains information about a payment made in cash
• Check – the purchase contains information about a payment made by cheque
• Credit card – the purchase contains information about a payment made by credit card or a refund to a credit card