It's nice to hear from you in this thread, maryluketich.

We use a credit memo/ refund when the customer returns the item. In this scenario, we can put towards the existing balance to reduce the total amount. Another one is when you have received the money back from them. You're right, maryluketich!

In your case, we can record the balance of the customer as bad debt.  It means, the customer owes you money but you can't collect it.

Recording the remaining balance as a bad debt expense account will zero out the balance. To do it, you can follow Lexiesmemere's instructions above.

You can also refer to this article: Write off bad debt in QuickBooks Desktop.  This article provides you steps on how to handle the money you can't collect.

Visit there again if you additional questions. The Community is always here to help you more! I hope you're good! Take care!