He sent me the file that his old account sent him when he finished his books for 2010. So what I have is a file backup and a file with the Accountant Changes, when I opened the Accountant Changes in my QuickBooks Accountant 2012, it won’t let me incorporate the changes into the backup copy. (Optional) Change the suggested location for the file. The QuickBooks application title bar now shows “Accountant’s Changes Pending.” Give the.QBX file to your accountant. Continue working with your company data. To send your company file using the Accountant’s Copy File Transfer: Go to the File menu and click Accountant.
Quicken Your QuickBooks:Export Import Online Offline
Work Offline onQuickBooks Desktop, then Import to QuickBooks Online
by WilliamBrighenti, Certified PublicAccountant, Certified QuickBooksProAdvisor
Work Offline onQuickBooks Desktop, then Import to QuickBooks Online
by WilliamBrighenti, Certified PublicAccountant, Certified QuickBooksProAdvisor
I have received a number of calls fromQuickBooks Online users, asking me to straighten out their QuickBooksfiles. If these users are small businesses, they often haveQuickBooks Online Plus, which is required for multiple users. Ifsuch is the situation, I prefer cleaning up—if not reconstructing—theirQuickBooks file in my QuickBooks Premier Accountant Edition on mydesktop, since it offers more features and much greater speed.
In addition, QuickBooks Online and internet service providers have beenknown to suffer outages, which would severely interrupt one’saccounting work if QuickBooks Online were the accounting software forthe business. Moreover it is sometimes risky undertakingreconstruction work directly on a client’s file since if transactionsare deleted, data may be lost irretrievably. It is a lot morereassuring to be able to make a number of sequential backup copies ofyour QuickBooks files in the event a “fatal error” is committed duringa major reconstruction of the QuickBooks file. Finally bydownloading a copy of the original file unto one’s desktop and thenuploading the reconstructed copy back onto QuickBooks Online, an audittrail is preserved, documenting all work undertaken and possiblyoffering the outside accountant or bookkeeper more protection from anypotential legal liabilities.
Consequently, whenever I am doing major housecleaning on a client’sQuickBooks data file, I customarily download a copy of the client’sQuickBooks data file from the Online website, do the work, and thenimport the data file back into the client’s QuickBooks Onlinefile. A major difference in features between the desktop andonline versions of QuickBooks is that while the desktop version offersan Accountants’ Copy, permitting the client to continue to post whilean accountant works on the copy of the file, the online version doesnot. Consequently, when the downloaded copy of QuickBooks isimported back online after it has been repaired, all of the QuickBooks’data existing online prior to the import is lost, including all of thework undertaken since the original export. Therefore, the outsideaccountant should advise the client not to post while thereconstruction work is taking place to save unnecessary expense of timeand money posting transactions needlessly in QuickBooks. Althoughsome might conclude that the lack of an Accountants’ Copy constitutes amajor impediment to working on a client’s file off-line, when oneconsiders that it is typically due to the client’s data entry thatcreated the need for the reconstruction of the Online version ofQuickBooks in the first place, it might not be any disadvantage at allfor the client not to continue to work in the file during the interimsince even more harm than good could come from their continued postingin QuickBooks.
To download the QuickBooks file, select the “Company” tab, the “More”drop-down menu, and “Export Data” appearing therein. On the“Export Overview” page that opens upon its selection, an Active Xcontrol needs to be installed in order to execute the export, so click“Install” here.
Now be careful undertaking the next step. Unless you wish tocancel your subscription to QuickBooks Online, do not select “ExportInterview” highlighted. Rather, “Save a copy of your data to yourcomputer (a ‘local copy’) by clicking and starting the highlighted“Local Copy Interview”.
After reading the interview’s first pop-up page, explaining the localcopy’s purpose, procedure, and limitations, select “Next”, and on thenext screen provide your name and email address where you wish to benotified when your data is ready for downloading, since the preparationmay take hours. Upon receiving the email notification that thecompany data is ready for download, login to QuickBooks Online Plusagain and click the task under “Messages and Tasks” called 'Downloadthe company file created on' the given date. On the pop-upwindow, “Download Prepared Data”, select “I’m creating a local copy tokeep on my computer”, and “Next”. On the next Webpage Dialogwindow that appears, after selecting “Download”, a “save your companyfile” window appears, allowing you to save the QuickBooks file on yourcomputer; the file saves as “export_company.qbxml”.
After downloading the file onto your desktop, you need to convert it sothat you can use it on your desktop. Return to the “Export Data”page, and now select “Converting a Local Copy of QuickBooks Online PlusInterview”, then “Next” on the appearing webpage dialog, and “Browse”on the succeeding dialog. Now open the “export_company.qbxml”file, select “Convert”, and save the file where you wish, providing theappropriate name. Your QuickBooks desktop version opensautomatically, requiring you to grant Internet Explorer access to theQuickBooks company file to complete the conversion process.
The import process is just as easy. Go toCompany>More>”Import QuickBooks Desktop Data”. In the nextscreen confirming “Are you sure you want to import your QuickBooksdesktop data?”, type “yes” in the box in the lower right hand corner ofthe screen. On the “Import Data” screen which appears, installthe “Convert control”. If the control fails to install, go toInternet Explorer’s Tools, select Internet Options, Security Tab, andCustom Level. Scroll down the Security Settings to “Automaticprompting for ActiveX controls” and enable this setting.
If you have a version of QuickBooks Pro or Premier 2006 or newer, go toyour QuickBooks desktop edition, choose the following: File>Utilities>Copy Company File for QuickBooks Online. Return to the “Import Data” screen and select “Browse”. Locatethe data file you wish to import, but which now has the ending filedescription, “oe.qbw”, instead of just “.qbw”. Select that file.
Enter the administrator password if there is one; otherwise, enternothing. Since you want to import the entire file, select “AllData” on the“Import Data” screen and then “Create Archive”.
Finally select “Import Data” at the lower right hand corner of thescreen.
If you followed these steps correctly, you should receive emailnotification within a few hours that your file has been successfullyimported.
Although the exporting and importing may seem cumbersome and timeconsuming, if you are undertaking a major overhaul of the QuickBooksOnline Plus company data file, it may be prudent to follow thisprocedure. All in all, if you have a significant number ofentries and work to do, working on the client file off-line on adesktop version will save you considerable time since the response timeof the online version is much, much slower than that of the desktopversion. In fact, by working off-line, you may be able toundertake the reconstruction in half the time it would take you workingentirely online.
And perhaps equally as important, you now have the ability to make aseries of copies on your desktop of the company’s data files whileworking. Since they are immediately available, they areeasily retrievable in the event that you commit a fatal deletion orerror. Finally you have a trail of your work supporting itsprogress, extent, and quality, in the event that there is any questionlater by your client or superior. I find this to be very reassuring anda great comfort.
This article is provided for informational purposes and isnot intended to be construed as legal, accounting, or otherprofessional advice. For further information, please consultappropriate professional advice from your attorney and certified publicaccountant.
Have a tax, a QuickBooks, or an accounting question? Please feelfree to submitit under 'Comments' on ourblog, Accounting, QuickBooks, and Taxes byWilliam Brighenti,Certified PublicAccountant, Accountants CPA Hartford, LLC. Forinformationand assistance onany tax, QuickBooks, or accounting issue, please visit ourwebsite: Accountants CPAHartford, LLC.
If and onlyto the extent that this publication contains contributions from taxprofessionals who are subject to therules of professional conduct set forth in Circular 230, as promulgatedby the United States Department of the Treasury, the publisher, onbehalf of thosecontributors, hereby states that any U.S. federal tax advice that iscontained in such contributions was not intended or written to be usedby any taxpayer for the purpose of avoiding penalties that may beimposed on thetaxpayer by the Internal Revenue Service, and it cannot be used by anytaxpayer forsuch purpose.The above tax advice waswritten to support the promotion or marketing of the accountingpractice of the publisher and any transaction described herein.The taxpayer recipients of this offeringmemorandum should seek tax advice based on their particularcircumstances from an independenttax advisor.
In this article, will break down the tools available in QuickBooks Desktop and QuickBooks Online,
With QuickBooks Pro, Premier, Accountant, or Enterprise, you have the following built-in tools
- Pre-formatted Spreadsheet (Simple) Import to bring in new Customers, Vendors, Non-inventory items, and Inventory Items using a built-in spreadsheet that opens in excel and has 4-5 fields, it is limited, but very simple to use
- Advanced Import can bring Customers, Vendors, Employees, Accounts, Service Items, Non-Inventory Parts, Other Charge, and Inventory Items with a mapping tool so you may choose which column in your spreadsheet matches the data that can be loaded into QuickBooks
I recommend you download Intuit’s template which will make this process very easy to learn how to do. The item has about 20 fields of data you can import and the names, such as customers have over 30 fields of importable data, yay!
But, what is REALLY neat about this tool, is the ability to UPDATE a field/name for an item already in the list, consequently, I can also wipe the data on that particular field, or pick and choose what to update based on what is on the spreadsheet. So, I am my client’s PRICELIST UPDATER hero!
I would also recommend downloading Intuit’s CSV/EXCEL Import kit, contains a few interesting examples. - IIF – Intuit Interexchange Format, while most people choose to “stay away” from this type of import, it is a very versatile tool. But this tool is like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde… Let me explain, there is the “File, Utilities, Export, List as IIF” side of this
Works very well for moving stuff from QuickBooks File A to QuickBooks File B… but it is not always this simple.
And then there is the “Dark side” of IIF, which makes you feel like hacker when you open these things in excel
You can download Intuit’s IIF Kit and open each sample IIF file in there within excel to see how these are structured, you will see the following templates: Bills, Bill Credits, Sales Receipts, Credit Memo, Deposit, Estimate, Invoice, Item Receipt, Journal Entry, Purchase Order, Payments, Statement Charges, Bank Transfer, and Write Check… not bad for for a free tool. Also, there is an awesome utility called the IIF Transaction Creator by Big Red Consulting that you can also use, not free but really effective if you choose to do IIF imprinting.
The big CAVEAT, is that IIF has limited error checking or protection, use at your own risk… your chances of data corruption increase when using IIF’s specially modified by non-experts in the subject matter. - And lastly, Add/Edit Multiple List Entries. The best thing about this tool is the ability to COPY/PASTE from Excel, so now you have a friendly and familiar interface for experienced Excel users. Warning, for updating lets say prices, on items, this tool is not as effective. This is a great tool for creating new items, customers, vendors, and even inventory assemblies.
It is important to customize the columns to match your excel spreadsheet
The great featurette behind this tool, is when updating item accounts, for example, you can choose to update existing transactions as well, retroactively… protected by closing date password, of course.
With QuickBooks Accountant Edition (and Enterprise Accountant), you get all of the above plus a relatively new tool introduced in 2013 named Batch Enter Transactions. Another game-changer from the makers of Add/Edit Multiple list entry…
Now we can finally copy/paste transaction data such as:
Now we can finally copy/paste transaction data such as:
- Invoices and Credit Memos
- Deposits
- Credit Card Charges & Credits
- Bills and Vendor Credit Memos
This tool is getting revamped every year, there still some challenges such as importing items with multiple items or checks with splits in the accounts. But this is single handedly the most powerful write-up tool I have ever used. Not just for importing data, also for data entry is great because of the ability to customize columns which is not available in check registers.
Moving to QuickBooks Online…
Sadly, this is does not have as power and extensive options to bring data into QBO other then the very powerful bank feeds. In a nutshell there are 2 options:
- Import Bank Data using .QBO files
- Import transaction data using 3rd party tools such as Transaction Pro or Zed Axis
- Importing List of customer or list of vendors
![Download Download](/uploads/1/2/4/7/124742508/297543859.png)
Under the New Customer and New Vendor buttons is the import feature, but very limited number of fields
I want to go back to the first bullet point about importing bank data using a .QBO file. Most people I know are only aware of the .QBO file that the bank allows you to download, but you can make ANY CSV or Excel file a .QBO file as long as you got the right converting utility; there are 2… one is called CSV2QBO and the other Excel to OFX Converter
This video was not recorded by me, but is a great resource for seeing how these built-in data import tools work with QuickBooks Desktop: