There are 20 steps to properly creating a NEW QuickBooks file for a current company that is doing the transition to a new QB File In the middle of the year:
- First we pick a start date, let’s say for this example, we will use 07/01/2021 for a calendar year (regular Jan to December) company
- Create or Import your Chart of Account
- Create generic non-inventory item to enter open A/R and A/P balances (Use any Sales account for the Income Account and any COGS account as the Expense Account, for now…)
- Create or Import your Customer List without beginning balances
- For Accounts Receivables should either be entering a single invoice per customer representing ALL the open A/R as of 7/31/2021 or create an invoice for EACH of the open invoices as of 7/31/2021 WITH their original dates so the A/R Aging report can calculate correctly). Recommend using one generic non-inventory item to summarize the invoice balance (no details)
- Create or import your your Vendor List without beginning balances
- For Accounts Payables should either be entering a single bill per vendor representing ALL the open A/P as of 7/31/2021 or create a bill for EACH of the open invoices as of 7/31/2021 WITH their original dates so the A/P Aging report can calculate correctly). Recommend using one generic non-inventory item to summarize the bill balance (no details)
- Enter a Journal Entry as of 12/31/2020 (to match last official balance sheet or tax return as of the same date) that represents the trial balance of the whole year, and only enter Balance sheet accounts, plugging the net income balance against Retained Earnings. Accounts Receivables, Accounts Payables will be entered as a lump sum number (no details, adjusting for A/R and A/P entered in Steps 5 and 7 that had dates before 01/01/2021). Inventory Asset will be entered as a lump sum, as the details will be covered in Step 10. NOTE: the journals containing lump sum A/R, A/P, and Inventory Asset should be reversed on 01/01/2021 against retained earnings
- Enter a Journal Entry as of 07/31/2021 (to match last official balance sheet as of the same date) that represents the ending balance of the first 6 months culminating in 07/31/2021. For Balance sheet accounts, you will plugg the net income balance against Retained Earnings; However Accounts Receivables, Accounts Payables, will not be entered, as they were covered in Steps 5 and 7 cover that
- Create and Import all the inventory items with their beginning balances and cost as of 07/31/21. Make sure description, sales price, reorder point, preferred vendor, MPN/SKU, etc.. is entered correctly
- If working with multiple inventory locations, transfer the inventory items to each proper site location to allocate (QuickBooks Enterprise only)
- If using Inventory Assemblies, create or import each assembly BOM
- Enter a Journal Entry as of 07/31/2021 (to match last official P&L as of the same date) that represents the trial balance of the first 6 months since the first journal entry we entered. For Income Statement Accounts (P&L) accounts, enter all the figures and plug net income against retained earnings (remember to adjust for the transactions already entered (A/P and A/R) for 2021 which could be affecting your current P&L, those need to be adjusted.
- If QuickBooks Payroll enables, create and import your list of Employees, and create your payroll item list
- Import all Year-to-date info from paychecks employee by employee as of 06/30/2021
- Create or import all Open Purchase Orders (just the open items) and all Open Estimates or Sales Orders (just open items) with detailed item information
- Create all the non-inventory and service item lists that will be used moving forward
- Customize form templates, custom fields, and setup other list items like terms, customer type, vendor type, classes, reps, terms, etc.
- Turn on/off any additional need features in the preferences
- Create all users and custom permissions via roles (QB Enterprise Only)
