How to switch from QuickBooks

To switch from QuickBooks to Self Employment Toolkit: download your QuickBooks transactions and mileage as spreadsheets and save your receipts, create a free account, import expenses on the Expenses tab and trips on the Mileage tab (both show a preview with duplicates marked), then add your clients and any open invoices by hand. Do it before your first trip of the new year and the whole tax year lives in one place.

Before you start

Pick a clean cutover date. January 1 is the best one: the tax year starts then, so every trip and receipt for the year lands in one record. Mid-year works too, as long as you import the months you already have.

Keep your QuickBooks subscription until you have downloaded everything. Intuit's own guide for Self-Employed users says the old account closes after their switch to Solopreneur, so download first.

The steps

1. Download your QuickBooks data. In QuickBooks, export your transactions to a spreadsheet and download your mileage log. Save your receipt images and copies of your invoices too: spreadsheet exports carry the numbers, not the receipt files.
2. Create your account. Sign up free. There is no card required, and the free plan includes unlimited mileage trips, clients, expenses, and invoices.
3. Import your expenses. On the Expenses tab, choose Import expenses, pick QuickBooks as the source, and upload the CSV or Excel file. Review the preview, where duplicates are marked and categories are mapped to Schedule C lines, then confirm.
4. Import your mileage. On the Mileage tab, choose Import and upload your QuickBooks mileage file. Trips already in your log, and trips the file lists twice, are marked before you confirm.
5. Add your clients. Add each client with their hourly rate. Client import is not available yet, so this step is by hand; for most solo businesses it is a short list.
6. Recreate open invoices. Enter any unpaid invoices so reminders and income tracking pick up where QuickBooks left off. Set up recurring monthly invoices for retainer clients.
7. Set up receipt forwarding. On Pro, forward receipt emails to your receipts address and they are read and filed for you. Add any other email address you send from as a forwarding address in Settings.

What does not come across

Receipt images are not part of a QuickBooks spreadsheet export, so imported expenses arrive without their original receipt files. Keep the files you downloaded with your tax records.

QuickBooks bank rules, tags, and connected-app data stay in QuickBooks. Self Employment Toolkit does not connect live to your bank. You can import a bank or card export as expenses on any plan, and on Pro you can upload statements and match them against what you have logged.

Common questions