Connecting Xero to QuickBooks: 4 Easy Steps

Companies do hundreds of transactions every day. Keeping all the Accounting books up-to-date becomes necessary. Staying organized and keeping the cash flow under control always help businesses to stay one step ahead of their competitors. Accounting is a critical part of any business as it is the vital factor that evaluates the company’s potential to grow. Companies use various software and packages to manage their accounts and keep books up-to-date.

QuickBooks is Accounting software that can help you manage all your business Accounting workflow. Companies use Quickbooks to send bills, accept payments, generate reports, and much more. Another leading Accounting software is Xero that is widely used by small-sized companies which supports instant currency conversions and provides Analytics for the company’s financials. Many companies use both software to manage their Accounting.

Companies transfer data from Xero to QuickBooks as few features are available in QuickBooks that are not supported by Xero or need to migrate from Xero to QuickBooks. In this article, you will learn the steps to connect Xero to QuickBooks. You will also learn how transferring data from Xero to QuickBooks helps companies ease their workflow and set up better Accounting.

Table of Contents

• Prerequisites
• Introduction to Xero
  • Key Features of Xero
• Introduction to QuickBooks
  • Key Features of QuickBooks
• Steps to Connect Xero to QuickBooks
  • Step 1: Exporting Data From Xero to CSV File
  • Step 2: Formatting the CSV File
  • Step 3: Uploading CSV File to QuickBooks
  • Step 4: Mapping the Data with QuickBooks
• Benefits of Connecting Data From Xero to QuickBooks
• Conclusion

Prerequisites

• An active Xero account.
• An active QuickBooks account.

Introduction to Xero

Xero is a Cloud-based Accounting software platform founded by Rod Drury and Hamish Edwards in 2006. It is designed for small and medium-sized businesses to manage all their Accounting. Xero offers a wide range of tools and finance solutions such as accounts payable, accounts receivable, cash flow management, bank reconciliation, financial reporting, processing payments, and payroll. Xero also provides mobile app support that allows users to get real-time data keeping the accounts up-to-date. 

Xero’s bookkeeping functions like invoicing and payroll allow you to connect the program to a live bank feed. Xero offers its services in 3 different subscription models. The Early plan allows a limited number of invoices, bills, and bank transactions to be processed each month. The Growing plan comes with unlimited invoices, bills, and bank transactions and the Established plan offers all features the same as the Growing plan but also provides an option for multiple currencies and expenses.

Key Features of Xero

A few features of Xero are listed below:

• Reporting: Xero allows users to track their company’s finances with the help of Reporting tools that provides accurate Accounting reports. It also let them collaborate with other members and advisors in real-time.
• Multi-Currency Accounting: Xero allows users to pay and get paid in more than 160 supporting currencies with up-to-date currency rates and instant conversions.
• Analytics Plus: With the help of the Analytics Plus feature, users can see short-term future cash flow, track metrics, and check financial health.
• Bank Connections: Xero allows users to connect their bank account and set bank feeds. It delivers seamless transaction flow securely into your Xero account on each business day.

To learn more about Xero, click here.

Introduction to QuickBooks

QuickBooks is an Accounting software developed and marketed by Intuit for small and medium-sized businesses to manage their income and expenses. It assists businesses with Accounting, Payroll, Inventory Management, Bookkeeping, and other financial services. Users can automate their business management workflow using QuickBooks, it can assist them in Sales Tax Calculation, Product Tracking, and automatic transactions updates in the register, etc.

QuickBooks offers on-premises as well Cloud based versions of Accounting applications that can manage payments, bills, accept business payments, and payroll functions. It can connect to your bank and credit card accounts to download and categorize all your expenses. With its business statements and reports, users can evaluate how their business is performing.

Key Features of QuickBooks

A few key features of QuickBooks are listed below:

• Cash Flow Management: Automate your workflow and save time by scheduling recurring payments and paying the vendors only when they are due.
• Multiple User Access: You can increase or decrease the level of accessibility of data to staff members. It improves collaboration among your company’s teams. 
• Integrations: Quickbooks offers integration with more than 700 apps and platforms that businesses use for daily business activities that make sure all your processes and workflows are seamlessly connected to flow data.
• Accounting Reports: You can get a holistic view of data and generate financial reports for team members, stakeholders, and managers to stay organized.

To learn more about QuickBooks, click here.

Steps to Connect Xero to QuickBooks

Now that you have understood about Xero and QuickBooks. In this section, you will go through the steps to transfer data from Xero to QuickBooks. In this tutorial, you will learn how to transfer Chart of Accounts data from Xero to QuickBooks. The steps to connect Xero to QuickBooks are listed below:

• Step 1: Exporting Data From Xero to CSV File
• Step 2: Formatting the CSV File
• Step 3: Uploading CSV File to QuickBooks
• Step 4: Mapping the Data with QuickBooks

Step 1: Exporting Data From Xero to CSV File

• Log in to your Xero account here.
• Navigate to the “Accounting” tab on the navigation bar and then select the “Advanced” option.

• Now, click on the “Chart of Accounts” under the “Advanced Settings” option.

• It will open the Charts of Accounts data of your company.
• Now, click on the “Export” button to export Xero data into CSV file format.

• The CSV file having Chart of Accounts data will be downloaded to your local system.

Step 2: Formatting the CSV File

• Open the Chart of Account data in any spreadsheet software.
• Make sure you have columns with names listed below:
  • Account Name
  • Type
  • Detail Type
  • Number
• If your company accounts by number then add a column named “Account Number“. This is an optional step, you can skip it if you don’t follow this format.
• You can also add a column named “Account Name” if your data has sub-accounts.
• Once all the formatting is done, save the file.

Step 3: Uploading CSV File to QuickBooks

• Log in to your QuickBooks account here.
• Navigate to the “Settings” option. Here select the “Import Data” option.

• Now, it will ask for which kind of data your want to import. Select the “Chart of Accounts” option.
• Then, click on the “Browse” button and then select the “Open” option.

• It will prompt to upload of the CSV file. Locate the file in your local system where you saved the file after formatting and then upload it.
• Click on the “Next” button.

Step 4: Mapping the Data with QuickBooks

• Click on the small down arrow in the “Your Field” column.

• Now, match the column names of data to the QuickBooks format for the fields listed below:
  • Detail Type
  • Account Name
  • Account number
  • Type
• After mapping the data, click on the “Next” button.
• Check again for all the fields if any of them are highlighted with red then fix that and then click on the “Import” button.

That’s it! You have successfully transferred data from Xero to QuickBooks.

Benefits of Connecting Data From Xero to QuickBooks

QuickBooks and Xero are widely Accounting software, and both of them serve some unique features. Companies prefer to transfer or sync data between both platforms. A few benefits of transferring data from Xero to QuickBooks are listed below:

• Migrating Data from Xero to QuickBooks helps companies stay compliant with the tax office. As Xero offers its service online, unsubscribing to it without migrating data can cause data loss. 
• QuickBooks serves a wide range of products to manage the Accounting and finances of any type of industry. Transferring data from Xero to QuickBooks helps companies handle the toughest Accounting challenges of all small, medium, and even enterprise-level businesses with the help of QuickBooks Desktop solution.
• Transferring data to Quickbooks allow you to get a holistic view of data with better Reporting and Analytics tools. 

Conclusion 

In this article, you learnt the steps to transfer Chart of Accounts data from Xero to QuickBooks. You also read about how Xero and QuickBooks help companies organize all their finances in a hassle-free manner and help in increasing profits. Transferring data from Xero to QuickBooks helps companies get all their financial data in one place and analyze it. As QuickBooks offers many features, users choose to transfer data from Xero to QuickBooks. 

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Xero stores crucial business finance data that companies can use to analyze and generate insights from it. Manually loading data from Xero to the Data Warehouse is a tedious process that involves building pipelines. Hevo Data is a No-code Data Pipeline that can help you transfer data from Xero for free to desired Data Warehouse. It fully automates the process to load and transform data from 100+ sources to a destination of your choice without writing a single line of code. 

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