Bringing your books from QuickBooks Desktop (IIF) or GnuCash

Easy Switch reads QuickBooks Desktop .IIF exports and GnuCash books directly — full history, or opening balances as of a date — then stages them for the usual review and acceptance.

Migration → Easy Switch. Choose QuickBooks Desktop or GnuCash as where your books are today.

How do I export from QuickBooks Desktop? In QuickBooks Desktop use File → Utilities → Export → Lists to IIF Files for your lists, and export your transactions to IIF as well, then upload the .IIF files. QuickBooks backup and company files (.QBB, .QBW) cannot be read — they are encrypted — so the upload refuses them and tells you to export to IIF.

From GnuCash upload the book itself: the .gnucash file, whether saved as compressed XML, plain XML or SQLite.

Choose what to bring across:

• Every transaction (full history) — each transaction comes across as its own journal entry.
• Opening balances only — one Opening balances entry as of the date you give (the latest date in the file if you leave it blank): a balance per account, split by customer and vendor for receivables and payables, with profit and loss to date in Retained Earnings.

What is read. Accounts and their types, customers and vendors (name, company, email, phone), items from QuickBooks, and transactions — as journal entries, not as separate invoices and bills. Estimates and purchase orders do not post in QuickBooks and are left out. Customer and vendor addresses come across where the file has them. A transaction that is out of balance in the source file, or has no readable date, is left out and listed.

Then the usual steps. Read file writes nothing; it shows what was found. Continue to choose what to import, Start import stages it, and the verification report shows the imported trial balance. Nothing is final until you Accept books, and an import batch can be undone for 30 days afterwards. Importing needs a company administrator or the module.accounting.create permission. See Migrating from another system (QuickBooks, Xero, Sage and more).

File size. A file larger than 18 MB is refused; export a shorter date range, or use opening balances only.