Transfer clients in QuickBooks Online Accountant

Learn how to transfer your clients in QuickBooks Online Accountant.

You can move clients between QuickBooks Online Accountant and Intuit Accountant Suite accounts. All their info, client numbers, and team access move with them. You can still use the original account to see them. This helps organise your team and keeps your clients in one place.

Note: Large firms can put their practice in one account with console consolidation.

Know the requirements and limitations

Before you transfer clients, know the requirements and limitations to do so.

Requirements

• You must be a company admin or primary admin on both the source account and the target account. Use the same login details for both.
• You can’t move your firm’s "Your Books" accounting file. If you merge accounts, the account with your "Your Books" file should be the target account. Transfer your clients into that account.
• You need an active QuickBooks Online Accountant or Intuit Accountant Suite subscription for the account you want to keep.
• The client must be in the same region as the target firm.
• The target firm must have an active subscription. You can’t move a cancelled or suspended subscription until it’s re-activated.
• To move clients on Bill My Firm, the target account must have a valid credit card. Without one, the transfer will fail.
• If a client is in both the source and target accounts, keep the record with billing. Delete the duplicate client record from the non-billing account before any transfer.
• Both companies need to be on QuickBooks Online Accountant to use the Transfer clients tool. It won’t work if one company is on QuickBooks Online Accountant and the other is on QuickBooks Online Accountant.

Limitations

• A client using the following features isn't eligible for consolidation:
  • Box Inc.
• You can’t move clients with no current online subscriptions.
• You have to reconnect any accountant-connected apps to resume data sync.

Transfer your client list

1. Sign in to your target account as a company or primary admin. Start the transfer from this destination account.
2. Go to Settings and select Transfer clients.
3. Review the info about the transfer, then select Get Started.
4. This takes you to the Select a realm tab.
   1. Select the account you want to transfer clients from.
   2. Select Next.
5. In the Select clients tab, select the checkbox for the clients you want to move to the new account.
   1. You can enter the client’s name in the Search clients... field.
   2. You can select the column headers to sort the list of clients to select from.
   3. Or, you can select Customise, then filter the list of clients to display and select from.
   4. When you’re done with the selection of clients, select Next.
      Notes:
      • You can only transfer from one account at a time and up to 100 clients per batch. If you have more than 100 clients, you’ll need to make several transfers.
      • As you select clients, the total number of transfers shows.
6. In the Select team access tab.
   1. Select Yes, give them the same client access they had before. if you want to transfer team member access along with the clients. 
      Important: In this step, select all team members who need access to the client on the target account. This is to make sure of a proper transfer of access, even if they’re already users.
   2. Select the See which team members are linked to the clients being transferred ▼ dropdown. A list of team members and their access appears.
   3. In the Search field, enter the name of a team member to see their access.
   4. Select Next.
7. In the Remove members tab:
   • Select the appropriate option to remove or keep the members who are linked only to the clients you're transferring from the source account.
   • Select Next.
8. In the Review tab:
   1. Review the info on the clients to transfer.
   2. Select Start transfer.
9. Check the status of the transfer.
   1. Select View transfer status.
   2. Select Move more clients to begin another client transfer.
   3. Check the final transfer log. If there are errors, note the log reference number.

Important: You can’t undo the transfer after you approve and process it. You'll need to one by one:

• Remove users that shouldn’t be part of the transfer.
• Add users that aren’t in the list.

Know how to change your team’s admin access.

Manage role-based access

• For your company admin to manage clients, you need to change role permissions. To do this, go to the QuickBooks Online Accountant role settings.
• Only your primary admin has access to manage your client list.