Manually upload transactions into QuickBooks Online

Learn how to manually upload transactions from your bank or credit card in QuickBooks Online.

When you connect your bank and credit card accounts, QuickBooks automatically downloads transactions up to a certain date. However, you can manually upload transactions if you want to enter old transactions, can’t find your bank, or connect it to QuickBooks.

Step 1: Pick a start date

To avoid entering duplicates, you need to know the date of the oldest existing transaction currently in the account:

1. Go to Settings . Then, select Chart of accounts (Take me there).
2. Find the account you want to upload the transactions into. Then, select Account history.
3. Find the oldest transaction, then write down the date.
   Note: Usually, the oldest transaction is the opening balance.

Step 2: Get transactions from your bank

To get transactions from your bank, you need to download CSV files of your transactions.

1. Sign in to your bank or credit card's website.
2. Follow the instructions on how to download CSV files of your transactions to your computer. Every financial institution has different steps.
3. Make sure the date range for the download begins at least one day before your oldest transaction.
4. Download your transactions. Save the file somewhere you can easily find it, like your computer's desktop.

Step 3: Review the file format and size

Review the file you download from your bank and make sure it's in the correct format before you upload it. Here are the things to check to prevent errors:

Note: The maximum file size is 350 KB. You can shorten the date range and download transactions in smaller batches if the file size is too big.

• Remove any zeroes (0) from the file and leave those cells blank.
• Fix any transactions that show numbers in the Description column.
• Remove the word “amount” from the Credit or Debit column header. They should only say “Credit” and “Debit”.
• Make sure that all dates follow the same format. We recommend you use dd/mm/yyyy format.
• If you’re a Mac user, make sure to save the file as Windows CSV file.
• Some banks add the day of the week in the Date column (for example, 20/11/2018 TUE). You need to remove the day of the week. To do this, split the date and the day of the week into separate columns.

Step 4: Manually upload the transactions

Step 5: Categorise the transactions

Now that your transactions are in QuickBooks, it's time to match and categorise them. The transactions go into your accounts after you review them.

QuickBooks Online also enters certain details automatically if you set up any banking rules, or if it recognises transaction descriptions.

Step 6: Reconcile the transactions

Reconcile the transactions that you uploaded. This is to make sure that all transactions are recorded correctly in QuickBooks.