I actually think what they are saying is illegal - that we can't access VAT records etc from at least 6 years ago is surely breaking the law??

Thanks for joining the thread and sharing your VAT concerns with us, @squirleyanne.

Helping you stay compliant is our top priority. Given the recent changes to accounting and tax regulations, we need to ensure you’re on a product that can be supported with regular updates.

That’s why we’ve decided to discontinue QuickBooks Desktop. 

At the moment, you can use alternative bridging software such as QuickBooks Online (QBO) to submit MTD VAT returns. 

You can refer to this link for more information about the discontinuation of the QBDT UK version: QuickBooks Desktop is being discontinued.

If you consider going with QBO, you can check this article to help you decide: Is QuickBooks Online right for me and my business?.

Please don't hesitate to post again if need further clarification about the product discontinuation. I'm always here to help you out, @squirleyanne. Take care. 

As a company we've used QB since 2002 in various guises and as a small e commerce business with around 1000 transactions a month we soon outgrew the std QuickBooks 2004 desktop due to the company file only accepting circa 14,000 entries.

But then QB 2013 came out with an open database and we can now run around 4 years of accounts without problem before we need to start a new company file as it gets a bit slow - Hallelujah this was amazing and still is today - July 2022. 

We got an e mail from our IT guys this am, saying check that QB2013 will still run after Jan 2023, which frightened the &H%T out of us. We've looked at QB online and it doesn't work for us as you don't do builds or very good stock control.  As a manufacturing company who sells on-line this is essential.  QB doesn't seem to have grasped this concept that people in the UK still make things so builds are vitally important. If we sold say flowers or ran a window cleaning service this would be fine.  Making products from other products using builds is perfect.  Sadly QB online can't / won't do this. so its pretty useless to us unless we open a window cleaning florist shop online :)

So what I'm reading in these threads is if you have a standalone program it will work fine after Jan 31st 2023.

If you have had a subscription program you are totally screwed.

We did investigate QB online in 2021, to see what it could do (as above) and it wasn't great at all and pretty slow too.

We looked at Xero and they were rubbish and just didn't want to talk to anyone ever - Real awful company.

Sage wanted £20K before they even got out of bed to talk with us.  20K really ??

So if its OK with everyone we will stick to what we know and what works and what we paid fairly decent money for in 2013. 

QB enterprise 2013 is great - go find a legacy copy, you wont regret it.

Steve Dalloway - Byretech Ltd UK

@useraccounts25 

Is your company located in UK?

If you are running a manufacturing company, you need a 3rd party app to integrate with QBO.

We don't use QB online - its not very good at all.......

We use QB desktop Enterprise 2013.

And we boldly go where no QB user has gone before........

I'm guessing you aren't in the UK as Enterprise is no longer a UK product, it hasn't been for quite a few years. As we have to file our payroll and VAT (I think in US it's local taxes) direct out of the software to HMRC (UK government tax department) using HMRC approved software we won't be in a happy place in January 2022. 

Just joining this thread now having finally called Intuit to try and understand whether QB Desktop would continue to work at all post 31 Jan 2023. It appears not. Time to panic. 

Has anyone got any suggestions at all as to an alternative product? I note one poster mentions Sage comes in at £20k minimum and that Xero were completely not responsive. Is there anything out there that can roughly match QBD's functionality? Like many other posters here, I looked at QB Online when it first came out and trialled it, complete rubbish. I am now wondering what the hell I'm going to do...

Appreciate Intuit you might not like us discussing competitor products but you have left us with no choice given your withdrawal of what was an excellent product. I also echo other comments here that we'd have been willing to pay more each month to keep the product going. So short-sighted as QBO will never suit many of us. 

Hi,

We went with Sage 50cloud Accounting Professional in the end. (Despite the name it is not cloud based, our company files are kept locally.) Xerox and other versions just didn't have the functions we needed.

QB Desktop Premier Pro was costing us £55 + VAT per user. (We had 2 users)

Sage costs us £160 inc. VAT per month for FIVE users.

It does everything QB Premier Pro does and more, it's not quite so easy to use but is much more flexible. Plenty UK help files available. Addons are available to integrate with our website to download invoices and customers etc.

With Intuits appalling (and probably illegal) decision not to give us access to our old data after January, we have no option but to also pay for its cloud version for three years, just to have access to old QB data in case HMRC decide to audit or we need to look up old sales for warranty issues etc.

Intuits attitude to this issue issue is terrible, read only access would be simple to implement if they wanted to. QB Online is terrible and is no way suitable for us to use, its for small one man businesses really, no flexibility or functions compared to the Desktop version.

Appreciate the information Yahal, thanks.

No Problem.

I asked them whether it will be going totally cloud based in the next few years and they denied it.

The 'cloud' just means remote connection is possible via cloud based data synching.

Its OK for remote connection but can create issues if the office has a networked installation (with company files kept on the local network) and a remote connection is also active at the same time, when it will occasionally need to re-synch. As I only connect out of office hours that is not an issue for me. QBDT didn't even support a remote connection.. (We used Anydesk as a workaround)

I don't care about advertising a competitors product here, Intuit created this crazy situation, whilst providing no solution. 

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@Yahal wrote:

With Intuits appalling (and probably illegal) decision not to give us access to our old data after January, we have no option but to also pay for its cloud version for three years, just to have access to old QB data in case

 

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@Yahal 

Alternatively, convert your QBD data to the QBO Accountant version for archival purposes. You can use this version for free.

I'm afraid you are one of many who hadn't noticed the QuickBooks email first announcing that they are pulling the plug on Desktop.

1. Bad news is that you will not be able to access your data from 31.01.2023. So not only do you need to extract everything for 7 years for HMRC you will need to extract anything important to your business from the start of using Desktop.

2. The other bad news is that I am still - for the last 6 months - searching for something that has anything like the functionaility so far without success. As far as SME's are concerned it is basic accounts or a very expensive SAP system. The gap is ludicrous.

Ha, wrong! QuickBooks states that Online is the solution. I say this tongue in cheek! I agree with all you say and if I find a viable solution will sing it here loud and clear. I have been informed that Sage are likely to pull their desktop as they are also concentrating on the online market but maybe if enough start to use it it may change their minds. I have no issues with online but the versions available fall well short of what we have been using for 22+ years

Try and get a copy of QB 2013 enterprise - Its not cloud based and will work after the end of 2022.

I'm coming late to this thread but am very concerned.  I have used QuickBooks since it arrived in the UK and had always thought it a good product.  The desktop version remained superior to most other market offerings.

I am very worried that companied that chose to keep up to date were forced into a subscription product which will now be cut off.

Intuit can't do that (or have decided that the cost of legal action will be less than sorting it out)  They will be causing all of their customers to break UK law.

What is needed is a one time read only licence to be applied to all existing subscription services so that data can be read (not written) after the cut off date.  Is this really so difficult?

I have just finished assisting a client to migrate to the Online version but their data was far too big to migrate and has been left behind.  Access will be needed for up to 6 years not 15 months.

Intuit MUST issue read only licences to those on subscription.

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@NigelR wrote:

I have just finished assisting a client to migrate to the Online version but their data was far too big to migrate and has been left behind.  Access will be needed for up to 6 years not 15 months.

@NigelR 

Since last month, we proposed 2 options to our clients:
1. If Total Target > 500K, purchase a 3rd party service to convert data to QBO or another cloud based app.

2. Purchase a one-time license for QBD 2020 to open any backup files created on QBD 2020 or earlier versions. Then convert the remaining data (open on QBD 2021) to QBO or another cloud-based app. With this option, the conversion costs will be lower because you will only be converting small portion of data (i.e 1-2 fiscal years).

exact online - https://www.exact.com/uk

To my knowledge there is no UK QDT version for any year that is a one time licence that would convert 2021 to a previous version. I believe you are talking about the US version but it won't convert UK data as it is a different software due to the countries having different requirements. 

@ell281 

You can only open QBD files created in QBD 2020 UK (not 2021) or earlier versions on QBD 2020 UK. I can help to obtain the one time (unregistered) license for it if needed.

I've still got the licence for my old version. The major problem is that quickbooks won't activate the software once it's been installed 🤷🤷

Hi SheilaMcC,

If the software was installed on a different PC, and that computer is broken, you can contact our QuickBooks Support to have your QuickBooks installed on a different computer. They'll give you a code so you can activate it. Just explain to them that you can't use the other PC anymore.

To contact the team:

1. Click on Help.
2. Choose QuickBooks Desktop Help.
3. Click Contact Us at the bottom.
4. Enter a sentence or phrase to describe the issue.
5. Choose Chat.

While the desktop version is about to end, you may also ask them about converting to QuickBooks Online.

Let me know if you have any other concerns.

I don't think it will convert current data to a previous version due to your 2022 data being on updated software also 2020/21 were not a one off licence it has been a monthly subscription for several years so I understand it will still  cease 31.01.23 

But this isn't good enough.

QuickBooks must NOT leave users where they are unable to comply with their legal obligations to keep 6 years data,.

Intuit MUST make a read only licence available.