Cannot make chart of account inactive

Hello there, Moscoso. I appreciate you sharing your concern about making an account inactive in your chart of accounts in QuickBooks Online. I'll impart guidelines to help you successfully achieve this.

In QuickBooks Online, if you don't want to use an account anymore, you can make it inactive instead of deleting it so you can access past transaction data for reporting purposes. 

Before you start, reach out to your accountant. Make sure this change is good for you. Don't have an accountant? We can help you find one. Here are some accounts that require extra steps before you can make them inactive:

• If products or services use the account, change the account they are linked to. Or you can make products and services that use the account inactive.
• If you want to delete an income account with pending charges, invoice your customers for the billable expenses, time, or charges. Then, you can make the account inactive.
• If you have recurring transactions linked to an account, you need to unlink them.
• You can't deactivate accounts with subaccounts until you move the subaccounts.
• When deactivating an account, ensure that all service items related to the account in every transaction are modified accordingly.

For detailed information, refer to this article: Make an account inactive on your chart of accounts in QuickBooks Online.

I'm adding this article you can use in the future: Add an account to your chart of accounts in QuickBooks Online.

Following this information will successfully help you make the account inactive. If you have further questions about the chart of accounts, post them here. I'll be one call away. Have a good one!

Hello,

i tried your above steps already, there are no more linked products/services/recurring transactions. We haven't used this at all and I am struggling to find any product/service that is using the chart of account I am trying to make inactive. Is there a way to trace where it is used?

Thanks for following the suggested steps above, Moscoso. Let me share additional details about inactivating an account on your chart of accounts in QuickBooks Online.
 

Can you tell me the type of account you want to make inactive?

When you create your company in QuickBooks Online, specific default accounts are created for you depending on the business entity you selected. On the Chart of Accounts page, it’s important to understand that some of them can't be deactivated. You can read through this article for more details: Manage default and special accounts in your QuickBooks Online chart of accounts.

To look for any product or service associated with the account you want to make inactive, just go to the Chart of Accounts, look for the account, and click View Register. You can also select Edit from the Action dropdown to view account details. See the screenshot below for your guide.

If the issue remains, I highly suggest reaching out to our support team. They have all the necessary tools to pull up your account securely and further investigate the issue. Here's how to contact them:
 

1. Go to the Help icon in the top right-hand corner.
2. Select Search, then press the Contact Us button.
3. Enter your question in the box and hit Continue.
4. Choose the best way you'll want to reach out to us.

See this article for our operating hours: QuickBooks Online Support.

Look at this guide to learn more about organizing your accounts: Use account numbers in your chart of accounts in QuickBooks Online. 

Please let us know if you have additional questions about inactivating accounts or any QuickBooks-related concerns. I'll be willing to answer them for you.

Hi,

This specific account is an income/service fee/income account we used before. There are transactions that occurred many years ago, but we have decided to change the accounts and this one will not be used anymore in the future. Are those old transactions causing the issue?

Hello, @Moscoso. Please allow me to join the conversation and assist with your chart of accounts question in QuickBooks Online (QBO). 

Yes, you're correct. It's possible that old transactions in the income/service fee/income account might be causing issues when attempting to make the account inactive. 

If the account has never been used or has a balance of $0, making it inactive is simple. However, if you make an account inactive that you’ve used, it's quite difficult to undo. Accounts depend on each other to remain balanced, so any deletion of data from one affects everything else. 

When you make an account inactive, QuickBooks Online (QBO) automatically generates an adjustment entry to zero out the non-zero balance. This entry posts to the Opening Balance Equity account, which could potentially cause issues, particularly if there are old transactions with non-zero balances. 

It's recommended to analyze the account and correct it to a zero balance before deactivating it. Once the account is inactive, you can still see the inactive account and its transactions, but it's critical to ensure that the account is correctly balanced before deactivation to avoid any potential issues with old transactions. 

While I can offer some guidance, I strongly suggest that you consult your accountant for accurate advice on the next steps to take. They will ensure that this change is suitable for your situation. If you don't have an accountant, we can assist you in finding one. Please refer to this article for more information: Find an Accountant

For more detailed information, please refer to this article: Make an account inactive on your chart of accounts in QuickBooks Online.

Also, we have some helpful articles that might be useful to you in the future:  Add an account to your chart of accounts in QuickBooks Online

Feel free to let us know if you have further questions about inactivating accounts in QuickBooks Online. I'll be happy to help you. Best regards. 

Actually, I am having the exact same issue with an account that was never used and a service that was never used.  I made the service inactive first and I still get the same error message.  Then I reactivated it and switched the income account to something else and I still get the same error message.  The account is most definitely NOT being used by a service and it has never been used and yet I am unable to make it inactive.  Your statement above is not true: "If the account has never been used or has a balance of $0, making it inactive is simple." Please advise.

I can see how hard you tried here. No worries, I'll make it up to you to ensure you never have to deal with this again, jaspitzer.

There are specific accounts in QuickBooks Online (QBO) that can't be deleted because they are default accounts. Some accounts require extra steps before you can make them inactive:

• If products or services use the account, change the account they're linked to. Or you can make products and services that use the account inactive.
• If you want to delete an income account with pending charges, invoice your customers for the billable expenses, time, or charges. Then you can make the account inactive.
• If you have recurring transactions linked to an account, you need to unlink them.
• You can't deactivate accounts with subaccounts until you move the subaccounts.

When you're ready to make an account inactive, just follow the steps below: 

1. Go to the Gear icon and select Chart of accounts.
2. Find the account you want to delete.
3. Select the Action ▼ dropdown and press Make inactive.

If the same thing happens, we can log in to your account using an incognito browser. Private browser prevents saving cache and cookies that sometimes cause errors when running frequently visited websites. Here are the useful shortcut keys you can use to access one:

• Ctrl+ Shift + N for Google Chrome
• Ctrl + Shift + P for Mozilla Firefox and Microsoft Edge
• Command + Shift + N for Safari

If it works, return to your default browser and clear its cache. Every so often the cache becomes overwhelmed with older data which can potentially cause viewing and performance issues. Clearing it will refresh the system, and you'll be able to work with a clean slate. Switching to another compatible one to help rectify the issue.

As always, feel free to read the topics from our help articles in case you need tips and related links while working with QuickBooks in the future.

I want to make sure I've got you covered. You can click the Reply button below for follow-up questions and clarifications about banking. I'll be in touch.