Why has slash (/) been removed as an acceptable character for products. I never had this issue before yesterday and now I can't add fraction sizes to the product name.

I can see how significant it is for you to add fractional sizes to your products, David.

Let's take some troubleshooting steps to ensure you can add a slash while using your QuickBooks Online (QBO) account. An accumulation of historical data can cause unexpected behaviors. 

To begin, open your account through an incognito window to rule out the possibility of a webpage issue. You can accomplish this by utilizing the following keyboard shortcuts: 

• Safari: Control + Option + P
• Google Chrome: Press Ctrl + Shift + N
• Firefox or Internet Explorer: Ctrl + Shift + P

If that works fine using a private browser, go back to your original browser and clear its cache so the system can start fresh. Also, using a different supported browser can help us dig deep into the root cause of this unexpected behavior.

However, if you'd like to learn more about grouping products and services, here's a resource you can browse: Group products and services into different categories in QuickBooks Online.

Additionally, you can check out this article for more tips and resources while working with QuickBooks in the future: Help articles, video tutorials, and more.

You can always have me if you have other queries about managing your products. Let me know if you have any other tasks that you'd like me to help you with. It would be my pleasure to lend you a hand again.

Regardless of which browser I use or even if I do it in an incognito window, it still won't allow me to add a new product with a slash in the name. We have several other products that allowed us to use a (/) before..

Thanks for following up with the Community, david407. I appreciate your detailed information and screenshot.

I can certainly understand how an ability to add new products with a slash (/) character in their names could be useful and have submitted a suggestion about it as of today.

You can also submit your own feature requests while signed in.

Here's how:

1. Use the Gear icon, then go to Feedback.
2. Enter your suggestion(s) in the Have feedback? window.
3. If necessary, attach a file with your Camera icon.
4. Select Next.
   
   

Your feedback's definitely valuable to Intuit. It will be reviewed by our Product Development team and considered in future updates. You can stay up-to-date with the latest news about your product by reviewing Intuit's Product Updates webpage.

I've also included a detailed resource about working with products/services which may come in handy moving forward: Add product & service items

I'll be here to help if there's any additional questions. Have a lovely Tuesday!

I have exactly the same issue. I use QuickBooks since 7 years. Now I need to issue a new invoice with new products but I can't add new products because they have slash character " / " in the name. Even when I try to edit existing product which has slash / in it, Quickbooks won't let me save it.  I can't work without /.  What happened?????

I just read that there is a list of acceptable characters where Quickbooks uses / in the list but the slash is not on the list of acceptable characters but there are some characters which probably nobody will ever use.

Bring back slash sign /  !!!!!!!!! 

RE: What happened?

QuickBooks Online is becoming more and more a steaming pile. It seems the people who are running it have no idea what's important. They probably made this change because it made their job easier somehow.

QuickBooks Desktop of course allows the / character, and just about everything else you can type into the item name field with a keyboard.

We have found the exact same issue with the / slash not available as an acceptable character. This has been used by us for years to define the size or colour variants of our products. 

This is not a new feature but something that we have used for many years up until yesterday when it suddenly was not acceptable. Something has changed on QB end not the user end. 

Hello there, I Dream A Highway.

We've received similar cases or reports about being unable to add or update product and service names with slash (/) characters, getting an error. As a workaround, you can replace the slash (/) with a dash (-).

In the meantime, I recommend contacting our support team for you to be added to affected users. This way, you'll receive email updates on the investigation's status and be notified once the issue is addressed.

1. Select Help at the top.
2. Click the Search tab, then choose Contact Us.
3. Select a topic or enter a brief description of your concern.
4. Hit Continue, then select Start a chat and Get a callback.

Let me know if you have further questions about products and services in QuickBooks Online. I'm always here to help.

@IrishNinoJ  RE: As a workaround, you can replace the slash (/) with a dash (-).

No you can't. That's just an uninformed reach and is nonsense.

3/4" pipe and 3-4" pipe are not at all the same thing.

@BigRedConsulting  You might have hit on the real motivation here.

Has Intuit recently invested in the plumbing industry?

@ZackE the problem with your "solution" to "submit a feature request" is that users are NOT suggesting a new feature. They are asking WHAT HAPPENED to the feature that existed up until this week.

Users were already able to use the slash character and based their existing product entries around that basic ability. Now @david407 is asking WHY IS IT GONE. He, and other users, are paying for a product that suddenly has one less feature than it did last week.

Did Quickbooks determine it was non-essential? Did they simply forget to include the slash character in an update? Were they unaware it was removed and will be reinstating it asap? Users need to know the answer in order to determine how they will proceed.  

So please, reach out to whoever can provide the answer WHY this basic character was removed so that the reason can be communicated to the userbase and they can make an appropriate decision to either look for a workaround on how to express fractions, or wait to for this issue to be fixed soon.

I believe the issue was finally resolved as I am able to edit existing products with fractions as well as add new products with fractions in the name. I hope everyone else's issue was resolved!!

Thanks for the update David!  3 hours ago I wrote to them 10 feedback messages  - "Bring back slash character to names" so they wouldn't miss it and it looks like this together with our messages helped as the slash character is now working!