Review your clients' books in QuickBooks Online Accountant

Learn what to review every month for each of your clients in QuickBooks Online Accountant.

With so much going on for every client, it can be hard to stay on top of everything. Use the Books review tool to finish specific tasks in each client's QuickBooks Online account every month.

The Books review tool focuses on common yet tricky bookkeeping areas: incomplete transactions, reconciliations, and account balances. It lists key tasks so you can quickly tie up any loose ends and prioritise work, and customise your own tasks for review. You can even collaborate on transactions with your client directly in QuickBooks, send and receive messages, and upload documents.

Step 1: Start a books review

Do books reviews for each of your clients, one at a time.

1. Open a client's QuickBooks Online account.
2. Select Books review. You can also select Accountant Tools and then Month-end review (Bookkeeping review).
3. Select Edit ✏️  next to the date to review a different month. By default, books reviews are for the previous month.

Tasks are divided into three sections. Follow the tabs in order. Start with the Transaction review tab. Then move on to the Account reconciliation and Final review tabs.

Step 2: Fix incomplete transactions

The Transaction review tab shows transactions with missing or incorrect info. QuickBooks flags uncategorised transactions, transactions without payees, and unapplied payments.

If data is missing, you'll see a blank line in the column. Select a transaction to open it and make corrections. You can also collaborate with your clients to capture missing transaction level information. Here’s how:

1. Select one or more transactions. In the Actions pop-up that displays, select Ask client.
2. The Create a request form automatically fills out a name and description along with the request for missing transaction-level details. You can edit these fields, such as the due date when you’d like a client response, or add additional documents.
3. Select Create. Your client is sent an email notification to open QuickBooks Online and respond with additional details for the transaction(s).
4. Your client needs to log into QuickBooks, then go to My accountant, then the Requests tab. Here they can open each request to explain what they bought and why.
5. Once your client has responded to the request, you can find the reply in Books review. Select Client requests, then View all requests.

Step 3: Finish reconciling accounts

Move on to the Account reconciliation tab. This lists accounts you need to reconcile.

Select an account to start reconciling it. Use the info in each column as a guide so you know how much work needs to be done. Outstanding transactions appear in the Unreconciled column.

Step 4: Check account balance issues

The Final review tab lists the financial reports you should check every month. Select Review to open a report. QuickBooks automatically filters reports for the month you select.

Step 5: Check books review progress

You can easily check the status of current books reviews for each of your clients:

1. In QuickBooks Online Accountant, go to the Clients menu.
2. Select the Bookkeeping tab.
3. Review the status of the Books review column.
4. Select the icon in the Books review column to see which tasks are finished or open.

Create additional items to track monthly tasks

Under each tab, you can create your own tasks. These help you keep track of items you need to accomplish for your month-end close. To create a task, go to the Additional items or Reports section and select + Add.