The New QBOA Firm Transition
Intuit released the New QBOA interface in December 2014. Accounting firms can wait to be migrated by Intuit,
or firms can walk through the RootWorks recommended steps to migrate themselves.
Note: Although Intuit is unable to provide the specific date when a firm/ login is going to be migrated, they have
shared that it is likely migration will still be occurring throughout July/August 2015. It is that reason that firms
are opting to migrate themselves so that they are in control of the timetable.
This guide will take you through the necessary steps to successfully migrate your firm’s staff members and
clients to this new, current version of QBOA.
The topics in this document include:
1. Taking an inventory of current QBOA consoles/clients in your firm
2. Understanding the different QBOA versions
3. Walking through the decision factors and steps of migration
4. Managing wholesale billing: sign-up process and eligibility factors
Table of Contents
Take a quick inventory of your firm’s QBOA consoles .......................................................................... 1
What version of QBOA are you currently working in? .......................................................................... 2
Old QBOA Version ........................................................................................................................................................... 2
New QBOA Version: *This is the version you want to be on!*......................................................................... 3
QBOA Migration: Decision Factors and Migration Steps....................................................................... 3
Decision Point #1: Generic Firm Account vs. Individual Master Admin Account .................................... 3
Step #1 ................................................................................................................................................................................ 4
Step #2 ................................................................................................................................................................................ 5
Step #3 ................................................................................................................................................................................ 5
Step #4 ................................................................................................................................................................................ 6
Steps for all QBOA Team Members: ...................................................................................................................................... 6
Master Admin Only Steps: ......................................................................................................................................................... 7
Step #5 ................................................................................................................................................................................ 7
Step #6 ................................................................................................................................................................................ 8
Wholesale Billing FAQ ....................................................................................................................................... 8
Take an Inventory of Your Firm’s QBOA Consoles
Before you make the decision to migrate, it is important that you take a firm inventory to
understand who is accessing what client and what version of QBOA they are on. The inventory
should include:
1. List of staff members with a QBOA login: Names and the email address associated with
their account
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a. Note whether or not their logins have been upgraded to the latest version
i. Please see section below to determine what version of QBOA you and staff
are working in if you are unsure if migration has taken place
2. List of each QBO client name and the accountant email address that was used to “invite the
accountant” There can be up to 2 accountant users
a. Open QBO company/Manage Users/Accounting Firms
b. You may need to have your staff help you with this, if each staff member has their
own independent lists of clients within their console
3. List of any other QBO clients that are not linked to an accountant (We have worked with
firms that may have QBO clients where the staff will use the client’s login and password to
access the data) *Note- This is not recommended.
(We recommend storing this information in a Word doc or Excel spreadsheet, example below)
Inventory spreadsheet example:
Important! The biggest problem with the old QBOA version is that the master admin, in our
example, John, he did not have access to Tom and Bryan’s clients. The goal of migration is to get all
clients under one umbrella, where a master admin is managing access, workload, etc.
What Version of QBOA Are You Currently Working In?
There is a chance that you may have already been migrated by Intuit, or some members of your
staff have been migrated where others have not. The easiest way to determine what version you
are on is by noting the visual differences between the versions as well as the URL to login.
Old QBOA Version
Visual: Blue bar across the top, left toolbar has ‘Clients’ and ‘Resource Center’ sections. (See Image
below)
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URL: office.intuit.com
New QBOA Version: *This is the version you want to be on!*
Visual: Green bar across the top and left side includes a ‘Clients’, ‘Team’ and ‘ProAdvisor’ section.
(See image below)
URL: qbo.intuit.com
QBOA Migration: Decision Factors and Migration Steps
Many firms are opting to migrate their accounts themselves in lieu of waiting for Intuit to migrate
their accounts for them. If you would like to migrate your existing QBOA accounts from the old
version to the new version, consider the following decision points and walk through these steps:
Decision Point #1: Generic Firm Account vs. Individual Firm Master Admin Account
1. Consider whether you want to have a generic firm account (i.e.
[email protected]) as the master admin account for your firm OR do you want
to use the owner/partner’s email address as the master firm email address
([email protected]).
Important! If you have an existing user account that you plan to use, then you need to make
sure that the account was migrated by Intuit, to the New QBOA Platform. If not, you will
need to wait for that conversion or consider setting up a new firm account that will utilize
the New QBOA Platform.
a. The email address that you decide to use will be used as the “accountant user” in
each of your client’s QBO accounts. By using a standard address you will be able to
consolidate all your clients in one place. From this “firm master admin console” you
can add staff users and give them access to the clients they need to see.
b. The account you select as the firm account will also serve as the QBOA Firm Books
account. This is where you will, if you decide to, use QBO for your firms accounting
system. This firm set of books is the “Your Books” component inside of the New
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QBOA Platform. It is the firm account that will serve as the “wholesale billing”
account for the QBO clients in which you choose to consolidated bill on your firms
CC. When inside your firm’s books, if you select the gear in the top right, go to “Your
Account” you will see the wholesale billing section and the clients included on your
bill.
Decision Results: Decision Point 1 was a critical decision point:
 If you decided to use an existing account as the master admin and the account has not
been migrated to the latest QBOA version by Intuit, you will have to wait until the
migration takes place to move on in the document.
 If you decided to move forward with setting up a generic or new QBOA firm master
admin account, then you are ready to move forward with the next steps in the
document.
Step #1
Based on your decision above, if creating a new firm master admin account using a generic or new
email please follow these steps next:
1. Setup the generic email (such as [email protected]) first. Your IT person may
be the correct person to get involved.
a. Important! This account should be a live/real inbox account, we recommend 1-2 people
(likely partners) that are setup to access and monitor this mailbox account. QBO
accountant invites will be emailed to this account.
2. Setup a new QBOA account following the link below:
a. https://quickbooks.intuit.com/start/qba_signup
b. Login setup, see image below
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Step #2
Setup your billing information.
1. Logged in as the master admin in your new account, click on the gear icon and choose
“Your Account”
a. Edit billing information here.
b. Important! Do not click button ‘Move Clients to Wholesale’ yet, we are not ready for
that step yet. We will be moving client to wholesale at a later point in the guide
Step #3
Setup your staff team members.
1. Logged in as the master admin, click on the gear icon and choose “Your Team”
a. Important! Setup each staff member using the email address that is currently
linked to their existing QBOA account. If they have been migrated by Intuit already,
that is ok, you still need to set them up as a member of your team under the master
admin console.
b. Setup each member of your staff here with either Full or Basic, Custom access
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c. Each staff member will receive an invitation from the new master admin, they
should accept invitation(See screenshot below)
Step #4
At this point you are ready to begin adding your clients to the master firm account, (refer back to
the inventory that we created in the beginning of the guide.) I will refer to the screenshot below in
my steps.
In the example above, John Smith has 4 clients, Tom Smith has 2 clients, Bryan Brown has 2
clients, all three have not been migrated to the New QBOA yet. Each of them will need to walk
through the following steps to move the clients to the new QBOA version using
[email protected] as master admin:
Steps for all QBOA Team Members:
1. Login to QBOA (John, Tom and Bryan all login to their own consoles)
2. Access data for each client in their list (one at a time)
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3. Gear Icon/ Manage Users
4. Choose Invite Accountant, use [email protected] as the email address. (or
whatever email is now associated as the new master admin account)
5. If the staff person is the Master Administrator on the client account, they will need to login
and transfer Master Administrator status to the new master firm user account
[email protected]
New QBOA Master Firm Admin Only: Steps:
1. The firm master admin will accept the invitation, and should verify the client now shows up
on the new QBOA dashboard as the master admin.
2. Now, logged into the firm master admin console, go into each client, ‘manage users’, and
edit the accountant users on the client and delete your staff person as an accountant user.
a. Note that in the New QBOA Dashboard, once you provide your staff user rights to
see the clients you want them to see, they will have access.
3. If your client has not given you permissions to do the above, then on each of their accounts
all you have to do is to ask the client to invite your firm master email
([email protected]) as the accountant user and ask them to delete the old
accountant user.
After Migration QBOA Client inventory spreadsheet:
Below is an excel spreadsheet depicting the changes in red font that take place during this process.
Step #5
Once all of the clients have been accounted for and are listed in the new QBOA console dashboard,
the master admin can go back into the team staff member’s permissions and provide access to the
appropriate clients. For clients that are eligible, you may also register them for wholesale billing.
(For more about eligibility please see Wholesale Billing FAQ section below)
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Step #6
Moving forward, add brand-new QBO companies when logged into the master-admin console, or
have an existing QBO client invite you as their accountant using the email address that is
associated with the master admin account, in our example [email protected]
Wholesale Billing FAQ
1. Question: What is wholesale billing?
a. Answer: Intuit QBOA Wholesale Billing invoices the accounting firm with one
monthly consolidated bill, that includes all of the clients (and their fees) who have
signed up for the service. The accounting firm can then include the fees in a monthly
fixed fee billing structure to the client that includes all services provided to the
client.
2. Question: I have some clients already signed up for wholesale billing in the old version of
QBOA. Will the migration steps be impacted or different because of this?
a. Answer: YES. If you have clients that are already signed up for wholesale bill, you
will be unable to transfer the Master Administrator roles until these QBO companies
are removed from your firm’s wholesale billing section.
 Steps:
 Remove the client from wholesale billing
 Invite the new master admin email as accountant
 Accept invitation
 Transfer master admin rights to new master admin
 Sign the client up for wholesale billing in new QBOA console
3. Question: How is a client eligible for wholesale billing in the New QBOA version?
a. Answer: The client must have the following:
 Client must be active
 The accountant (Master admin QBOA) MUST be the Master Administrator on the
client
 Client must be in your region (United States, Canada, etc.)
 Clients must be using QuickBooks Essentials or QuickBooks Plus (With or without
payroll)
4. Question: I am hearing a lot about wholesale billing, is this something I should be
recommending for all of my QBO clients?
a. Answer: It depends
i. The largest benefit is the price break: 50% off the lifetime of the subscription
(Note: You will always get 50% off the price, but the price itself is likely to
change over the years)
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ii. An important consideration that you would want to talk over with your
client(s) is that the accounting firm would need to be master admin of the
QBO account in order to move the client to wholesale bill. For some clients
this may not be a big deal, for others this could be a deal-breaker.
iii. If the client does not want wholesale bill, you can also choose the option to
“pass along offers” Pass along offers are prices that are more expensive then
wholesale billing, but less expensive than if the client were not working with
you as their accountant. They would be paying the monthly subscription fees.
Contact Intuit for more details.
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