Bring unpaid customer invoices and vendor bills into QuickBooks Desktop

Use unpaid documents to establish the balances

For a new QuickBooks Desktop file, bring in each unpaid customer invoice and vendor bill once. Their outstanding amounts form Accounts Receivable, which customers owe you, and Accounts Payable, which you owe vendors. Do not also enter the same amounts in the customer or vendor Opening Balance fields or in a separate opening journal.

This procedure covers US QuickBooks Desktop and Enterprise for Windows, using one currency, fully unpaid service invoices and expense bills. It assumes the customer and vendor names already exist, the invoice items and bill accounts have been approved, and no transaction history or opening totals for these debts have been imported. It is not a whole-company conversion or a procedure for QuickBooks Online or Mac.

Part-paid documents, unapplied credits, deposits, inventory, foreign currency and tax adjustments need a separate conversion plan. Do not turn a partly paid invoice into a new invoice for its remaining balance without accounting review: that can lose the original history and change reporting. If those cases are present, separate them before using this procedure.

Have the accounting owner approve how invoice items and bill expense lines affect the conversion accounts. An invoice can affect income as well as receivables; a bill can affect expenses as well as payables. Those effects must fit the opening trial balance and any history being retained. This guide does not choose a balancing account, tax treatment or opening equity amount for your business.

1. Agree the cutoff and prepare a control list

Choose the last date represented by the old records, then start new daily transactions on the following day. For example, a 31 October cutoff means the list contains documents still unpaid at the end of 31 October. A receipt or payment made on 2 November belongs after that cutoff, even if you are entering the records later.

Collect the outstanding invoice and bill lists, the original documents, and the approved receivable and payable totals for that same date. Keep customers and vendors separate. For each document record its name, reference, original date, due date, currency, original amount and amount still open. Check for duplicate references under the same name and explain any difference between the document list and the approved totals before entry.

These are invented amounts in one currency, not client records or values to enter in your file. Do not net the 1,250 receivable against the 500 payable: they are two separate controls.

Before entry, arrange exclusive use if needed and choose File > Back Up Company > Create Local Backup. Select Local Backup, choose the destination with Browse, confirm the options, then select Save it now and Next. Wait for confirmation and retain this pre-entry backup.

2. Check that the debts are not already recorded

Open the customer and vendor centres and review each relevant name's transactions. Compare references, dates and amounts with the control list. Also run the dated reports in step 5 before adding anything; retain those starting reports.

If an invoice, bill, imported balance or opening journal already represents a debt, stop that document's entry. Identify the existing record and agree the correction before continuing. A blank Opening Balance field does not prove that no opening transaction exists. Conversely, a correct total can hide two duplicates and a missing document.

Check the approved customer/job and vendor name carefully. Do not create a slightly different spelling to get around an existing name. Keep Opening Balance fields unused for the documents being entered individually. Record the chosen method in the control list so another operator does not load the totals again.

3. Enter each fully unpaid customer invoice

1. Choose Customers > Create Invoices and select the existing Customer:Job that owns the debt.
2. Enter the original invoice date and reference. Check the billing address, terms and resulting due date against the source document. Do not replace every old invoice date with the conversion date.
3. Select the approved service item or items and enter the agreed descriptions, quantities and amounts. Check any automatically filled price or tax setting rather than accepting it by default. The saved total must equal this fully unpaid invoice's source amount.
4. Confirm that the item mapping follows the accounting owner's conversion plan. If the plan is missing or would duplicate income already imported, stop before saving.
5. Choose Save & Close. Reopen the invoice from the customer record and compare its name, reference, date, due date and amount. Mark it entered on the control list only after this check.

Repeat for the remaining supported invoices. Do not receive a payment merely to finish the setup: these documents are unpaid at the cutoff. Do not send newly generated invoices to customers as part of this conversion; the entries represent documents already issued.

4. Enter each fully unpaid vendor bill

1. Choose Vendors > Enter Bills and select the existing vendor.
2. Enter the original bill details, including the date from the approved records, reference, total and due date. Intuit describes the Date field as the date the bill was received; resolve a source-date discrepancy with the accounting owner rather than silently changing it.
3. For the expense-only bills covered here, use Expenses and the approved account allocations. Enter the description and amounts, and confirm that the lines equal the bill total. Do not select Accounts Payable as a plug for a missing expense mapping.
4. Save the bill, reopen it and compare it with the source. Mark the matching line entered on the control list.

Repeat for the remaining supported bills. Do not create a cheque or bill payment for an unpaid debt. Inventory purchases and credits require their own treatment; entering an inventory bill without coordinating opening quantities and value can create another conversion difference.

5. Prove the balances at the same cutoff date

1. Open Reports > Customers & Receivables > Open Invoices. Set the report through the cutoff date, with the range covering all older documents. Under Customize Report > Display > Advanced, use Report Date for Open Balance/Aging.
2. Compare every customer's open documents and subtotal with the control list. Check references, dates and due dates as well as amounts. The example requires three invoices and a total of 1,250.
3. Open Reports > Vendors & Payables > Unpaid Bills Detail. In Customize Report > Advanced, select As of Report Date for Open Balance/Aging, then set the cutoff date. The example requires two bills totalling 500.
4. Run Balance Sheet Standard from the Company & Financial reports. Use Accrual and the same cutoff date. Compare Accounts Receivable with the customer report and Accounts Payable with the vendor report. If there are multiple control accounts, reconcile each separately.
5. Have the accounting owner compare the complete opening trial balance and the posting effects with the approved conversion plan. Matching receivable and payable totals alone does not prove that income, expenses, tax or equity are correct.

Use the historical report-date setting even when later payments have already been entered. A current-open-items view can exclude an invoice paid after the cutoff and make a correct historical opening balance appear wrong. Keep the report date, basis and filters with the saved reports.

Resolve differences before handing the file over

A name's total is wrong: compare document by document. Look for a missing invoice or bill, a duplicate opening entry, a wrong customer/job, or a document dated after the cutoff. Correct only the identified error, then rerun both the detailed report and the balance sheet.

The details agree but the control account does not: review report settings and other postings to receivables or payables, including journals and entries without the correct name. Keep the discrepancy for the accounting owner. Do not add a balancing journal solely to make two totals match.

The entry batch needs to be undone: stop further entry and retain the before-and-after reports. Have the accounting owner choose between correcting the identified transactions and restoring the pre-entry backup. Restoring would discard work entered since that backup, so reconcile any intervening activity first.

The finished result is an approved document list with each supported invoice and bill entered once, customer and vendor detail matching the dated control totals, and the whole conversion reviewed for its other accounting effects. Save the reports, approval and a new backup. Later receipts and payments should be applied to these existing documents, not recorded as a second sale or expense.

Sources and scope

Official US Desktop guidance reviewed 15 October 2026. Labels can vary by version. The control worksheet and conversion checks are original examples and practical review guidance. No test in a live QuickBooks company file is claimed.

• Intuit: Enter opening balances
• Intuit: Create an invoice
• Intuit: Enter bills
• Intuit: Compare receivable reports
• Intuit: Customize vendor reports
• Intuit: Back up a company file

Related guides

• Prepare the wider opening-balance records
• Review account names and types before entry