QuickBooks files hiccup now
and then. Perhaps you worked through a spectacular thunderstorm and a power
spike zapped a bit of your company file, say. Fortunately, QuickBooks’ has a
feature that can scan your company files and tell you whether the file has
suffered any damage: the Verify Data utility. It’s a good idea to run the
utility every so often, just to make sure that your company file is OK.
How often you run this
utility depends on how hard you work your company file, but monthly
verifications are in order for most companies. The utility is indispensable,
though, if you notice any of the following symptoms:
• Invalid protection faults or fatal errors. If these types of errors appear in message boxes when you run
QuickBooks, you almost certainly have a damaged data file.
• Discrepancies on reports. Your Balance Sheet
doesn’t show all your accounts, or transactions show negative values instead of
positive ones.
Tip: If the totals in your reports don’t seem
right, first check that the report dates are correct and that you’re using the
right cash or accrual accounting setting.
• Missing transactions and names.
Transactions or names that you’re sure you entered don’t appear in reports or
lists.
Running the Verify Data Utility
Whether you’re just giving
your company file a checkup or you see signs of problems, the Verify Data
utility is easy to use. To run it, choose File➝Utilities➝Verify Data. (If any
windows are open, click OK to give QuickBooks permission to close them.) When
the utility is done working, you’ll have one of two possible outcomes:
• If QuickBooks displays a
message saying that it detected no problems with your data,
congratulations—your file is healthy!
• If you see the message
“Your data has lost integrity,” your company file has some problems. QuickBooks
displays instructions for running the Rebuild Data utility, which tries to
repair the damage. Read on to learn what to do.
Reviewing Problems
If your company file has
“lost integrity,” the Verify Data utility writes down any errors it finds in a
file named QBWIN.log. Before you run the Rebuild Data utility, it’s a good idea to
take a look at this log file and review your company file’s problems. However,
you’ll need a map to find the log file. Fortunately, you can open the file with
the Windows Notepad program. Here’s how:
1. In Windows Explorer, go
to the folder where QuickBooks stores QBWIN.log. In
Windows 7, it’s C:\Users\<your user
name>\AppData\Local\Intuit\ Quick- Books\log\21.0. In Windows XP, it’s C:\Documents and
Settings\<your user name>\Local Settings\ Application
Data\Intuit\QuickBooks\log\21.0.
Note: Windows initially hides application-data
folders like the log folder you’re looking for here. If you don’t see the
folder, in the Windows Explorer window’s menu bar, choose Organize➝“Folder and search options” (in Windows 7)
or Tools➝Folder Options (in
Windows XP). Then click the View tab. In the “Advanced settings” list, under
“Hidden files and folders”, select “Show hidden files, folders, and drives”.
2. To open the log file,
double-click its name. The file opens in Windows
Notepad, and you can use Notepad commands to move around the file. (If the file
doesn’t open, launch Notepad, choose File➝Open,
and then double-click the QBWIN.log filename.) The most recent addition to the file is at the very
end. When you verify data, QuickBooks automatically renames the previous QBWIN.log file to QBWIN.log.old1 so that the QBWIN.log file contains information for
only the most recent verification. QuickBooks also renames other old files,
changing QBWIN.log.old1 to
QBWIN.log.old2,
and so on. ╉╉╉╉Cleaning Up
Data
Running the Rebuild Data Utility
If your file is damaged,
QuickBooks’ Rebuild Data utility tries to fix it. Unfortunately, it can also
make matters worse. Intuit recommends that you run the Rebuild Data utility only if an Intuit technical support
person tells you to. Always make a backup of your company file before trying to rebuild it.
Take extra care to prevent overwriting your previous backups—those files might
be your only salvation if the rebuild doesn’t work.
To run the Rebuild Data
utility, choose File➝Utilities➝Rebuild Data. When the utility is done working, close your company
file and reopen it; this refreshes the lists in your data file so you can see
if the problems are gone. Then, run the Verify Data utility once more to see if
any damage remains. If this second Verify Data run still shows errors, restore
a recent backup of your company file.
Cleaning Up Data
As you add transactions and
build lists in QuickBooks, your company file gets larger. Although larger
company files aren’t too big of a hassle, you might be alarmed when your
company file reaches hundreds of megabytes. Plus, if you use CDs to back up your
file, your backups will start to take up too much valuable time and storage space.
Enter the Clean Up Company Data command, which creates an archive file and
deletes obsolete list items and transactions prior to the date you choose.
Warning: The Clean Up Company Data wizard removes
the audit trail information for transactions that the cleanup deletes. So if
you’re watching transaction activity, print an Audit Trail report first, and, as always, back up your company
file.
When QuickBooks cleans up
data, it replaces the detailed transactions prior to your specified date with
general journal entries that summarize the deleted transactions by month. As a
result, some of your financial details are no longer available for running reports,
filing taxes, and other accounting activities. Still, there are a couple of compelling
reasons to do a data cleanup:
• You no longer refer to old transactions. If you’ve used QuickBooks for years, you probably don’t need the finer details from
eight or more years ago. And if you ever do need details from the past, you can
open an archive file to run reports.
• You have obsolete list items.
Cleaning up a company file
can remove list items that you don’t use, like customers you no longer sell to.
This option comes in handy if you’re nearing the limit on the number of names.
An archive file created by
the Clean Up wizard is a regular company file that contains all of your
transactions, but it’s read-only, meaning you can’t add data to it or edit it, so you can’t
inadvertently enter new transactions. If QuickBooks runs into trouble cleaning
up your file, it automatically pulls transaction details from the archive file.
An archive copy is not a backup file, so you can’t use it with the Restore
command to replace a corrupt company file. So even if you create an archive
copy, you still need to back up your data. If you decide to clean up your
company file, here’s what you can expect to find afterward:
• General journal entries summarize deleted transactions. QuickBooks replaces all the deleted transactions that happened
during each month with one general journal entry. For example, instead of 20
separate invoices for the month of June, you’ll see one journal entry
transaction with the total income for June for each income account.
• Inventory adjustments reflect the average cost of items. QuickBooks removes inventory transactions that are complete,
such as invoices that have been paid in full. When QuickBooks finds an
inventory transaction that it can’t condense (perhaps because the payment is
outstanding), it keeps all the inventory transactions from that date forward.
Because inventory transactions use the average cost of inventory items,
QuickBooks also adds an inventory adjustment to set the average cost of the
items as of that date.
• Reports might not include the details you want. You can still generate summary reports using condensed data
because QuickBooks can incorporate the info in the monthly general journal
entries. Likewise, sales tax reports still include data about your sales tax
liabilities. But detailed reports won’t include transaction details before the
cutoff date you choose for condensing the file . And cash accounting reports
won’t be accurate because they need the dates for detailed transactions.
• You still have payroll info for the current year. QuickBooks keeps payroll transactions for the current year and
the previous year regardless of the cutoff date you choose for condensing the
file.
• QuickBooks deletes estimates for closed jobs. If a job has any status other than Closed, QuickBooks keeps the
estimates for that job.
• QuickBooks retains time data that you haven’t billed. QuickBooks keeps any time you’ve tracked that’s billable but
that you haven’t yet billed to your customers. Also, if you pay employees by
the time they work, QuickBooks keeps data about time for which you haven’t compensated your employees.
╉╉╉╉Cleaning Up
Data
Running the Clean Up Company File Utility
If you’re ready to clean up
your company file, first consider when to do it. The cleaning process can take several hours for a large
company file, and a slow computer or a small amount of memory exacerbates the
problem. You might want to clean your company file at the end of a workday so
it can run overnight. Here’s how to condense a company file:
1. Choose File➝Utilities➝Clean Up Company Data. If you’ve created budgets
in QuickBooks, you’ll see a message that the cleanup might remove budget data.
You can export your budget before you clean up your data and then import the
budget back into your company file after cleanup. If the loss of some budget
data doesn’t scare you, click Yes. The Clean Up Company Data dialog box opens.
2. Select the “Remove transactions as of a specific date” option. This option deletes old
transactions and things like unused accounts and items. The “Remove ALL
transactions” option removes transactions but keeps your preferences, lists,
and service subscriptions—such as payroll—intact. You won’t use this option
often, but it comes in handy if, for example, you want to offer your clients a
template company file that contains typical list entries, but without any
transactions.
3. In the “Remove closed transactions on or before” box, type or
select the ending date for the period you want to condense, and then click
Next. If you use a QuickBooks Payroll Service you can’t clean up data
for the current year. Besides, QuickBooks won’t let you clean up transactions
that are later than the closing date on your company file. Choosing a date at
least two years in the past ensures that you can compare detailed transactions for
the current year and the previous year. For example, if it’s March 1, 2011, consider
using December 31, 2009 or earlier as your cutoff date.
4. On the “Select Additional Criteria for Removing Transactions”
screen, turn on the appropriate checkboxes if you want to remove transactions
that the clean-up process would normally leave alone, and then click Next. Figure 7-8 shows your choices. Before you turn on these
checkboxes, carefully review your company file to make sure you won’t delete
transactions that you want to keep.
5. On the “Select Unused List Items To Remove” screen, turn on the
appropriate checkboxes if you want QuickBooks to delete list items no longer
referenced in the cleaned up file. Then click Next. Accounts, customers, vendors, other names, and invoice items might
become orphans when you delete old transactions they’re linked to. You can
neaten your file by removing these list items, which now have no links to the
transactions that still remain. But keep in mind that you might still work with
one of these vendors or customers later. Cleaning Up After Deleting Files
Figure 7-8:╇ The Clean Up Company File utility includes
settings to remove transactions that it would normally leave alone—like transactions
marked “To be printed” that you don’t need to print. If you have very old,
unreconciled transactions, invoices, or estimates marked “To be sent,” or
transactions with unreimbursed costs, turn on these checkboxes to remove them
during the cleanup.
If seeing all the To Do
notes you’ve completed gives you a sense of accomplishment, leave the “‘Done’
To Do notes” checkbox turned off. To keep only To Do notes that you haven’t completed, turn this
checkbox on.
6. On the “Proceed with cleanup?” screen, click Begin Cleanup.
If you’re not sure of the options you chose,
or if you have any doubts about cleaning up your file, click Back to return to
a previous screen, or click Cancel to exit without running the cleanup.
When you click Begin
Cleanup, QuickBooks tells you that it’ll back up your file before condensing
the transactions. Click OK when you’re ready to back up and clean up your data.
QuickBooks first creates a backup file of your data. Then, it creates the
archive file (a QuickBooks company file, not a backup file;) in the same folder
as your original company file. The filename for the archive copy has the format
Archive Copy mm-dd-yyyy <company name>.qbw, where “mm” represents the month, “dd” the day, and “yyyy” the
year that you created the file.
As QuickBooks proceeds with
the cleanup process, it scans your data three times. You might see dialog boxes wink on and off in rapid
succession; then again, you might not see anything happen for a while if your
file is large. But if your hard disk is working, the cleanup process is still
in progress. Be patient and resist clicking Cancel. When the cleanup is
complete, QuickBooks displays a message telling you so.
Cleaning Up After
Deleting Files
QuickBooks doesn’t give you
a command for deleting company files. If you want to get rid of a practice file
you no longer use, you can easily delete the file right in Windows. But you’ll
still have some housekeeping to do to remove all references to that file from
QuickBooks.
A deleted company file will
still appear in QuickBooks’ the list of previously opened files but the program
won’t be able to find the file if you choose that entry. Here’s how you
eliminate those stale entries:
1. In Windows Explorer, navigate to the folder where your
QuickBooks company files are stored, and then right-click the company file you
want to delete. What you look for depends on how you’ve set up your folder view.
If your folder shows the full names of your files, look for a file with a .qbw
file extension, such as DoubleTrouble, Inc.qbw. If the folder includes a Name column and a Type column, the type
you want is QuickBooks Company File.
Files with .qbx extensions
represent accountant’s copies. Files with .qbb file extensions are backup
copies of your company files. If you delete the company file, go ahead and
delete the backup and accountant’s copies as well.
2. On the shortcut menu, choose Delete.
Windows displays the
Confirm File Delete message box. Click Yes to move the file to the Recycle Bin.
If you have second thoughts, click No to keep the file.
3. In QuickBooks, to eliminate the deleted company file from the
list you see when you choose File➝Open Previous Company, open another company file by choosing the
filename for that company on the Open Previous Company menu. Alternatively, if
QuickBooks’ displays the No Company Open window, open the company file that you
typically work with by double-clicking it.
4. To clear out old files in the previously opened file list,
reset the number of companies displayed in the No Company Open window by
choosing File➝Open Previous Company➝“Set number of previous companies”. In the “How many companies
do you want to list (1 to 20)?” box, type 1 and then click OK. Then, if you choose File➝Open Previous Company again, you’ll notice that only one company
appears—the company file you opened last.
Note: In the No Company Open window, the “Select
a company that you’ve previously opened and click Open” list still shows all
the company files you’ve opened recently.
5. Now that you’ve removed the deleted company file from the
drop-down menu you can reset the number of previously opened companies. With a
company file open, choose File ➝Open Previous Company➝“Set number of previous companies”.
In the “How many companies
do you want to list (1 to 20)?” box, type the number of companies you’d like to
see in the list, and then click OK. As you open different company files,
QuickBooks lists these files in the No Company Open window and on the Open
Previous Company menu.
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