How to Migrate from QuickBooks to Relentify: A Step-by-Step Guide

QuickBooks is the accounting software most small businesses default to, which also means it's the software most small businesses eventually outgrow. Rising costs per user, feature restrictions on lower tiers, and an interface that's picked up more layers than a Victorian mansion—these are the reasons you're probably thinking about migrating to Relentify.

If you've already decided that's the right move, this guide walks you through the full process. The goal is a clean transition with no data loss, no missing transactions, and minimal disruption to your daily operations.

Why move from QuickBooks

QuickBooks Online Plus costs £49/month. That's the lowest tier most growing businesses actually use. Add a second user—another £49. Add a third—another £49. By the time you've got three team members doing invoicing or expense entry, you're at £147/month for software that hasn't meaningfully changed in five years.

Our equivalent Relentify accounting tier is roughly a quarter of that price—and team members don't cost extra. Invite five people; the bill stays the same. Invite ten; still the same. This is how small-business software should work, but QuickBooks doesn't see it that way.

There's also the interface problem. QuickBooks stacks features on top of existing features. Bank reconciliation, tax categories, custom fields, invoicing rules—they all live in slightly different corners because they were built over a decade. Relentify is newer, built for how small businesses actually work now, not how they worked in 2010.

If you're comparing software side-by-side, our full Relentify vs QuickBooks breakdown covers the feature differences in detail.

When to migrate: Choosing your window

The ideal moment to switch is the start of a new financial year or VAT quarter. This creates a clean break: your QuickBooks history is complete and archived, and Relentify picks up from day one of the new period. No overlap, no guessing.

If you can't wait for a period boundary (and often you can't—you've already made the decision), mid-period migration works fine. You'll just need to be more careful about the transition to ensure no transactions slip between the cracks.

Pre-migration: The checklist that saves hours

Before you touch the export button, do this:

Reconcile everything. Every transaction in your bank feeds should be matched, categorised, or flagged. Unreconciled items become difficult discrepancies after migration. Do this first.

Clear pending items. Send draft invoices, record outstanding bills, process pending payments. The cleaner your QuickBooks data, the faster the migration.

Finish VAT periods. If you have an unsubmitted VAT return, complete and submit it through QuickBooks now. Splitting a VAT period across two Making Tax Digital-compatible platforms creates unnecessary complexity, and HMRC expects each return to come from a single digital records system.

Save reports. Export PDF copies of your profit & loss, balance sheet, trial balance, aged receivables, and aged payables. These become your verification benchmarks after migration. You'll compare Relentify's numbers to these to confirm nothing went missing.

Document recurring transactions. QuickBooks won't export these in standard exports, so you'll need to recreate them manually in Relentify. Make a list now of anything that recurs: retainers, subscriptions, standing bills, monthly journal entries. Five minutes now saves 30 minutes of "wait, did we set that up?" later.

Review your chart of accounts. Most small businesses use QuickBooks' default chart. If you've customised it heavily, take a screenshot or export the full list. Relentify uses a standard UK chart of accounts; custom accounts will need manual setup.

The migration process: Step by step

Step 1: Export your data from QuickBooks

QuickBooks Online exports to CSV and Excel. You'll need these:

Chart of accounts: Settings > Chart of Accounts > Run Report > Export to Excel. This gives you account codes, names, types, and balances.

Customer list: Sales > Customers > Export to Excel.

Supplier list: Expenses > Suppliers > Export to Excel.

Trial balance: Reports > Trial Balance (set date range to your migration date) > Export.

Unpaid invoices: Reports > Accounts Receivable Ageing Detail > Export.

Unpaid bills: Reports > Accounts Payable Ageing Detail > Export.

Products & services: If you invoice using QuickBooks' product/service list, Settings > Products and Services > Export.

Save these to a folder labeled "QB Migration."

Step 2: Set up Relentify

Create your Relentify account and fill in the basics: company name, registration number, VAT number, financial year start date (match your QuickBooks), VAT scheme, bank accounts, and multi-currency settings if needed.

Step 3: Import your chart of accounts

Relentify includes a standard UK chart of accounts covering 90% of small businesses. Your call: use it as-is and add custom accounts manually (faster), or use the import tool to upload your QuickBooks accounts and let Relentify map types automatically.

One quirk: QuickBooks uses a slightly different account classification than UK standards. Relentify's import handles common mappings, but review the results to confirm accounts are categorised correctly.

Step 4: Import customers and suppliers

Upload your CSV files. Relentify maps standard fields automatically: name, email, phone, address, VAT number. QuickBooks exports some fields that don't translate (internal IDs, for instance); these are safely ignored.

Review the import preview before confirming. Pay close attention to names and email addresses; these are used for invoice delivery.

Step 5: Enter opening balances

Your opening balances are the foundation of everything. They must match your QuickBooks trial balance exactly.

Use the trial balance PDF you saved earlier:

1. Go to Settings > Opening Balances in Relentify
2. Enter each account balance as shown in your QuickBooks trial balance
3. Or use the bulk import template to upload them all at once

After entry, run a trial balance in Relentify and compare it line by line to your QB trial balance. Every debit and credit must match. If they don't, find the discrepancy before moving forward.

Typical sticking points:

• Rounding. QuickBooks sometimes displays rounded figures in reports. Use the exact numbers from the detailed trial balance, not the summary.
• Retained earnings. This figure needs to be spot-on. It's the cumulative profit/loss from all prior years and flows directly to your statutory accounts at Companies House. Get it wrong at migration and you'll have a mess later.
• Bank balances. Your opening bank balance in Relentify should match the reconciled balance in QuickBooks and your actual bank statement. If it doesn't, your earlier reconciliation wasn't complete.

Step 6: Import outstanding invoices and bills

For unpaid invoices and bills, create them in Relentify with their original dates and amounts. This preserves the audit trail and shows which invoices are still waiting for payment. For large volumes, use Relentify's bulk import.

Step 7: Recreate recurring transactions

Go through your documented list and set each recurring transaction up in Relentify: recurring invoices, recurring bills, recurring journal entries. Takes 15–30 minutes for most small businesses; saves you months of manual entry.

Step 8: Connect your bank

Link your bank accounts via Open Banking. Transactions from your migration date forward will flow in automatically. You don't need to import historical data—it stays in QuickBooks.

Step 9: Authorise Making Tax Digital

If you submitted VAT returns through QuickBooks, authorise Relentify with HMRC for MTD. Go to Settings > VAT > Connect to HMRC and sign in with your Government Gateway credentials. This deauthorises QB as your MTD provider. Do this only after your final VAT return has been submitted through QuickBooks.

Step 10: Add your team

Invite team members. Unlike QuickBooks, there are no per-user fees for Relentify accounting—add everyone who needs access. Set permissions based on role: full access, invoicing-only, expense submission, or view-only.

Step 11: Verify everything

Run these checks before you consider the migration complete:

1. Trial balance: Must match your saved QB trial balance
2. Bank balances: Must match actual bank statements
3. Outstanding receivables: Aged receivables report must match your QB export
4. Outstanding payables: Aged payables report must match
5. MTD authorisation: Confirm HMRC connection is active

All five should check out.

Timeline and post-migration

A typical small business migration takes 3–6 hours: data export (30 min), Relentify setup (30 min), chart of accounts & opening balances (1–2 hours), customer/supplier import (1–2 hours), verification (30 min).

Keep your QuickBooks account active for at least a month as a safety net. Most teams realise by week two they're not going back. Save PDF copies of any reports you might need for historical reference before your QB access expires.

Migrating from other accounting software? We have step-by-step guides for switching from Xero, FreshBooks, and Sage as well.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I migrate mid-month without losing transactions? Yes, if you reconcile everything before you start. Every bank transaction, every bill, every invoice should be matched. After reconciliation, your QB closing balance is your Relentify opening balance. As long as you're careful about the cutoff date, mid-month migration works fine.

What happens to my historical transactions? They stay in QuickBooks. You're not moving them to Relentify; you're using opening balances to reflect their impact. Keep QuickBooks as your archive for historical reports and reference. Most businesses keep access for a month or two post-migration.

Do I need to import years of bank transactions? No. You only need your bank balance as of the migration date. Relentify's bank feeds pick up from your migration date forward. Historical transactions remain safely in QuickBooks.

Will my invoicing templates transfer? No. You'll recreate them in Relentify. Most small-business templates are simple (company name, bank details, terms), so this usually takes 10–15 minutes.

What about multi-currency transactions? Relentify supports multi-currency. Configure your currencies in Settings before importing. Record historical multi-currency transactions in opening balances using the invoice date exchange rate.

Is migration support available? Our support team is available via live chat if you get stuck. For complex setups—multiple entities, custom integrations, large transaction volumes—we offer guided migration support.

How do I know the migration was successful? The trial balance comparison is your checkpoint. If Relentify's trial balance matches your QB trial balance exactly, your migration is solid. Additional verification: bank balances match, aged receivables match, aged payables match.

What's the actual cost saving versus QuickBooks? QB Online Plus is £49/month per user. Relentify's accounting module starts at £6.30/month (sole traders) and £21/month (growing businesses)—with unlimited users included. The per-user fee doesn't exist with us. For a three-person business, that's roughly £115 saved monthly. For five people, roughly £225. Do the maths for your team.

Ready to move?

The hardest part is making the decision. The actual migration is methodical, predictable, and faster than most expect.

Start your free Relentify trial—no credit card required. Give it two weeks. By the end of week one, you'll probably forget you ever used QuickBooks.

If you hit any snags, our support team is standing by.