Books Review vs. Books Close: Is the Juice Worth the Squeeze? [03.17.26]

Comparing Books Close to the Books Review Feature for Accountant Users

There’s more than one way to “lock things down” in QuickBooks Online… but which one actually makes sense for your firm?

In this upcoming QB Power Hour, we’re breaking down the real differences between Books Review and Books Close for accountant users. What do they actually do? Where do they overlap? And most importantly are you adding steps that don’t move the needle?

We’ll dig into:

What Books Review is designed to streamline (and where it shines)

What Books Close actually locks down and what it doesn’t

Workflow implications for monthly and year-end processes

Risk management, team accountability, and client impact

Whether using both is strategic… or just extra clicks

As always, this won’t be theory. We’ll keep it practical, candid, and focused on what matters in real firms doing real work.

If you’ve been wondering whether the “juice is worth the squeeze” when it comes to your close process, this session is for you.

00:00 Welcome and Agenda

01:19 Webinar Format Updates

02:57 New Series Categories

04:25 Housekeeping and Q&A

05:48 Poll on Books Review

07:54 Why Use Books Review

09:47 Desktop 2023 Discontinuation

13:32 Will Desktop End Soon

18:53 Books Close Overview

21:00 Playbook and Task Sections

23:22 Books Review New Experience

25:37 Where to Find Books Review

28:21 Need Global Templates

29:36 Finding Books Close Tool

30:01 Feature Comparison Spreadsheet

33:23 Cleanup Versus Pre Close

35:05 Who Books Close Is For

38:12 Reconciliation Inside Tool

43:37 Transaction Review Controls

46:44 Payee Review And 1099s

48:48 Final Review Wrap Up

52:09 Pricing Beta And Billing

55:02 Removing Clients Limitation

57:39 Next Session And Farewell

Transcript

Dan DeLong 0:22

welcome everyone to another QB Power Hour. Today we're gonna be doing a side-by-side comparison of books review versus books close. The highly anticipated books close feature inside of Intuit Accountant Suite that we had talked about about a month ago or so, and it's coming up close to the end of its beta. So we want to just talk about is that cost, is the juice worth the squeeze when it comes to books closed and the cost, so we know who we are. If you want to get connect with us,

Sharrin Fuller 1:04

we do.

Dan DeLong 1:06

You can, scan the QR codes. I think I did put in the in the chat, the the, handouts for today. So you should be able to download them there. So a little bit about the QB Power Hour webinar. Updates. We are, if you haven't noticed we have, switched to from from a, recurring series where you only had to register once to individual registration. So we appreciate everyone who is joining us here live today. That that's, that got the memo on that. We're trying to and right on queue. As soon as we started doing this and, moving everything as our source of truth to be our, website, qb power hour.com, the website goes down. That's. Kind of par for the course. Just when, something, when you plan something to go ha to, to go, wrong it, it, certainly happens. But the way we're why we're doing this is we're one it'll allow you to be able to add them to your calendar based on the topic that we're that we're scheduling. So we're, so you'll be able, you'll be able to register for the ones that you want. The website is currently, updated, or at least it's live. We are still working on getting access to make updates to the site, but at least it's there. So you should be able to click on that link that's in the the slide here to go and see what's upcoming and and, the register for the ones that that, you want. And we are doing a new quarterly ish series and we're calling them we're putting them into different categories. So the open tab we had last week that's all about Intuit news and product updates. Take it to the limit where we're talking about different apps and technology that augments QuickBooks beyond bookkeeping. Is where we're gonna be focusing on advisory and other high value services. Niche nuances is where we're gonna have different industries types and the different types of industries net needs for, those types of businesses. If you want to which kind of goes in hand with the Beyond bookkeeping because when you do specialize in an industry that by default raises your standard of pricing that you can command in that, area. Is the Grass Greener is another series where we'll be talking about different alternatives to QuickBooks and app Showdowns, where we pit one app against the other. We're trying to have the whole idea there is that we'll have like power users of those apps to talk about the pros and cons of those various the various apps. Appreciate you on this. Joining us on this journey of transformation of the QB Power Hour series. Today we're gonna be talking about our Intuit news and updates.

Sharrin Fuller 4:31

Legit. Hey guys, go ahead and message me. Don't raise your hand. I, we are having technical difficulties in the attendees right now. Just message me. Throw me a q and a. I'll handle you. I see your hands popping up, but I can't get to everybody and I am paying attention. Oh, see, they're now on purpose. Now that you're on purpose,

Dan DeLong 4:50

as long as it's all of the fingers on the hand and not just one of them.

Sharrin Fuller 4:54

I I can't control that, Dan. I can't control that. Alright. But I'm listening to you, Dan. Keep going. You know me

Dan DeLong 5:02

all. to, in our Intuit news and updates segment which is something that we do on every QB Power Hour, we'll be talking about the 2023 service discontinuation, which typically leads to when is all of desktop service being discontinued. We'll talk a, little bit about that. But we really wanna focus on books, review versus books close, like what they are and how they're accessed, the general differences. And then we'll, go in a side by side comparison where we'll break down the different categories or sections of, these tools and really just put 'em side by side to, to the other one, one against the other. let's launch the first poll question, Sharrin.

Sharrin Fuller 5:51

I'm ready for that. There we go.

Dan DeLong 5:54

So the simple question is, do you use the book's review? Because that was, I think part of the challenge of it not being used is you didn't know how, where it was unless

Sharrin Fuller 6:05

you it moved, right? Am I wrong? Yeah, it moved. Yeah. Okay. Because I use it, Dan, I use it and I actually really like it. I've used other software double. I have we had client hub but me personally, I like it a little bit different because I can actually confirm, okay reconcile, I really, like it. And then it moved and I went to go do my own clothes or something a month or so ago and I was going nuts. I'm like, how will I know? So I, actually u used it and like it here everybody I get told that I, oh, don't say anything good, but I do. I actually really liked it because it made sense to have it right there. At least that here's my in it just made sense.

Dan DeLong 6:47

Yeah, and it had some, different tools like you could change it from cleanup to set up and going and, seeing that, that extra tab and some unique tools that, that were in there and we'll talk about those. But we it was one of those things that if you didn't know where it was you didn't, you couldn't find it. It's kinda like that client overview screen where you can see all the, settings and the apps and things that they have connected in inside of QuickBooks but really didn't get, if you didn't know where you were going, especially since the user interface changed everything. It was a challenge to do that. But it looks like go ahead and we'll end the poll. Most folks have. Alright,

Sharrin Fuller 7:35

there

Dan DeLong 7:35

you go. It looks like most people know. That was the answer.

Sharrin Fuller 7:40

Wow.

Dan DeLong 7:41

So 62%

Sharrin Fuller 7:42

of you. That why throw in your chat. Why do you not use it? Do you not know it's there for the ones that don't? Do you not know it's there? You use something else? I'd really like to, I'd really,

Dan DeLong 7:51

yeah, it's

Sharrin Fuller 7:51

communicate with us in the chat.

Dan DeLong 7:54

It's probably very similar to what you were saying is like you you maybe use client hub or double or some other tool that filled the gap because that's what we tend to see with Intuit features that are introduced inside, of I-A-S-Q-B-O-A QuickBooks Online. It, is the shallow end of the pool when it comes to the. The scope of what it, can do, and then you end up finding something that you need more. Is that what you, what was your experience with it?

Sharrin Fuller 8:30

Yeah, I don't use it as my task management, right? It's in addition to, it's like my second my task management system, which when I had my firm was client hub, right? And you check things off. But something about when I'm in there and I, even now I use motion, right? Dad and I are motion users. But when I'm in there, I like to see it all done. I like to make sure I didn't miss anything because you don't always have everything set up correctly in your task or something could have been added, right? Even in double. You have to re-add it in client hub. You have to re-add it. So something could have been added to your balance sheet. Something could be there. And I like in the books review that I can look at, I'm like, okay I, got everything because I'm that weirdo that reconciles. In QuickBooks, I hit the reconcile button to everything. Just because I know it scales, it's quick. I know I did it. I don't have to worry about whether, oh, this used to tie, I can actually, there's a history there. So I love it. I think I, I love it. I'm glad that it's not gone. I haven't been able to find it. So I'm actually, Dan, I was looking for it the other day and I thought, I don't need to, Dan's gonna show me how Yeah. Next Tuesday. So here we are. I am not only a panelist or a co-host. I am also a client.

Dan DeLong 9:47

All right let's let's talk about our, Intuit news and updates. 2023 is, on the chopping block this year for service discontinuation. So let's talk a little bit this, is a conversation that we have every year because it tends to lead to other things, right? But in, in general, intuit has a service discontinuation policy of live support for the current QuickBooks desktop year.

Sharrin Fuller 10:20

Oh, desktop

Dan DeLong 10:21

minus two. So this is all dealing with service disc discontinuation with desktop product. So typically it's May 31st. So May 31st, 2026. That's

Sharrin Fuller 10:35

a birthday. Everybody. Mark it down. I like Ciroc vodka and sour gummy candy. May 31st. I will be 32. I'm also a compulsive liar.

Dan DeLong 10:46

Exactly. So on Sharrin's birthday

Sharrin Fuller 10:50

Yes.

Dan DeLong 10:51

They, they commemorate Sharrin's birthday by turning off connected service.

Sharrin Fuller 10:58

They're also just gonna shut down for the day and morning of me being bored.

Dan DeLong 11:03

Exactly. The connected it's service discontinuation. So the, big thing to keep in mind is that the program will still open. It's not discontinuation, discontinuing the program itself. And this is, we're talking specifically QuickBooks, years versions, 2023. So this could be pro or premier if you're still on those active subscriptions. And this is the challenge sometimes is that people on these subscriptions it's a, it is a hardship sometimes to update their software, right? Because they have to download the software, they have to update it on all workstations and and then update the data, right? So a lot of times people don't get around to it. And maybe they're sitting on 2023 without. Having updated to the latest version, which is staying at 2024. So the connected services will cease to function after May 31st. So that includes online banking. So even if you're using the web connect where you're downloading the web connect file, it still has to go online to, and

Sharrin Fuller 12:26

so everybody that's asking this is desktop only. Yes. And only if you're in 2023 or prior. Okay. Yeah. This is not if you're in 24, 20 every, I'm just answering what is being asked. This is only desktop, and this is only if you're in version 2023. You've already been cut off prior, but you're okay if you're in 24 or 25 and you, sold a kidney on the black market to pay for your subscription. You're okay.

Dan DeLong 12:51

So inside the handouts, there is a link there to the specific desktop, 2023. Service discontinuation policy article which talks about these, very same things, right? Sorry if it wasn't clear on, on the slides.

Audio Only - All Participants 13:10

So

Sharrin Fuller 13:10

yes everybody got excited. Calendaring my birthday, so they just, I got 'em sidetracked and I apologize. And then that link, they were so excited about that link

Dan DeLong 13:19

And to DB who just put in there didn't know there was the 2025 version. There is not a 2025 version.

Sharrin Fuller 13:26

There isn't. See, this is why I'm not teaching you guys, sorry.

Dan DeLong 13:31

Yeah, my bad. So Intuit made the decision at some point that 20, that they will not create New Year's versions of of QuickBooks Desktop. So this is all part of the conspiracy.

Sharrin Fuller 13:49

Wait, So what's their last version was 2025.

Dan DeLong 13:52

The 2024 was their last. Yours version. And

Sharrin Fuller 13:58

and they haven't done a new one yet. And the conspiracy is, they're not gonna do a new one and they're gonna be very, is that what you're saying?

Dan DeLong 14:04

So

Sharrin Fuller 14:05

again, asking is a client, Dan, because I have the opportunity to not talk in chat and I could just go straight at you because I don't pay attention to desktop. I don't. So I know nothing when it comes to desktop. Unless we're talking 2015 prior. It's been that long.

Dan DeLong 14:21

Yeah. So traditionally they would come out with a New Year's version of QuickBooks Desktop yearly, and they would call it that year. 2024 was the last year's version that they did that. Now they are still, trickling quarterly updates into QuickBooks 2024 as far as features that they might be doing. It's just not

Sharrin Fuller 14:48

Wow.

Dan DeLong 14:49

It's not a one, it's not a one stop you gotta download a new version. But all of that is feeding into this policy against

Sharrin Fuller 14:59

Yep.

Dan DeLong 15:00

The latest version. Because now do

Sharrin Fuller 15:03

you know Dan

Dan DeLong 15:03

As, we speculate, I'm

Sharrin Fuller 15:04

sorry.

Dan DeLong 15:05

As, we speculate when is QuickBooks desktop going to be completely discontinued following along with this policy? That could put us at me at Sharrin's birthday 2027 for when?

Sharrin Fuller 15:22

I'll be 33.

Dan DeLong 15:23

For 33, of course.

Sharrin Fuller 15:27

I will

Dan DeLong 15:28

not that, that would put us at 2027 for the 2024. Products right now. A lot can happen between now and then, right?

Sharrin Fuller 15:37

Like we can riot we can storm the castle, you guys, if we collectively all got together, went to Incon, into a connect, didn't buy a ticket, but we all go, the security aria can't stop us. The CEO's gonna be there and I think 3000 of us could make a difference. I will, get this going. If I have anybody that can help go fund my lawyer bills that will come from going after into it. I don't see anybody offering

Dan DeLong 16:08

so, I

Sharrin Fuller 16:09

don't use desktop. I've been saying this for years though, dad, right? For two years I've been saying they're gonna, everyone's no eight. Wow.

Dan DeLong 16:16

This is, all speculation, right? Because until something has made an, announcement and we've had Marjorie on last year, right? She's very heads heavily desktop centric in her firm until, so QuickBooks Enterprise is the desktop flagship product. You can still actively purchase that and because QuickBooks Desktop is an annual subscription, right? It would be really hard if somebody purchased a new enterprise subscription on May 30th, 2027, and then they announced a discontinuation one day later. I'm sure there's going to be a grace period of some sort. And, again, this is a I've not been told anything and there's nothing been externally announced. I am just interpreting the past to predict a future.

Sharrin Fuller 17:12

Yeah.

Dan DeLong 17:13

Based off of their their, behaviors and, policies in the past.

Sharrin Fuller 17:19

It just makes sense. Why would you it makes sense to me, right? Like, why would you. Have it's double support for them and they're condensing all and plus AI and everything. I know it sucks. Everybody wants desktop, but I don't, I think we're just moving away from that as a society. But Dan, you keep saying speculation and conspiracy, but I wanna just point out that something we've learned in the US as a whole over the past month is that all the conspiracy theories are true.

Dan DeLong 17:51

Quite

Sharrin Fuller 17:51

sorry, had to go there. You go ahead.

Dan DeLong 17:54

So that is that's, a lot to take in. But right now what it basically, I mean with regards to 2023 the program will continue to open. If they don't have any connected online services that require an internet connection then it will still continue to open. They can still use 2023. Definitely, they just won't Yep. Have

Sharrin Fuller 18:23

support. It

Dan DeLong 18:24

updates. They won't make updates to the software to download. So security could potentially be a problem as years go on with, those types of

Sharrin Fuller 18:33

things. And you can't transfer the file. I know plenty of people that are using a really old file, but you can't transfer it, you can't move it, you can't do anything with, it's very, manual, which is fine for some people, right? Anyhow, I'm excited, Dan show me, this because then I'll close my books. I gotta close the A FWA books today, so this is, I'm happy.

Dan DeLong 18:53

So now we're gonna be doing a comparison of books review versus books close. And this is different than close the books, which is a preference, right? So just putting in that closing date, we're not that's, part, that's a task that's part of either of these two processes, but we'll, talk about these comparisons. So Books Close is as Intuit has talked about it on the, in the No webinars as labeled it as an Advanced Books Review. So the main benefit is you're working on closing activities without leaving Intuit Accountant Suite IAS

Sharrin Fuller 19:32

Yeah.

Dan DeLong 19:32

So that is. The savings, right? Is that you are going to, you could basically have one place to do these things without jumping into your, each individual client. So you can have multiple clients listed there. You'll have a dashboard there for all of your clients, and you can assign those you can assign clients to team members or by task, right? By groups of tasks. So you could have a preparer, you could have a yeah. A reviewer and then final stamp of approval, and you can assign people to those roles. And those roles then can be assigned those tasks. And then those people can then do complete those tasks. And then you'll be able to see somebody who's overseeing this whole process will be able then to see this dashboard of how are things going, right? Because in QuickBooks online, when you have, depending on the version that your clients are using the financial summary that AI is going to create for those clients is gonna be done on the fifth of the month, right? So you might wanna make sure that some of these tasks are done before the fifth of the month. So that is more of a useful financial review to, be able to, look at now. Intuit has created a really nice books closed playbook. I put a link in link for it into in the, handouts here. It has, I'm gonna click on it. It has all sorts of videos. It is a living document. Please do not. Know, try to make copy changes of to it, because of course they're, modifying it as, we speak. But it has screenshots. And

Sharrin Fuller 21:28

whose is this? Is this yours?

Dan DeLong 21:29

This theirs? No, this is this is provided by Intuit. Intuit has made this available. And they're I don't know who this person is in the videos, but whoever they've contracted this this out with they are very thorough in these little videos that they've that they've made. So that is that's a great resource. If you're evaluating the book's closed feature. It's divided into section. So there is a pre-close, an account reconciliation, transaction review, payee or entity review, additional items, and then sending the financials. And some of these you'll be able to add your own custom tasks to. And so when you assign them to a client, then all of those tasks and those settings will, go it'll create your its own task template. Right now, books review is also divided into section, but there are two options. There is a cleanup dropdown. So when you're in books review inside of the client it adds a setup area. And then the monthly dropdown just takes that setup. Tab out of the equation since you don't need it. But nothing changes with regards to what in the transaction. Review account, reconciliation, final review or wrap up. What I've done, oh, and then as I was checking this out and researching this I logged into a client that I onboarded for books close to compare apples and apples with books review. And when I did that there was this prompt or ad or this message about updating the book's review to the new experience, which basically takes the tasks in books, clothes, and puts them in books review. So it makes it even more complicated because Marni on Facebook, she was talking about a the fear is that when there's this new shiny feature called Books, clothes, what are they gonna do with Books Review? Are they going to en encourage people to use books clothes by taking things away from Books Review, which is a concern, right? And, she had she had noticed something I couldn't get it to duplicate, but this was, I thought this was very peculiar because this is actually the opposite. You can add more features to books review by upgrading the books Review experience. Now, I couldn't get this message to come up more than once, and I couldn't do it in multiple clients. So my, I'm wondering and I really need to double check and try to. Really get to the, root cause of, doing this or what I need to do to have it trigger this this message is I'm, wondering if I already brought somebody on to Books Close, if that is the triggering event that allows you to add this new experience to Books review copying the books, close features into Books review, because they've already been onboarded as a, books closed client. But I couldn't get it to do it in in a, client that was not already on Books Close.

Sharrin Fuller 25:22

Okay.

Dan DeLong 25:23

But there is there's more detail. You can have the anomaly detection. And as we go through the side by side comparison, you can see how that kind of plays out. So accessing the tool, where did it go? Books Review?

Sharrin Fuller 25:41

Yes.

Dan DeLong 25:43

Is available under one thing is it's available under it's always gonna be available under all apps, accounting, and then Books Review. So regardless of what

Sharrin Fuller 25:53

if you love that, Dan, to me, I feel like the all apps should be third party, don't you guys? To me apps, I'm thinking third party, to me, all those other things are built in. So I never go to all apps. Yeah. So I'm always looking at like my menu or bookmarks or something and now it's I know we're relearning. What they did is they've had this lingo for decades, right? And now they're like, by the way, we're changing all the lingo on you and you need, and I think that's the hardest part, is the acronyms of the lingo that we know is going away and then they move things. Kind of keeping us on our toes a little bit. But I think that's been the hardest part, is tracking things down. So I'm glad we have you here tracking it down. 'cause I don't do it anymore. I seriously don't do any I wait or I, Slack You, Dan has all the answers, everybody.

Dan DeLong 26:41

Or I will at least try to find out the answer what that is. If I don't know what it's Yes. Yes. But a consistent experience will be all apps, accounting and books review to get into into that section. As you mentioned, you can customize the my menu and add that as, your own shortcut. That is something, to your point,

Sharrin Fuller 27:05

you can customize the way Apple lets you customize.

Dan DeLong 27:09

Yes,

Sharrin Fuller 27:09

you can customize within this pretty little square, but beyond that, no, it's not an Android customization over here. Sorry. The is all right. He wants me to shut up. Go ahead.

Dan DeLong 27:22

I'll just mute you.

Sharrin Fuller 27:23

I know. Oh, zing. It's happened before.

Dan DeLong 27:29

The, downside of adding it to my menu is that's not you would've to do that to all of your clients, right? So you would've to go in and add that as a bookmark and, so on. And again I've, seen a different experience in the, my menu. Sometimes I know I have not created bookmarks or shortcuts in, in a client, and all of a sudden some bookmarks show up that we're in a different client now.

Sharrin Fuller 27:59

I may, have, I

Dan DeLong 27:59

forgotten that I said them

Sharrin Fuller 28:01

can, if Intuit's on here listening, stealthily trying to get free information what us want, what US accountants really, want. You know how you make us really happy right now. Global changes. Let me make a global report. Let me make a global setting of the apps I want and then I can make adjustments per client. That is what we need. That saves us time because the ai, all this stuff is great. They're great tools, but what is time consuming for us is if you have a hundred clients and you have to go into every freaking client I have a report template I had, I don't have to do this crap anymore, wah wa. But I had this report template that every time a new client came on in my onboarding, I would have to go in and reset up this template. I'm like, this is stupid. It's set up across the entire, every single client. So give us. Global. Global. We'll do that when we storm the capital, but I don't know if I wanna wait until October. I still need this stuff. I still, yeah, I'm a treasurer of things. I still do some CFO work, so I still care. I just care differently.

Dan DeLong 29:00

Yeah. And there's just like the client chart of accounts templates, so those can be

Sharrin Fuller 29:09

oh my God,

Dan DeLong 29:10

that functionality

Sharrin Fuller 29:11

can be tied

Dan DeLong 29:12

to

Sharrin Fuller 29:12

those are some, Dan, those are, they need to be paying us. Those are some things that would be great. It's we're like, Hey car dealership, I'm here to get my air conditioning fixed. They're like, we fixed this right tire for you. I'm like, I live in Vegas. You're fixing shit. I don't, oh, sorry. You're fixing things I don't need fixed, fix the things I need. Anyhow. A global is what we need. Yeah. Global.

Dan DeLong 29:36

Now the to get the books closed when you're in IAS, right? You won't see this when you're in a client. You have to be in your practice. There will be a big old button, a big old app sitting there called books close. And the only option you have in to in there is going into the overview. So that's the access point for, both places. Where is my cursor? There we go. All right, so a general side-by-side comparison. I've created a a blog article on school bookkeeping. You can click on it from here. It will have this embedded into the blog article as well. Don't worry it, will always be there, or at least it will be there until my website goes in. But there's side by side comparison, right? And I added an additional column for the new experience. To so that you have that in there. So if you do have the option to upgrade to the new experience, you can see that's the advantage of doing that, right? So included with, yes, it's included but in Books Close, it can be added on Core or accelerate in Intuit accountant suite. And then so there's set, whether there's settings for the closed process, books Review does not have these settings. In books closed there, there are some, settings. So you can change the, status label whatever it is. There's three that you can choose your own. So if you don't like to do or impending or you can call it whatever it is that makes more sense to you you can create custom. Or, templates for clients that you cannot do in, books Review, either experience, customizable statuses adding additional tasks. All of them have some form of that assigning tasks to teammates because it's you going into the books review process. You can't change who they should be assigned to, right? So it's, all you, right? Centralized task management, that's really what Books Close is getting into, right? A firm where you have more more than one person doing different things for the same client. This is where Books Close is, venturing into, that area, multi-entity management only an option for books close accessing client requests within the. Two that should be tool need to, change my word wrap on my spreadsheet. This is actually a yes for all. Now that I'm, looking at my side by side comparison. Especially in the in the new experience, you'll be able to see requests. So when you send a client a, message clarifying I need some clarification on a transaction, you'll see those requests right within the, tool progress tracking is, for all of them. Whether there's a cost there's no cost inside of books review, either experience. But there is a cost for books close, and that is $8 per onboarded client up to 50, and then it goes to $6. Then you can toggle a monthly review and cleanup. That's a function only of books review. All right, so let's, we're gonna take it by section, right? So the cleanup and pre-close comparison. It's exclusive. The cleanup is exclusive to books review. So you only have that option in in inside a books review. And there are adjustment tools to get started, right? So when you're bringing, onboarding a client and you just want to choose that moment in time maybe tie it to a tax return or some moment in time, another trial balance from a, different platform, what have you, you can do some adjusting in the cleanup setting section of the book's review and pre-close, it's just called. Before you begin. So it, it's not a section that is expandable and added is just a, it's just an area called before you begin. And these are customizable in books closed. They are customizable tasks that really should be completed priority, starting the books close closing the books process, right? Very simple things like make sure you've accepted all of the bank fee transactions. Yeah. Or things of that nature, right? Yeah.

Sharrin Fuller 34:43

Things that you don't really have in like double. So I think the difference is, like you're saying, books close versus books review. I like books review. I don't need books closed. That's what my project management tool is. But they're trying Intuit being a software is trying to create this all in one. Which makes sense and it makes sense for some people. But yeah, I like the books review.

Dan DeLong 35:04

Yeah. And one other thing too

Sharrin Fuller 35:07

plus books review will be free.

Dan DeLong 35:10

And one of the thing, one of the things that I've realized over the course of doing these comparisons is really Sharrin, you're not the target, Yeah. Customer for books close, right? Because you've no, you've already found a workable solution.

Sharrin Fuller 35:28

Yep.

Dan DeLong 35:28

Within the books review and outside, whether it's double or client hub or some other practice management software. I saw other ones click up and those types of things in in the chat. So you, all of you people who are here, maybe not are the target of the initial books close, right? But somebody who's just getting into, an accountant suite for the first time, they don't know any different than these tools that are already there unless they have a Sharrin in their corner. Telling them, oh you need, double when you're if you've got a mentor in the, space telling giving you suggestions and recommendations on, software to use. But a somebody just starting out their own bookkeeping practice, they're not gonna, they're gonna see what the capabilities of the software that they're currently using, and they'll stumble upon books close faster than trying to find a, double client hub or keeper financial sense software,

Sharrin Fuller 36:32

plus already in one software. And they, don't know about the others, but they're like, Hey, here it is. I can do it all. And then as they grow, they're like, okay, I need more. Again, it makes sense. It, makes sense to be in the same place, but those of us that have been doing this for a long time know what our needs are. And we also have got accustom to what we like and how we like to do it, which is why there are 2,700 project management tools because each of us like to see things in different ways. So it is, it's an option.

Dan DeLong 37:03

Now in here there's a lot of nos in the books close, right? Because it is something exclusive to to clean up is exclusive inside of the book's review. So the opening balance adjustments is just not a function of the, book's close. And nor I think, would you want to have an opening balance adjustment as part of your book's closed process, because that is a setup or cleanup type of function anyway. But if you need it, you can jump over into the client, switch over to. Clean up and there you go. You can make it now disconnected bank feeds it, it says no, but here's a, caveat to that because it is available as a dashboard widget, Intuit, accountant Suite, just on the home screen, right? So you can see all of your clients and their dis if they're disconnected, if their bank feed is disconnected, you can see that. And then accounts without Activities for 90, 90 or plus days is, not an option in books close. All right? This is a big win for for Books Close is the reconciliation function. So books Review. The reconciliation. And I think this is part of what Marni was talking about is that some of these columns that were there in Books Review aren't there in after books closed. This is the part I closed.

Sharrin Fuller 38:33

I think this is why I was telling you about that. You could customize what's there, this is the good part. But

Dan DeLong 38:38

yeah. In books review your reconciliation, you will have the name of the account, the number of transactions that are unreconciled, the last reconciliation date, and access to statement only if fetching is supported. So you can click the statement button. It's not gonna show any statement if the bank that they're using is some regional, credit union that doesn't support statement fetching. But if those statements are already been downloaded, they will be accessible there by clicking. So one thing that was noticeably missing here is the ability to go reconcile the bank, transaction. So this is more of an alert than actually a, transaction or do doing a, doing work, right? So in books, closed reconciliation more information. You see the ending balance, you see the number of transactions un reconciled. Again, you have access to the statements, but within the tool itself, you can reconcile directly in, into an accountant suite. So you're not actually. Going into your client because you, this the reconciliation window just shows up with inside the books closed tool in as if you went into the customer's subscription and went to the gear and reconcile or however you navigate to, the reconciliation screen, right? So you can also go into the client's file if you need to. But if you're going down the list like Sharrin and reconciling everything, this makes a lot more sense because you're able to do that reconciliation with inside the books closed tool without going into the client's file. So anything that would normally be visible when you go to the gear and reconcile is gonna be available inside the books closed tool. Into an accountant suite without you going into the, needing to go into the company's company file. That's, a big time saver. Having to switch companies, wait for it to show up, go into go into the reconciliation screen, wait for that to show up and then start reconciling. You can just reconcile right within the tool. So a win there, right? So just a side by side comparison big thing here. Flagging unreconciled transactions it has a no here for books closed because there wasn't a way for it to show what transactions weren't reconciled. But again they will, show in the transaction review, right? So you'll be able to see some of those things. So you won't necessarily see them right within the uncon the, reconciliation module, but you can see them elsewhere, right? So the big win for Books Close is being able to reconcile within the tool. Did think it was weird that in Books Review you don't see the ending balance. Which, which is a, that's a nice thing to know when you're reconci or

Sharrin Fuller 42:00

Go to your open a second tab of your balance sheet and look there, honey.

Dan DeLong 42:06

Whoops. And then, alright I, didn't mean to click. I'll wait. I'm ready for you now. I was trying to highlight Okay. But you're, you know what's coming now.

Sharrin Fuller 42:15

I do.

Dan DeLong 42:16

Un unclear transaction. You can see uncleared transactions, but only greater than 90 days. In books review and the end transaction review. You'll see those in books close, but not as part of the reconciliation module. You'll all see the client requests this create journal Roundtree for Uncleared transactions. I, I thought it was just a weird option when you're trying to do that because all it does is open up a journal entry screen that's blank, so there's not like a prefill or anything that you're trying to do when you're trying to acknowledge or do something for those Uncleared transactions. And then inside of the Books Review, you can add additional to do things so tasks and things like that. The only thing you can do in the reconciliation of, in Books Close is reconcile the accounts and choose what accounts you want to reconcile. All right. Polling question. Have you ever tried the books close while it's in beta? So while you're answering that, let's continue on 'cause we're almost at the end. All right. All right. So the side-by-side transaction review. Now I've I've, done a a side-by-side comparison of, this with Alicia Katz Pollock for the unofficial QuickBooks Accountant podcast. So we, you can access that as well. And we did this as a workshop on workshop Wednesdays as well. But really you can see the old books review was, severely lacking. And when you do add the new experience, it essentially copies all of the books, closed functions within. The books review option. So if you are missing something and you do have the opportunity to add the new experience inside a books review, and you don't wanna pay for the books closed you can get those there. But again, I'm still unclear on the triggering event to make that new experience available in inside a Books review and we'll talk about here. So in the new experience or in Books Close, you have the ability to change options in transaction review. So you can customize what you, can, what you wanna see, right? So you can edit exclusions, right? So you can change the transaction type or the payee. So if you don't need to see. Certain transactions in, in that whatever category that happens to be you can you can specify those things to exclude. You can also edit inclusions. So if you want to see specific accounts you can add those accounts in those in the transaction review, and you'll also be able to customize what on the screen by sort number of rows and the columns to display. And if it's applicable you can edit the amount threshold, right? So there's one in there that says, only show me transactions. That's over $2,500. If you wanna change that to 500, you can. So they have that option to be able to do that. Now, the options that are available inside of transaction review, as far as what you can do with those transactions, those are gonna depend on the action that you're actually looking at, right? Individual transactions, you will be able to add a payee send a request or add an attachment to that transaction right within there. And then as far as batching, transac or batch transaction options, normally just dismissing the alert. So once you've reviewed it bulk editing, you can typically can do voiding or deleting or send send a request to the clients. Now there's no comparison in payee review because it doesn't exist in, in review. And so we wanna talk a little bit about what it is available.

Sharrin Fuller 46:55

Wow. So this is they're really, so their books closed essentially as double. I told keeper back in the day came up, I said, Intuit needs to just buy your software because you guys have everything here. And Intuit's we'll just do it. We will take all your ideas and do this. But anyhow, it really is. A lot of the same, the books close. The review to me is just completely different.

Dan DeLong 47:19

And then, so for the books, close payee review. You have new customers and vendors where you can confirm transactions. And what I mean by that is just confirm that there are transactions for that payee whether it's a vendor or customer. Because then at that point, if there are no transactions for a new vendor, then you may just want to inactivate them, and you can do that in the payee review. The W 9 10 99 management which would've been a wonderful thing to show up a couple months ago. But it was released in February after the W 9 10 99 management was really necessary. And the new account is coming soon. But in the books closed W 9 10 99 management, you can edit the EIN that's, there, you can see the address add attachments. So if they did send you the ten nine the, not the 10, the W nine you can upload it to the vendor, you can mark it that the W nine was received and see the 10 99 amounts, right? So it'll, run this this, utility and see what's what type of 10 90 nines they're eligible for. And then see the eligible amounts and then clear them off if you if you need to. The final review and wrap up the comparison, the nod goes to Books Review here because there are a few nos for for books close. This unusual or unexpected balances options not an option in books close. But again, most of your, most of this is gonna be addressed somewhere in the transaction review process, right? Just so that it's not here. But in books review it, it does raise those things up to the surface in, one place or, isolate them so that doesn't get lost in the, shuffle. You can add, additional reports or this this little placard or section in inside the Books Review. That's AR or AP that's older than 90 days. It's just not there by de by default in books closed. But as far as wrapping up and sending financials, all the same functions exist in, in either one. All right. We time that pretty well. 'cause we can go into if we did have any questions that popped up, if anybody wants to take a, we can take a a, gander at some of these some of these things. If, you wanted to, if you saw anything Sharrin but asking that question of what's, yeah, this information's useful.

Sharrin Fuller 50:18

So a lot of clarification points. Dan, as always, you're very thorough and you give so much information. And so I think when people go to chat in, they miss some of it. So I think some of the clarification points were one is Books review, and again, I'm gonna let, or is Books Review going away? And the answer to that was no. It's shifting some of the features in your side, byside. And keep in mind you guys, the handout link is in there. Some of the features side by Five Side will still be free. Some of those features are moving to books, clothes that you need to pay for. Is that correct?

Dan DeLong 50:54

Yeah. Yeah I the, future is always unclear, right?

Sharrin Fuller 51:03

As of now from what they've told us, as of what we know right now,

Dan DeLong 51:06

yeah, as we know right now they will continue to be available in, both places. I think really the. The, point here is that if you are a smaller solopreneur small practice firm Books review is likely going to be the place that you would do these things anyway, because the, advantages of books closed is really gonna come to light when you have a a team and you're, delegating some of these, tasks, right? A solopreneur, a solo certainly might not need those or, see value in, in doing these things. Unless there are specific tasks or specific things that that are there that, that kind of give the, give that nod to to, to books close.

Sharrin Fuller 52:09

And the, other thing that I see a lot of asking is having, with pricing so from what I've learned from you is that if we're on beta, you have to opt in to upgrade, right? You have to opt in to upgrade to the close. You won't just automatically be added into it, and you can choose how many clients go to there. And you pay based on your client, not by how many team members you have working on it, Right.

Dan DeLong 52:36

Yes.

Sharrin Fuller 52:37

Okay, good.

Dan DeLong 52:37

Yes. And it's a, just a flat fee and it's onboarded clients, right? So if you have 150 clients on your client list you're only gonna be charged for the clients that are listed as part of the onboard the books close feature, right? Now I was able to add myself multiple times with different periods. So I don't know if that counts as two clients or if it's, just the clients that are onboarded maybe you have multiple if you're doing 12 months for example of books closed to get caught up. Is that 12 individual

Audio Only - All Participants 53:25

Ooh.

Dan DeLong 53:25

Costs?

Sharrin Fuller 53:26

I hope not. You should be able to. Oh, yeah. That's a good question. It shouldn't be you should be able to catch, I don't know. That's a good question. You didn't find an answer for that?

Dan DeLong 53:35

I didn't. Because of course right now the you go, you can go free into subscriptions and billing and you'll see a section for when it comes up, the book's closed and zero, right? Yeah. Having the option and, seeing the payment history is only gonna become clearer after May 1st when they start charging for these things. I don't know specifically whether whether that will be the case or not, but if I go back to my book's closed I am listed here. I I put in two different periods and I'm listed here twice, right? Does that count as four or three? 'cause this is the same.

Sharrin Fuller 54:28

Yeah,

Dan DeLong 54:28

this

Sharrin Fuller 54:29

is the same client. That's a good, that's a good question. I didn't even think of that. Then the other thing I wanna remind people, the one thing that Intuit does that I think is a very good business practice is they don't hold you in your full month. They actually prorate you. So if you upgrade one day or you, get charged and you're like, oh my God, if you go and downgrade, they give you all that money back. So that's, that is one of the, a lot of businesses don't do that nowadays. They're like, no, we'll downgrade you next month. And I think that is a good business model. Knock on wood, they don't change it. So if for some reason you forget to downgrade, don't forget. Do it. Do it right away.

Dan DeLong 55:02

One o one other thing I wanna point out here is that, there is no option to remove a client from Books close yet.

Sharrin Fuller 55:13

Okay,

Dan DeLong 55:14

so this is a one way, this is a one way ticket. I have been promised that this will be figured out by May, by, by the

Sharrin Fuller 55:23

time to charge,

Dan DeLong 55:25

but but if you're looking for a place to remove someone from the book's, clothes that was, small oversight.

Sharrin Fuller 55:38

Yeah. How we, once you're here, you don't wanna go back. That's a lot of confidence. That's a lot of confidence. No, Downgrade. Or they're like, you have to call us.

Dan DeLong 55:47

Yeah. No. And then they, your

Sharrin Fuller 55:49

car's warranty at the same time

Dan DeLong 55:51

they spent two hours on the phone and they realize, oh that's a that's, an odd option. The first okay. First option of course was we'll just remove all of your clients turn off. You can cancel the books close altogether because it is a separate module on the billing and subscription your oops. Your firm subscriptions, you can just cancel the whole thing. But if you have 50 clients and you only wanna remove one of them, that's a pain to bring back 49.

Sharrin Fuller 56:25

Yeah.

Dan DeLong 56:26

Of them.

Sharrin Fuller 56:26

Yeah. Especially if you lose anything that you've got saved. I wonder if that's, I always wonder that, like when you cancel things, do they cancel your settings? If I go back in after we do everything, I guess so. Huh? Most things do that.

Dan DeLong 56:38

Yep. And the other,

Sharrin Fuller 56:40

do we know the course

Dan DeLong 56:40

was, you

Sharrin Fuller 56:41

haven't given us cost yet, or six bucks. You just told us that, right? Yes. You just told us that. And I was $6. I remember the six go,

Dan DeLong 56:51

$8 per client go per month for the first 50 clients onboarded. A book close. And then after that first 50, then it goes proactively. It's not, the 51st is only $6. Yeah. It's all of them get get lowered to that.

Sharrin Fuller 57:11

Yeah.

Dan DeLong 57:12

And then, yeah, the, so the article here this is where we go into the workshop that we, did as far as the comparison as well as I actually included an, AI argument debating these two, features here. So you, can listen to these people argue about whether books review or books close is, better.

Sharrin Fuller 57:38

Yeah.

Dan DeLong 57:39

Okay. So next time now, since we are going to individual registrations going into the, website qb power hour.com to register for the next one. So we're gonna have a niche nuance. On this series where it's all gonna be talking about the contractor industry, we'll have a, an industry professional join, be joining us and we'll be going through that the construction, business practices that, the construction clients tend to have. And then we'll be pairing and com comparing that to inter Intuit Enterprise Suite. And the contract con construction add-on that can be added inside of advanced and talking about projects in general with plus and advanced in, those different versions of QuickBooks Online. Appreciate you joining us today, Sharrin. Any, final thoughts, closing comments?

Sharrin Fuller 58:43

No.

Dan DeLong 58:43

Prior, no,

Sharrin Fuller 58:44

I'm I'm glad that I learned where the review is 'cause like I said I'm I'm excited. Now

Dan DeLong 58:50

we know what you'll be doing for the rest of the afternoon.

Sharrin Fuller 58:53

I know. Yeah, no, and that's before, in fact, I just got noticed that I have a conference I have to go to today. I'm, bittersweet about all the conferences being in Vegas 'cause it means that they're right there, but it also means that they're right there.

Dan DeLong 59:06

They're right there. Excellent. So the 31st we'll be doing the, construction niche nuances and hopefully you can join us then and we'll see you next time on the QB Power Hour.