A Complete Guide to Set up & Edit QuickBooks Bank Feeds

How to Set up QuickBooks Bank Feeds in QuickBooks Desktop

Bank feeds allow you to eliminate the hassle of manually recording bank transactions. Users can configure their credit card and bank accounts in a multi and single-user mode for online banking. 

1. Link your bank account to QuickBooks bank feeds.

• Head to the ‘Banking’ menu and access the ‘Bank feeds’ option. 
• Choose ‘Set up a bank feed for an account.’
• Choose your QuickBooks account, followed by ‘Next.’
• Choose the ‘Financial institution’ for your QuickBooks account.
• Now tap ‘Next.’
• You will see certain prompts on the screen. Use them to link your account to bank feeds. 
• Finally, choose ‘Connect’ followed by ‘Close.’

• Employ Web Connect to download transactions from your bank.

• In the ‘Banking’ menu, access the ‘Bank feeds’ option. 
• Now, choose ‘Set up bank feeds for an account.’
• Choose your QB account, followed by ‘Next.’
• Choose your bank for this account and tap ‘Next.’
• Now choose the option ‘Go to my bank’s website.’
• Sign into the website of your banking institution and download the Web Connect file. 

• Import online banking transactions from the website of your financial institution.

Online banking transactions are Web Connect (.QBO) files. After downloading them on your PC,     import the transactions. This will let them show in your bank feeds. This is for those whose financial institution provides Web Connect. 

• Choose ‘Bank feeds’ from the ‘Banking’ menu. 
• Now choose the ‘Import Web Connect files’ option.
• Choose the QBO file you downloaded earlier and tap ‘Open.’
• When you see the ‘Select bank account’ prompt, choose either of the following according to your needs. 

• If the account you transfer transactions into is configured in QB, choose the ‘Use an existing QuickBooks account’ option.

• If the account you are sending transactions into isn’t set up in QB, choose the ‘Create a new QuickBooks account’ option.

• Now tap ‘Continue.’
• When the box of the information being successfully imported into QuickBooks appears, tap ‘OK.’
• Finally, head to the ‘Bank Feeds Centre’ to view all your online banking transactions. 

How to Set up QuickBooks Online Bank Feeds

The bank feeds feature in QuickBooks Online lets you synchronize your banking transactions to this software. You can import cash deposits/withdrawals, loan payments, online payments, and debit card charges to QB Online bank feed. This feature in QBO lets you report and assess similar transactions without you needing to manually enter them. 

• Always check that your bank accounts are linked to a QuickBooks version. This will facilitate proper reporting and record-keeping.

• Go to the Banking page.

• In QuickBooks Online, navigate to the ‘Banking’ tab.
• Here, choose your linked bank account. 
• On this page, you will see many transactions at the bottom. 

• Review the transactions

• The next step is to go to the ‘For Review’ tab.
• Here, you can review the transactions that haven’t been matched, included, or removed from QBO transactions.
• Review the dates, amounts, and vendors for all transactions.

• Make changes in the transactions for accuracy.

• Start out by matching a transaction. Match the import from your credit card or bank to the QB register.
• Review the information that QBO provides. If it is correct, tap ‘Match.’
• Click ‘Add’ to add a transaction to include new ones in your QBO check register.
• Ensure to choose the suitable category from your chart of accounts.
• If a transaction is already recorded, select ‘Match’ instead of ‘Add.’
• If there’s a transaction that rectifies an error in reporting, use the ‘Exclude’ feature. It will eliminate its information from your check register.

How to Make Bank Rules for Bank Feeds

With bank rules, you can categorize recurring transactions, whether the transactions have the same or different amounts. 

• To create bank rules in QuickBooks Online, tap the ‘Banking’ tab.
• Now, choose ‘Rules.’
• From the right part of the page, choose the ‘New rule’ option.
• In the field ‘What do you want to call this rule?’ give a short description of the rule.
• Now, in the drop-down menu for ‘Apply this to transactions that are,’ tap ‘Money in’ if it pertains to income and ‘Money out’ if it’s an expense. 
• Now, choose ‘Cash’ or the ‘All bank accounts’ from the next menu. 
• Going forward, choose whether your transaction fulfills any or all of the conditions below:-  

•  Choosing ‘All’ means that your transaction corresponds to every item in the next functions.

•  Selecting ‘Any’ means that your transaction should match either one of the items in the next functions. 

• Choose an option for making a rule on the basis of bank text, description or amount. 

•  The description is the payee’s name.
•  Bank Text includes the transaction detail in QBO.
•  The Amount is the transaction’s numerical details.

• Now choose either of the following options:

‘contains,’ ‘doesn’t contain,’ or ‘is exactly’

• You can add more conditions to your rule. 
• Now choose to do either of the following:

• Assign – This is for assigning rules for particular transactions
• Exclude – it’s for excluding particular transactions automatically. 

• Define the transaction type. 

• Expense Type is for the rule to classify expenses that are paid digitally or online.
• Transfer Type is when you want to send money from one source to another.
• Check is the transaction type when you want to use QB to print checks.

• Now, from the ‘Category’ drop-down, choose a category.
• Finally, add your payee. 

Also Read:-  QuickBooks Install Diagnostic Tool

Summing up

It’s easy to set up QuickBooks bank feeds and manage your transactions. Follow the simple process mentioned above as per your version of QuickBooks and do away with manual entry into QuickBooks. Consult a QB technical expert if you have more queries.

Frequently Asked Questions

• How does bank feed in QBO work?

The QuickBooks bank feeds let you import bank and credit card transactions into the software automatically. You can then add them to the check register as a new transaction or correspond them to a current transaction. This reduces errors related to manual entry.

• How to categorize bank feeds in QB Desktop?

Go to ‘Bank Feeds Centre’ in QB Desktop and choose ‘Rules.’ You can then edit a rule or add rules. To manually create rules, go to ‘Preferences’ followed by ‘Check-in.’ choose ‘Company Preferences’ and then ‘Express mode.’ Here choose the checkboxes for creating rules automatically and asking before creating a rule.

• How are QuickBooks Direct Connect and Web Connect different?

Direct Connect in QuickBooks is an automatic update option that communicates via a direct link. It is a two-way communication connectivity type. QuickBooks Web Connect needs you to download a .QBO file and import it into QuickBooks. You don’t need your credentials to enter into QuickBooks.