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Deb in Texas
February 24, 2021
Question

How to Copy a QuickBooks Online Advanced company to a new Online Advanced company

  • February 24, 2021
  • 7 replies
  • 0 views

Has anyone followed the instructions on the Intuit website for Step 2 - Copy a Quickbooks Online Advanced company and copied it to a new Online Advanced company.

I have now spent over 8 hours in a two week period and talked with dozens of representatives, none of whom could help me and now I have been on hold for 1 hour and 26 minutes with Advanced Online support and still cannot find anyone who can troubleshoot why the New Copy link is grayed out and will not allow for the transfer of the company data.  Any help would be appreciated.

    7 replies

    DivinaMercy_N
    DivinaMercy_N
    February 24, 2021

    I've got you covered, @Deb in Texas.

     

    Let's determine if this is a browser issue. There are times when the cache and cookies in your browser may be corrupted which leads to navigation issues in QuickBooks. To get started, open your QBO account in a private mode to have a clean slate. The following are the shortcut keys you can use: 

    • Google Chrome: press Ctrl + Shift + N 
    • Mozilla Firefox and Microsoft Edge: press Ctrl + Shift + P
    • Safari: press Command + Shift + N

     

    Make sure to sign in as the master admin. Once done, go to Settings again to back up your company. Here's how:

    1. Sign in to the company you want to make a copy of.
    2. Go to Settings, then select Back up company. 
    3. Click Copy. Then tap New Copy.

     

    If this works, clear your regular browser cache. This is to remove the damaged and corrupted files. If the same thing happens, you can use another supported browser. The one you are currently using may have a temporary issue with QuickBooks.

     

    Then, to help you resolve copy and restore issues, please visit this article: Make a copy of your QuickBooks Online Advanced company. 

     

    Also, QBO offers self-help articles that will guide you to finish your tasks in no time. To start browsing, go to our QuickBooks help page at this link.

     

    Feel free to get back here again if you need further assistance copying and restoring your QBO file. I'm always here to help. Have a good one. 

    R
    RSA7
    September 23, 2021

    I do not have the option on my settings to backup.  I have been needing to make a copy of an existing company with all transactions as well as accounts.  I cant seem to see how it is possible.

    Fiat Lux - ASIA
    Fiat Lux - ASIA
    September 23, 2021

    @RSA7 

    Are you using QBO Advanced or the lower plan?

    Fiat Lux - ASIA
    Fiat Lux - ASIA
    February 24, 2021

    @Deb in Texas 

    As I recalled, there was an ongoing issue with the backup/restore/copy feature in January. I am not sure yet whether it is resolved or not. You may have other options to migrate/clone data between QBO accounts with an additional cost for the time being.

    D
    Deb in TexasAuthor
    February 25, 2021

    To My knowledge if this has been an issue it would have been nice for the 13 or 15 people I have spoken with in the last three days to know that there was an issue with copying QBO advanced company to another company.

    The instructions published by Intuit do not tell you to clear the cookies, log in to an Incognito browser, and in order to copy the company files you have to have one company in automatic backup and one in backup not enabled. The instructions published do not match the instructions in the application.

    These are the case numbers I have dealt with since the 22nd:

    [removed] 2/22 at 8:26 am

    [removed] 2/22 at 8:36 am

    [removed] 2/22 at 9:52 am

    [removed] 2/23 at 2:50 pm

    [removed] 2/24 at 4:30 pm

    [removed] 2/25 at 2:30 or 3 pm

    For approximately 5 hours in the last three days and I have spoken to at least 13 to 15 people, from first line tech support people who ask me the same questions over and over again, each time I'm asking to escalate the call to Advanced Online support but they insist on going through their protocol to confirm.

    I have been able to get to Advanced Online support and they are reading the Intuit instructions on how to do this copy of data, and asking me to go through the same steps over and over.  When you look at the landing page for the copy feature you will see 7 or 8 attempts to copy with an error message, the last attempt copy times from 8:51 am to 8:09 pm on the 24th.  

    This was a Chronobooks software purchased by Intuit, however, clearly the process of doing the copy feature has not been properly debugged, and the advanced online tech support people have not been properly trained.  And the fee for having Advanced is $150.00 a month, just so you can backup and restore your data.

    If anyone has had this problem and can help troubleshoot the issue I am ready, otherwise, I may lose my job as an accountant with this company.

    C
    Catherine_B
    February 26, 2021

    Hello there, Deb in Texas.

     

    You can create a backup copy in your QuickBooks Online Advanced company file and can only restore it in QuickBooks Desktop. We're unable to restore it to another QuickBooks Online Advanced account. You'll want to create a backup in QuickBooks Online Advanced first and restore it to QuickBooks Desktop. From QBDT, import it to QuickBooks Online.

     

    Let me know if you have other questions. Take care!

    A
    annegenova
    June 12, 2022

    Hi Deb-

     

    I'm also having a problem copying a Quickbooks Online Advanced company to a new Online Advanced company. Were you ever able to resolve your issue? Would love to know ho you solved the problem.

     

    Thanks in advance!

    Anne

    C
    CharleneMaeF
    June 12, 2022

    I've got your back, annegenova.

     

    Let's determine if this is a browser issue. There are times when the cache and cookies in your browser may be corrupted which leads to navigation issues in QuickBooks. To get started, open your account in a private mode. The following are the shortcut keys you can use: 

    • Google Chrome: press Ctrl + Shift + N 
    • Mozilla Firefox and Microsoft Edge: press Ctrl + Shift + P
    • Safari: press Command + Shift + N

     

    Once signed in, make sure you're the master admin. Then, go to Settings again to back up your company. Here's how:

    1. Sign in to the company you want to make a copy of.
    2. Go to Settings, then select Back up company. 
    3. Click Copy. Then tap New Copy.

     

    If this works, clear your regular browser cache. This is to remove the damaged and corrupted files. If the same thing happens, you can use another supported browser. The one you are currently using may have a temporary issue with QuickBooks.

     

    Then, to help you resolve copy and restore issues, please visit this article: Make a copy of your QuickBooks Online Advanced company. 

     

    Also, QuickBooks offers self-help articles that will guide you to finish your tasks in no time. To start browsing, go to our QuickBooks help page at this link.

     

    Feel free to get back here again if you need further assistance copying and restoring your QBO file. I'm always here to help.

    J
    jbailey22
    July 10, 2022

    I have had the exact same experience with trying to copy my online advanced subscription to another online advanced subscription. The new company subscription window is greyed out disallowing the transfer of the data files. I’ve spoken with 6 different tech support agents and spent over 5 frustrating hours trying to get someone to help me to no avail!!! My husband and I own a CPA firm, all of our employees are CPA certified Quickbooks Account Pros, we have numerous subscriptions ourselves and clients with subscriptions and spend a LOT of money each month with Intuit. At this point I am completely disappointed in their product and lack of qualified tech support agents to help. What do we do now????

    Fiat Lux - ASIA
    Fiat Lux - ASIA
    July 10, 2022
    @jbailey22 wrote:

    What do we do now????

     

    @jbailey22 

    Use a 3rd party tool. You don't have to use QBO Advanced.

    https://rewindio.grsm.io/copy

     

    K
    kevinvinv
    July 12, 2022

    @Deb in Texas ,  did you ever find a way to copy your company from A to B?   still struggling here...

    A
    ArielED
    April 25, 2023

    Hi @Deb in Texas , and everyone else with this problem. I had the very same issue you experienced and after reading through your frustration, I try a couple of things but fortunately, I just fixed it on my end. I was able to go around by deleting the target company of the copy and adding it again. A solution that literally takes less than a minute and nobody at QB thought about. Go to home and under the target company in the action dropdown button, select Remove company. Then click on add company button on the top right of the screen. Hope it helps.

    S
    skaya
    May 5, 2023

    Hi everyone,

    I followed the directions from TechSoup to copy one Online Advanced company into a new TechSoup account and it basically worked after the sluggish backups completed. However, none of the tags copied over and my client used tags heavily in the original company. I can't find anything that says that tags won't copy in the instructions. Did I miss something? This is going to be a big problem for my client if they don't have the tags on the migrated transactions.

    Thanks,

    Jen

    J
    JaneEC
    June 25, 2023

    I just completed 2 attempts at migrating to the donated QBO subscription from TechSoup.  Second time worked much better but there were still a lot of issues on the stmt of fin'l position and stmt of activity.  

    After my first attempt,  a QB Payroll Rep gave me some very useful information that no one in QB Advanced Support gave me.  She said that the new company settings such as chart of accounts, classes, sales tax, payroll settings, products, etc. need to match the old company prior to copying the data.  She didn't mention tags but if you didn't set those up in the new company, that might be why they didn't migrate.  If you are still running the old company in the "paid" version, I was told by this Payroll rep that you can do another copy to the new company and it will overwrite it.  She said she has assisted with several migrations to the donated QBO.  

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