To have us prepare your business tax return (a 1120 or 1120S corporation tax return, a 1065 partnership or LLC tax return, and then the equivalent state returns), we need access to your accounting records once you’ve closed the books for the year.
We also need you to complete a business return organizer to collect the information that doesn’t appear in your accounting system. And to sign an engagement letter. (To get your business on our list of people we send an organizer and engagement letter too, email or telephone us.)
Note: If we have a signed engagement letter on file, we will automatically extend business tax returns if you bear risk of missing the deadline.
If you’re using an online accounting system like QuickBooks Online, Xero Accounting, or FreshBooks, you need to provide us with authorization to your books. How you do this depends on the software. But usually the steps work simply.
QuickBooks Online
If you use QuickBooks online, here’s how you can give us access to your data:
- Sign in to QuickBooks Online at qbo.intuit.com.
- In the upper right corner, choose the gear icon next to your company’s name, then Manage Users.
- Go to the Accounting Firms section and click Invite Accountant.
- Enter your accountant’s email address. Entering your accountant’s first and last name is optional.
- Click Next and Finish.
QuickBooks Desktop
If you use QuickBooks desktop, you want to provide us with a backup copy of the QuickBooks file. (You also need to provide us with the administrator username and password so we can restore the backup file.)
Fortunately, the steps to do this work pretty simply, as described below.
Creating a Backup File for QuickBooks for Windows
- Open your QuickBooks company file
- In the upper-left corner of the program window, choose File → Back Up Company → Create Local Backup.
- In the new window, make sure the radio button next to Local backup is selected, then click Next. If a new window appears called Backup Options, click Browse, and choose a location to save your backup file to that you’ll remember. Click OK.
- In the next window, make sure the radio button next to Save it now is selected, then click Next. Save the file.
Sending Us the Backup File
You can hand delivery or even snail mail your backup QuickBooks file.
But the easiest delivery method uses our portal
No Accounting System
Log into your bank account and down load the years transactions to a CSV file. Open the file and add a column. For each row, add a category for the transaction. For example, income, office supplies, contractor services, telephone, etc. so we know how to classify them in your return. Once completed, send us the file so we can construct your information. This method may incur additional fees for bookkeeping.
