QuickBooks Files

The Clean Up Company Data… utility performs 2 functions:

1. selectively summarizes closed transactions by creating new general journal entries by month and deletes the summarized transactions
2. selectively removes unused list items, including accounts, items, customers, vendors, other names, and To Do notes

The Clean Up utility can accomplish several important goals:

• improve performance by reducing the size of the company file
• improve efficiency by removing stale list items
• reduce recording errors by reducing the chance of assigning a transaction to the wrong list item

It can be used to remove transactions as of a specific date or to remove all transactions.

QuickBooks will not remove a closed transaction if it has 1 of the following attributes:

1. it is an uncleared bank or credit card transaction
2. it is marked To be printed
3. it is an invoice or estimate and marked To be sent
4. it contains unbilled costs

By default in the clean up process, closed transactions that meet any 1 of these 4 criteria will not be summarized and deleted, but these defaults can be changed. We don’t recommend changing these defaults, with the possible exception of transactions excluded because of the To be printed or To be sent flags.

Unused list items can be removed from 1 or more of some important QuickBooks lists as part of the clean up:

The Clean Up utility will complete 4 steps:

1. Make a backup
2. Verify the company file (.qbw)
3. Create an archive copy of the company file (.qbw)
4. Clean up data

Just before starting the clean up, QuickBooks will describe what it is about to do and ask you to proceed with the clean up:

During the clean up process itself, you’ll see the following messages, indicating that processing is being performed:

Once the clean up process has successfully completed, you’ll see this information window:

Running the Clean Up utility has a significant impact on your company file. See our related article on the effects of running the Clean Up utility.

For more information on the Clean Up utility, consult this Intuit knowledge base article.

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When the Clean Up utility is run, the effects on a company file (.qbw) can be significant. The goals of the Clean Up utility are to shrink the company file size and to make using that file more efficient. These gains come with some trade-offs.

Important considerations when using the Clean Up utility are:

1. Transaction details from the cleaned up period will no longer exist in the company file (.qbw), so detail reports will not be available for the cleaned up period
2. Financial statements and summary reports for the cleaned up period will be accurate to a given month but not a shorter interval of time, because the clean up process summarizes transactions with a monthly journal entry
3. Inventory transactions up until the first inventory transaction that can’t be removed will be summarized in an inventory adjustment using the average cost of the items on that date; clean up of inventory items stops after the first inventory item that can’t be cleaned up
4. Cash basis reports for a cleaned up period will not be accurate because detail transactions are required to determine a transaction’s paid status
5. Sales tax reporting for the cleaned up period will be accurate because QuickBooks does not delete information required to produce reports on sales tax liabilities
6. Regardless of the end date specified for the clean up, QuickBooks retains payroll transactions for both the current and prior years based on the current setting of your computer’s clock
7. Only Estimates with a job status of Closed are deleted; Estimates with any other job status are preserved
8. Lists elements for 6 lists may be optionally removed if they’re not used in a transaction

The principal trade-off is that detail history for the period cleaned up will no longer be in your primary company file (.qbw). You’ll have to open an archive or a copy to review details from the cleaned up period or run reports that aren’t accurate for a cleaned up period, such as a cash basis report.

The Clean Up utility optionally can remove lists elements from 6 lists that are no longer used in a transaction. These lists are:

• accounts
• customers
• vendors
• other names
• invoice items
• To Do notes

Each of the 6 lists can be selected for clean up individually, as shown in the screenshot below.

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