Questions and answers

Yes. CopyMyBooks copies a real QuickBooks Online company into an Intuit sandbox: its lists, its transactions and, if you want, its starting balances. It reads the real company through the QuickBooks Online API, writes each record into the sandbox in the right order, and then checks the sandbox's reports against the real company's (or its record counts, when amounts are disguised).

Intuit's sandbox FAQ is right that you can't upload a company file or a backup into a sandbox. CopyMyBooks doesn't. It writes records one by one through the QuickBooks Online API, the same way any QuickBooks app adds an invoice or a customer, and sandboxes accept that.

A sandbox is a full QuickBooks Online test company that Intuit gives anyone with a free Intuit Developer account. It works like a normal QuickBooks Online Plus or Advanced company, but it isn't connected to a bank, payroll or real money, so nothing you do in it affects a real business.

No. You need a free Intuit Developer account to own a sandbox, but no coding. Creating one takes about ten minutes, and our step-by-step guide walks you through it. Everything else happens in CopyMyBooks and on Intuit's own approval screen.

Developers testing a QuickBooks app against real books, and accountants and bookkeepers rehearsing a cleanup before touching a client's books. See the uses.

Both. If you're an admin of the company, connect it yourself in CopyMyBooks (Real company, then Connect). If someone else is its admin, a client or your employer, send them a connect link and they approve on Intuit's screen.

CopyMyBooks is independent and isn't affiliated with or endorsed by Intuit. It connects the way every QuickBooks Online app does: an admin of the company approves it on Intuit's own screen and can disconnect it at any time. Copies go only into sandboxes, the test companies Intuit gives developers.

Nothing today. The sandbox is free from Intuit, and CopyMyBooks is currently free. If we start charging, account holders hear first and choose whether to continue.

No. An Intuit sandbox is free and needs no QuickBooks subscription. That's the main difference from Intuit's own "Copy company" feature, which needs a second, paid QuickBooks Online Advanced company to copy into. Compare the ways to copy.

Lists: accounts, customers, vendors, employees, products and services, classes, locations, terms and payment methods. Transactions: estimates, invoices, sales receipts, payments, credit memos, refunds, purchase orders, bills, bill payments, vendor credits, expenses, checks, deposits, transfers, journal entries, time activity, recurring transactions and inventory adjustments. Attachments too, if you choose them and the owner hasn't left them out.

Company settings: preferences, sales tax setup, users, bank connections and payroll. Bank feeds, bank rules, reconciliation history, the audit log, payroll runs and budgets are never copied. The copy turns on class, location or inventory tracking in your sandbox only when the copied records need it.

Yes. Choose the dates (all dates, a period such as last year, or a custom range of up to 10 years) and which kinds of records. Lists come along as the copied transactions need them, or you can copy all of them.

Yes. Payments stay applied to their invoices and credit memos, bill payments to their bills and vendor credits, deposits keep the payments they bundle, and invoices keep their estimates. A link to a transaction outside the dates you chose can't be kept: the copy warns you before it starts and leaves that payment unapplied.

Each tax code is matched to one in your sandbox by name, then by rate, and the tax amount on each transaction is kept. When neither matches, the copy uses the sandbox's first sales tax code and lists that. If the sandbox has no sales tax code at all, those transactions are copied without tax and listed, and the report check shows the difference (unless amounts are disguised, when only record counts are checked). Your sales tax settings and filings aren't copied.

Inventory products come over with their starting quantities, along with inventory adjustments. After a sandbox is cleared, QuickBooks locks inventory for about 30 minutes, so a copy with inventory waits that out before it writes.

No. The transactions are copied, but the reconciliation history isn't. Bank feeds and bank rules aren't copied either.

No. CopyMyBooks copies QuickBooks Online companies only. If your books are in QuickBooks Desktop, move them to QuickBooks Online first with Intuit's own tools.

Every copy is checked. When it finishes, CopyMyBooks checks that every record it wrote is in the sandbox, and compares your sandbox's profit and loss, balance sheet and trial balance with the real company's for the same dates. With amounts disguised, it checks the record counts only. Records QuickBooks refused are listed with its reasons; any past the first 200 are counted.

It should, with starting balances on. They're journal entries dated the day before your first date that give the sandbox the real company's balances on that day. Copy every kind of record in your dates, journal entries included, and the check after the copy shows whether it matches. Starting balances are off while amounts are disguised, since they would show the real balances. The unpaid-invoices and unpaid-bills reports still won't match, because the older invoices and bills aren't there.

Yes, and it's a good idea. Copy last month, look at the result, then copy a longer range. Every copy clears the sandbox first, so nothing piles up.

Everything in it is removed first, so the copy isn't mixed with old data. You confirm the sandbox by typing its name. A few records QuickBooks protects can't be removed; the result lists them.

About 450 records a minute, plus the time to clear the sandbox first. A year of a small business, a few thousand records, takes about ten minutes; the 25,000-record maximum takes about an hour. Inventory adds about 30 minutes. The copy keeps going if you close the page, and a long one emails you when it's done.

Yes, as often as you like while the company stays connected. Each copy clears the sandbox and starts from the real books again.

Never. The real company is only read, and nothing you do in the sandbox reaches it.

Yes: QuickBooks sandboxes really send email. That's why the owner can make every email address undeliverable, and we recommend it. With real addresses, a test that emails an invoice reaches the real customer.

No. CopyMyBooks only ever writes to sandboxes, so a copy can never land in a real company by mistake.

No. Books read for a copy are kept encrypted and deleted 60 minutes after they're read or copied. You can extend that an hour at a time while you work, but never more than 24 hours. Database backups can hold them until the backups expire on their own: nightly ones after 4 days, and the few taken just before an update once later updates replace them. A copy's history keeps its record counts, the records QuickBooks refused and, unless amounts were disguised, the real company's report totals. The copy itself lives in your sandbox, at Intuit, not with us.

It only reads it. Intuit's approval screen has no read-only option, so the permission it shows is broader than what we do, but CopyMyBooks never writes to a real company.

No, and never share it with anyone. An admin of the company approves on Intuit's own sign-in screen. CopyMyBooks never sees the password.

Yes. The company's admin can require every copy to disguise customers', vendors' and employees' names and contact details, make email addresses undeliverable, and leave out notes, memos, line descriptions, custom fields and attachments. Whoever makes the copy can't turn those off. They can also disguise amounts: every price and amount is multiplied by one secret number.

In QuickBooks, go to Apps, then My apps, and disconnect CopyMyBooks. It stops working at once. You can also disconnect the company in CopyMyBooks.

No. It isn't sold, used for ads or used to train AI models. The privacy policy has the details.

US QuickBooks Online companies in US dollars, without multicurrency. Canadian, UK, Australian and other companies, and companies with multicurrency on, aren't supported yet.

Up to 25,000 records per copy. For bigger books, choose a shorter date range, such as the last year or two, and turn on starting balances.

The copy carries on and lists the record with QuickBooks' reason, and the report check shows any difference it makes (with amounts disguised, the record counts do). You're never told a copy matched when it didn't.