Reckon Accounts Hosted - How can I import journals from excel?

Mike_9336004

Can i create my journal in excel and import it in Reckon Accounts Hosted?

Zappy

I have a template for this kevin@zappy.com.au

Mike_9336004

Great, can you also explain how this is imported into Reckon Hosted?

Zappy

Precisely the same way it is imported to desktop.

Mike_9336004

This is a forum for people with less knowledge then yourself to read and understand how to do things.  This is the reason I've asked for an explanation to be written on the forum so that other people will also benefit from reading it.  Your cryptic messages and arrogant tone are confusing and not at all in line with the point of the reckon community. 

Furthermore your equally cryptic email  where you tried to charge me for providing an example is not cool.

Zappy

Mike Im sure ypu didnt come here expecting to get free help. Reckon is a complicated system and you are asking for detailed help on a complex task. I dont really care if you think my expertise is worthless I have a different view. I have helped dozens of people to do this already but I stopped at the point of actually doing the work for them. My offer is still open. Thank you for your time.

Mike_9336004

I asked you to use a 4 line journal in the template you provided so that I could see how it would apply.  This would literally take 2 minutes (maybe less) to do.  Please don't try to play this off as something other than that.  You tried to do something unethical and I pulled you up on it.

Nicole Gough

Hi Mike,

Did you ever sort this out?  I too am also trying to work out how to import a journal from excel so I can split wages against various projects quickly.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thaks
Nicole

Zappy

You can import journals. You cannot import payroll. Drop me an email kevin@zappy.com.au

Zappy

Very funny Mike. Since when is it unethical to seek reward for effort? Take your time with an answer. I can wait.

Mike_9336004

Move on Russell, I have.

Zappy

Its Kevin Mike and I never stop moving. Just got back from a 13k run. Keep up the good work

Mike_9336004

Hi Nicole, 

I was able to find this out, although it took a while.  There is a template which is an .iif file type which can be opened and completed in excel.  To create an .iif
 file, complete the journal template in excel (as per below) then save as a Text (tab delimited) file type.  Open the folder where you saved the .txt file and rename the file to end with .iif as its file type.  After you have 1 .iif file type you can re-use it directly instead of having to go through this process each time.

I have uploaded an image so you can see the layout of a simple journal (you can add more lines as needed).  Note this is assuming you split your projects out by class.  Hope this helps.  I am new to using it but it saves me time.  The only issue i have encountered is rounding on larger journals - sometimes you will need to adjust the cents as reckon wont accept it if it does not balance exactly. There may be a better way to do it but overall this seems to work fine.

Once you have the .iif file as you need it.  First Make sure you are logged in to Reckon Hosted as Admin and switch to single user mode (under the file menu). Then upload the .iif file into Reckon using the red upload button (the same place you go to download exported reports from reckon - inside the little red suitcase icon).  

Once you have uploaded the file you then need to import it into Reckon.    Click File - Utilities - Import - IIF Files...  You will then need to choose the uploaded .iif file from the upload folder in Q drive (that's where it is for me anyway).  Click the file and import - if it works a message will pop up saying its been successful. And that's it.

I then go to the journal section in Reckon and check it looks ok.  Hope this helps.  Let me know if you get stuck, cheers.

Zappy

Anyone can do this. The search facility in Reckon is basic but its entirely satisfactory. I use it every day. Its not complicated.

Georgina Lawry

Hello Mike,

I tried your template and it imported but it doesn't show the journal in my journals ledger. Do you know what I may have done wrong? 

Also is it possible to use this template for importing estimates? If so would you change any of the line items? 

Appreciate if you can give me guidance on how to import estimates? 

Many thanks, 

Mike_9336004

Hi Georgina.  Did it come up with a message saying it had imported successfully?  I had a few issues when i first started using the template. I'd import the journal and it wouldn't come up with an error so it appeared to have imported, however when i checked the company journals it wasn't showing anywhere.  From memory it turned out that i had put "ENDTRNS" against a journal line and not on the line below the last line of the journal.  Another possibility could also be the date format might be wrong.

Sharon Dawson

Hi Mike.  I found your post very useful indeed.  The problems I have been experiencing relate to saving manually entered journals.  Pretty much every time I hit the save button Reckon closes with an error and it is pot luck whether it saves your journal or not.  Reckon support have been no use whatsoever so this will save me a huge amount of wasted time.
Thanks for sharing your knowledge.   

Mike_9336004

Hi Sharon, if the error message in Reckon is saying the transaction isn't balanced then for me its usually a rounding issue (even though the file appears to be balanced).  As you highlight down the amounts of your journal watch the sum and if you see it go into the larger decimals (greater than 2) this could be the problem.  I now round all the source data entered into the excel/iif file to 2 decimal places and it fixes this particular problem.  Alternatively it could be the format of the date or the template itself (see my format example above to check), or that you are posting a journal into a previously closed period.  Unfortunately reckons error message for importing iif journals tend to always say "the transaction does not balance" however it can often be a few different issues.