Starting fresh for FY - plus an upgrade, and want to bring stuff over... what's the best approach?

I'm part time account keeper and mind reader for my partner's small workshop... we currently use Reckon Accounts Premier - 2015 (desktop) and have purchased the same product but 2020 version which will make us STP compliant and bring us out of the dark ages.

Hubby wants a fresh start. His inventory has hundreds of out of date items and his customer list is kind of screwed - 80% of customers are on the same card, 'CASH', and he just modifies the details each time to save creating hundreds of brand new cards.

His plan is to start a brand new company, and just have the old one sit there as a reference if he needs it. I am a bit sketchy on this but want to humour him if it's realistic to do that. He'd like me to set this up now, so he has a few weeks where he can create his new item list with a view to doing a stocktake on 30/6 and going from there.

I know from other forum posts that I can export lists from the existing file, import them to a new company, and that's part of the puzzle. But what about the rest?

- Can I set the file up now, but then somehow update the balances for each account on the chart of accounts later? i.e. once we have everything up to date to reflect status as of 30/6?
- Can I bring over the history for just one employee, or do I need to create him manually and update his leave balances?
- How do I manage suppliers who need to be paid, I am guessing the best way is to sit down on 30/6 and physically pay as much as we can so there's not a lot outstanding, but there will always be bits and pieces.
- I'm guessing I'll still want to wipe out the old Reckon installation and upgrade the old company file so he uses the same software to open both? And just really clearly label the file and look up how to close off the old one once I've reconciled it all so it can't be edited.

What else do I need to know or do? Is this going to work?

Would appreciate your wisdom, folks

Comments

Kris_Williams

Yes you can create the company now and unless you want any other history I would wait until the 2020 financials are done and simply do a journal for the balance sheet items. You can do all items of course it depends on what you want. Of course you will have to enter the bank balance as at 30/6 And any outstanding invoices or bills also as at 30/6. From the old file you can export iif files for most of the lists, chart of accounts, supplier, customer and other lists.
You cannot bring over any figures so will have to setup leave manually (I am pretty certain but will stand corrected if not)
As for the old file, what I have done in this case is to put a password on the old file so that it’s easy to distinguish between the two, in addition to the name. Or at least a different password if you are already using a password.You could import your items if you still have many usable ones and delete the ones that are not used once they have been imported to the new file, same with customers and suppliers.
Another way to protect the old file is to put a closing date of 30/6/20 so that it’s not possible to record or change anything prior to that date. This won’t stop you from recording anything later by accident but I guess you could make that closing date June 2021.
i hope this helps you to get started, and I’m sure others will have some different ways to go about things, this is just my process.

Mereki

Thanks for your very informative comment! Makes good sense.

Just to clarify - can I update the bank balance once I know what it is, but still create the company file now?

And wondering if another idea would work - is there any way I can just clean up the items list, i.e. actually delete items, or will reckon prevent that as there are transactions using those items from 10+ years ago? If that were possible, I could just clean out the customer database, clean out the items, and that would give him his 'fresh start' without having to rebuild everything else... I'm just remembering how mapping the tax codes for the first BAS always catches me out after an upgrade, and feeling a bit lazy!

glendaveale

Yes you would enter the opening balance as at 30.6.20 once you have finished the old company file. If you want to keep this file you cannot delete items or customers but you can make them inactive so they do not appear on the list. This can be handy if you ever want to go back and have a look at them in the future.

Kris_Williams

Yes you will have to import the items into the new file and then delete what you want. Yes you can create the file anytime and update on 30/6.

You could also copy the file so the original stays untouched and in the new copy make anything inactive or merge them into one of the same name. That can apply for customers, suppliers or items.
Entering Tax codes for BAS is not difficult, I would not let that be my reason for not starting fresh if you really want to, happy to help if that’s the route you take