What's the best bookkeeping software setup for moving to a new accounting system with historical imports and bank feed integrations?

A good setup usually depends on how much history you need, how clean your old data is, and how automated you want the new system to be. The “best” approach for most small-to-mid businesses is:

Recommended setup

1. Pick the new accounting platform first Choose the core system before planning imports. Common options:

• QuickBooks Online: strong bank feeds, lots of integrations
• Xero: excellent bank reconciliation and clean UI
• NetSuite / Sage Intacct: for larger or more complex businesses

2. Import only the right historical data Don’t always try to bring in everything. Best practice is usually:

• Chart of accounts
• Customers/vendors
• Open invoices/bills
• Outstanding payments/credits
• Ending trial balance or opening balances
• Fixed asset register
• Optional: historical transactions for 1–2 prior years if needed for reporting

If you need long-term trend analysis, consider importing:

• Prior-year summarized monthly data
• Full transaction history in a separate archive, not necessarily into the live system

3. Set a clean cutover date Choose a migration date, often:

• Start of a fiscal year, or
• First day of a month

This makes reconciliation much easier.

4. Turn on bank feeds after the opening balances are loaded Connect bank feeds once:

• opening balances are entered
• outstanding transactions are recorded
• your migration date is set

That prevents duplicate transactions.

5. Reconcile in stages Use this sequence:

1. Load master data
2. Load opening balances
3. Import unpaid invoices/bills and open items
4. Connect bank feeds
5. Reconcile bank statements
6. Compare trial balance to old system

Best-practice migration structure

A solid bookkeeping setup during migration often looks like:

• Accounting system: Xero / QuickBooks / similar
• Document storage: Google Drive / SharePoint / Dropbox
• Receipt capture: Dext / Hubdoc / Expensify
• Bank feeds: native bank connections or aggregator
• Payroll: integrated payroll app if needed
• Reporting archive: PDFs of old financials, trial balances, and tax returns

What to avoid

• Importing messy transaction-level history without cleanup
• Enabling bank feeds before balances are set
• Changing the chart of accounts mid-migration
• Migrating old payables/receivables without aging them first
• Over-automating categorization before reviewing bank rules

Simplest reliable approach

If you want the lowest-risk setup:

• Import 2–3 years of summarized financials
• Import open AR/AP only
• Start bank feeds at the cutover date
• Keep old-system data read-only for reference

If you need full history

If you truly need complete transaction history in the new system:

• Use a structured migration tool or accountant-led migration
• Verify IDs, dates, taxes, and payment links carefully
• Expect a longer reconciliation process
• Keep an archival copy of the old system anyway

Bottom line

For most businesses, the best setup is: clean cutover + opening balances + open items + bank feeds after migration + old system archived for historical reference.

If you want, I can recommend the best setup specifically for:

• QuickBooks Online
• Xero
• a retail/ecommerce business
• a service business
• a multi-entity business