To set up cash flow forecasting with QuickBooks Online, put the books in order first, connect the company to a forecasting tool, then add what the ledger does not hold: when each customer will actually pay, and the tax and commitments that have no invoice or bill yet. Putting the books in order mostly means reconciliation, bills and transfers. The connection is quick. The expected dates and budgets are where the finance team's time goes, and they decide whether the forecast is worth planning on.
This guide takes the setup in order, using Float as the example. It covers what to tidy in QuickBooks Online before the first import, the seven setup steps, what arrives from QuickBooks Online and what does not, and the three places the setup works differently from Xero. If you are still deciding whether QuickBooks Online's own cash flow planner is enough for your team, start with do you need a cash flow forecasting tool if you already use QuickBooks Online. If your books are in Xero, what Xero gives your cash flow forecast is the matching guide.
What To Have In Order In QuickBooks Online First
A connected forecast reads the books as they are. Five habits in QuickBooks Online decide whether what it reads is usable, and each is quicker to fix before the first import than after it.
Reconcile, and keep reconciling. Float takes only reconciled transactions into the forecast, and the opening balance is the "In QuickBooks" balance of the accounts you include, not the balance the bank shows. A bank line nobody has reconciled is a cash movement the forecast cannot see. QuickBooks Online's guidance is to reconcile regularly and sets no frequency. Float's is daily, or at least weekly.
Enter supplier invoices as bills. In QuickBooks Online a bill records something you will pay later, and an expense records something already paid. Only a bill gives the forecast a future payment with a due date. Pay the bill through Pay bills when the time comes: a bill settled by entering a separate expense stays open in the books, and the forecast will go on showing it as still to pay.
Record transfers as transfers. Money moved between your own bank accounts should be recorded as a transfer. Float nets a transfer between two included accounts to zero, and a transfer recorded as an expense does not come through to the forecast at all. Paying off a company credit card is the same: record the payment as a transfer, so the card and the bank account cancel out instead of counting twice. Float's current guidance is to use a transfer for this rather than QuickBooks Online's Pay down credit card option.
Clear Undeposited Funds. A customer payment recorded to Undeposited Funds has not yet reached a bank account in the books. Until it is deposited, it is not part of the reconciled balance the forecast opens on.
Decide on Multicurrency before you switch it on. QuickBooks Online asks you to confirm that Multicurrency cannot be undone once it is on, and turning it on makes QuickBooks Online's own cash flow planner unavailable. Float works either way: it converts foreign-currency bank accounts, invoices and bills into your base currency and shows the exchange rate used on each item.
How To Set Up The Forecast, Step By Step
Step 1: Connect QuickBooks Online and choose the company. When you first create a Float account, you are asked to authorise the connection to QuickBooks Online. It is a standing connection, so later imports need no new authorisation. Only a QuickBooks Online admin user can connect an app, so whoever does the setup needs admin access in QuickBooks. If you run more than one QuickBooks Online company, check that you have selected the right one before the import starts; each company is a separate set of books and connects on its own.
Step 2: Let the first import run. The first import brings in the previous three months of actual figures, along with the current and future months: bank accounts and credit cards with their reconciled transactions, and open invoices and bills. How long it takes depends on the volume of data. When it finishes, a first version of the forecast is on screen, built only from what the books hold.
Step 3: Choose the bank and card accounts the forecast includes. Every bank account and credit card comes across, and all are included by default. Open the list from the Balance panel and keep the accounts that hold the business's cash. A credit card can be included, which shows every card transaction, or excluded, which shows only the payments made to the card. If you run payroll inside QuickBooks Online, keep the account called Direct Deposit Payable switched on, because it holds the payroll transactions.
Step 4: Check the opening balance against QuickBooks. The balance of each included account in Float should match its "In QuickBooks" balance exactly. Where it does not, the usual causes are unreconciled transactions or an account included that should not be. Historic balances are worked backwards from today's balance using reconciled transactions only, so a gap in reconciliation also shows up in the months behind you. If the figures still differ once both are checked, Float's support team will look at it.
Step 5: Date the receivables and payables. Each invoice and bill arrives on its due date, because that is the only payment date QuickBooks Online holds on it. The due date comes from the terms on the transaction. When the cash will actually move is for the team to set, and ICAEW's eighth principle for cash flow forecasting is to "assign expected, worst case and best-case dates for receipts and payments". In Float you can move a single item by seven or thirty days or to a chosen date, re-date a batch in one action, or split an invoice into part payments on separate dates. Start with two lists: the overdue items, because an overdue invoice or bill with no new expected date is assumed to be paid today and is marked with a warning triangle in the app, and the largest receipts due in the next few weeks. Expected dates entered in QuickBooks Online's own cash flow planner are planner data rather than part of the invoice, so they do not come across and need setting again in Float.
Step 6: Add what the books do not hold. Anything the business has agreed but not yet invoiced or billed goes in as a budget, which Float treats as a placeholder that invoices, bills and reconciled transactions fill as they arrive. There are four kinds: repeating, for rent, payroll and anything else on a rhythm; one-off, for a tax payment or an equipment order; auto, which tracks last month or the three- or six-month average for a cost line; and linked, which follows another budget by a percentage and an optional delay. The Review Suggestions prompt on the cash flow page proposes regular income and costs from your history for you to accept or ignore. Three things belong here on QuickBooks Online in particular: recurring invoices and bills, which Float does not import, so set the same items up as repeating budgets; the VAT, GST or sales tax payment for each period, as a one-off budget on its due date; and the employer taxes and contributions that follow each payroll run, on their statutory dates rather than on payday.
Step 7: Set the import hour and the review rhythm. Float imports from QuickBooks Online once a day at an hour you choose in company settings, and the sync button pulls the latest data whenever you have just finished reconciling. Set a threshold at the balance you have decided not to go below, or a negative figure where an overdraft is the real limit, and the side panel shows the date the forecast balance is due to cross it. Then fix the weekly order: reconcile, sync, clear the overdue list, re-date anything that has moved, and retire budgets whose cost has ended. Our guide to running a weekly cash review in a finance team of three covers that meeting.
What Arrives From QuickBooks Online, And What Does Not
Data flows one way. Float reads QuickBooks Online and sends nothing back, so nothing done in the forecast changes the books. The reverse also holds: a due date changed in QuickBooks Online overwrites the date set in Float at the next import.
| Item | In the forecast | What the team does |
|---|---|---|
| Bank accounts and credit cards | Imported with their reconciled transactions; all included by default | Choose which to include, and reconcile daily or at least weekly |
| Opening balance | The "In QuickBooks" balance of the included accounts | Check it matches account by account before relying on the forecast |
| Open invoices and bills | Imported and placed on their due dates | Set an expected date wherever payment will not land on the due date |
| Journals | Imported once the manual-journal option is switched on in company settings; off by default | Switch it on if payroll or other cash movements are posted by journal |
| Payroll run in QuickBooks Online | Arrives through the Direct Deposit Payable account, shown as one Payroll line rather than split into wages and taxes | Keep the account included, and carry employer taxes as budgets on their due dates |
| Deposits taken on estimates or sales receipts | Shown in a Float-created account called Direct Deposit Items | Know where to find them |
| Recurring invoice and bill templates | Not imported | Set the same items up as repeating budgets |
| Bundles on invoices | Line items inside a bundle do not come across | Avoid bundles where you can |
| Estimates and purchase orders | Not imported | Carry agreed work and placed orders as budgets until they become invoices or bills |
| Classes and locations | Not imported | Keep class and location reporting in QuickBooks Online |
| VAT, GST or sales tax for the open period | Not a dated item in the books | Add the payment as a one-off budget on its due date |
Where QuickBooks Online Differs From Xero
If your team has set up a forecast on Xero, three things work differently on QuickBooks Online. None of them changes the steps above. Each changes how much of steps 5 and 6 the team does by hand.
Expected payment dates
On Xero, Float's Smart Expected Dates applies each customer's average days late, worked out from your own payment history, to new invoices and bills as they import. It is not available for QuickBooks Online. There, every invoice and bill arrives on its due date and the team sets expected dates in Float. In practice that is one more task in the weekly review: work through the overdue list and the largest receipts due in the next month, and move each to the date you expect. Batch re-dating and part-payment splits work the same way on both platforms, and a comment on the invoice records why a date was moved, which saves the next person asking.
VAT, GST and sales tax
For Xero users in the UK, Australia and New Zealand, Float forecasts the VAT or GST payment automatically. That is not available for QuickBooks Online, and the books will not supply the payment date on their own either. In QuickBooks Online, the tax owed for a period that is still open is a balance on a liability account, not a dated bill. In the UK, VAT from your transactions sits in the VAT control account until the return is filed, then moves to the VAT suspense account until it is paid. In Australia, GST collects in the GST liabilities account, and lodging the BAS moves it to the ATO clearing account. In the US, sales tax collects in a liability account for each agency, and each state sets its own filing frequency and due dates.
So on QuickBooks Online, carry each VAT, GST or sales tax payment as a one-off budget on its due date, sized from the balance on the liability account and the sales still to come before the period closes. The UK, Australian and New Zealand payment dates are set out in our Xero guide, and they are the same whichever accounting platform you use. Corporation tax and other one-off tax bills are budgets on the same basis.
Read-only access
QuickBooks Online gives a connected app accounting access as a single permission, with no separate read-only level. Float is built to read only. It imports, and it sends nothing back, so the forecast cannot change your books whatever the team does in it. To disconnect, an admin user goes to Integrations, then Manage integrations, and chooses Disconnect from the app's menu.
Three smaller differences sit in the import list. On Xero, repeating invoice templates come across, and so do draft invoices if you switch them on; on QuickBooks Online neither does, so recurring items go in as repeating budgets. And payroll run inside QuickBooks Online arrives as one Payroll line, so if you want wages and employer taxes on separate dates in the forecast, the employer taxes go in as their own budgets.
How Float Fits
Float is a cash flow forecasting tool for finance teams that keep their books in Xero or QuickBooks Online. Sage Intacct support is coming soon; you can join the waitlist. It forecasts cash by the direct method from the ledger's own invoices, bills and reconciled bank transactions, in monthly and 13-week views.
On QuickBooks Online it gives the finance team a one-way daily import at an hour you choose, an expected date on every invoice and bill that can be set singly or in batches, four kinds of budget for what the books do not hold, a threshold with the date the balance is due to cross it, and scenario layers that sit on top of the base forecast. Several QuickBooks Online companies can be consolidated into one view in a display currency of your choice, on the plan that includes consolidation, and the forecast exports as a PDF or CSV whenever someone asks for it.
It has limits, and they belong beside the features. Float does not connect to the bank, so it has no intraday view. It does not send alerts or scheduled reports. Smart Expected Dates and automatic VAT and GST forecasting are for Xero users, so on QuickBooks Online the team sets expected dates and carries tax payments as budgets. And a spreadsheet forecast does not import as a file: budgets are entered directly or pasted in from a spreadsheet grid.
There is more on Float's QuickBooks Online integration, and plans are on the pricing page. For how the connection and data flow work across both platforms, see Float's accounting integrations.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do I connect QuickBooks Online to a cash flow forecast?
In Float you authorise the connection when you first create your account, then choose the QuickBooks Online company to import. Only a QuickBooks Online admin user can connect an app. The first import brings in the previous three months of actual figures with the current and future months, and from then on Float imports once a day at an hour you choose, with a sync button for when you have just reconciled.
What does Float import from QuickBooks Online?
Bank accounts, credit cards, invoices and bills, transactions, and journals once the manual-journal option is switched on. Only reconciled transactions come into the forecast. Float does not import purchase orders, estimates, classes, locations, or recurring invoice and bill templates, so agreed work, placed orders and recurring items go in as budgets.
Does QuickBooks Online tell the forecast when a customer will pay?
No. An invoice in QuickBooks Online carries a transaction date and a due date, and the due date is the only payment date the ledger holds, so each invoice arrives in the forecast on its due date. The team sets expected dates in Float, one at a time or in batches, starting with the overdue list. An expected date entered in QuickBooks Online's own cash flow planner is not part of the invoice and does not come across.
Why doesn't my opening balance match my bank balance?
Because the forecast opens on the reconciled balance, the "In QuickBooks" figure for each account you include, not the balance the bank reports. Any transaction not yet reconciled is left out until it is. Reconcile, run a sync, and check each account in Float against its "In QuickBooks" balance; if one still differs, check which accounts are included.
How do I forecast VAT, GST or sales tax with QuickBooks Online?
As a one-off budget on the payment's due date. In QuickBooks Online the tax owed for an open period is a balance on a liability account rather than a dated bill, so it does not reach the forecast on its own. Float's automatic VAT and GST forecasting is for Xero users. US sales tax dates are set by each state agency you file with.
Does payroll run in QuickBooks Online come through to the forecast?
Yes, through an account called Direct Deposit Payable, which needs to stay included in the forecast. The payroll transactions show as a single Payroll line rather than split into wages and taxes. Payroll recorded as an ordinary payment syncs like any other transaction, and payroll posted by journal needs the manual-journal import switched on. Employer taxes and pension or superannuation contributions go in as budgets on their statutory dates.
Can Float change anything in my QuickBooks Online books?
No. Float only reads QuickBooks Online and sends nothing back, so nothing done in the forecast changes the books. QuickBooks Online gives apps accounting access as a single permission, and Float uses it to read. An admin user can disconnect at any time from Integrations, then Manage integrations.
How often does the forecast update from QuickBooks Online?
Once a day, at an hour you choose in Float's company settings, with a manual sync whenever you need the latest figures. It is a daily picture rather than a live feed, and only as current as your last reconciliation.
How is setting up on QuickBooks Online different from Xero?
The connection and the steps are the same. Three things differ: on QuickBooks Online the team sets expected payment dates by hand, because Smart Expected Dates is for Xero users; VAT, GST and sales tax payments go in as budgets, because automatic tax forecasting is for Xero users; and recurring invoice and bill templates go in as repeating budgets, because they are not imported.
The quickest way to see your own setup is to connect it. Start a 14-day free trial of Float, connect QuickBooks Online, and the first version of your forecast arrives from the books, ready for your team to set the expected dates and the first budgets.
