Stop hand-typing into QuickBooks: one-click IIF & Xero CSV export

Updated: May 11, 2026 · For tradespeople whose accountant uses QuickBooks Desktop, Xero, Wave, FreshBooks, or Sage.

If your CPA uses QuickBooks Desktop, the year-end ritual probably involves you transcribing 200+ transactions from your invoicing app into QuickBooks by hand — or paying the CPA $200 to do the typing. Either way, it's silly.

Daily Invoice Maker v5.10 adds two one-click exports designed to bypass that step:

• QuickBooks Desktop (IIF): Intuit Interchange Format — the only no-API import route for QB Desktop
• Xero / generic (CSV): RFC 4180 standard CSV that also imports into Wave, FreshBooks, Sage, and most other accounting packages

What gets exported

For the tax year you pick, the export pulls:

• Paid + partially-paid invoices as income transactions, dated to the service date
• Expenses with category and vendor description
• Bank-imported transactions (Chase, Wells Fargo, BoA, PayPal, etc.) with their type preserved

Sorted chronologically. Signed positively for inflows, negatively for outflows. Reference numbers (INV-1024, EXP-42, TX-1098) included so each row traces back to source.

The QuickBooks IIF format — old but reliable

IIF was Intuit's original interchange format. It's tab-separated text. Modern accountants might tell you "we use QuickBooks Online now" — and that's true, but QBO accepts CSV imports too, so the IIF format is mainly for QuickBooks Desktop holdouts.

The IIF we generate declares four accounts up top — Business Checking (bank), Sales (income), Business Expenses (expense), Owner Draw (equity). Then each transaction is a triplet: TRNS (the main entry), SPL (the offsetting split), ENDTRNS. This is the structure QB expects.

Nice touch: expense rows include the category in the account name (e.g. Business Expenses:Fuel/Vehicle), so when your accountant imports, your categorization is preserved — and they can choose whether to keep your structure or remap to QuickBooks' chart of accounts.

The CSV — the universal format

The CSV is simpler. Six columns: Date, Amount, Description, Reference, Payee, Category. Amount is signed (+income, −expense). Description includes the invoice number or vendor.

This is the format Xero's "bank statement import" expects. Wave, FreshBooks, Sage, and QuickBooks Online all accept the same format with minor mapping.

The double-count problem (and how we solve it)

Most tradespeople record income twice: marking the invoice paid AND importing the bank statement. Without protection, exports would sum both — gross income inflates ~2×.

The export UI in Dashboard → Tax Summary includes an Income Source radio selector:

• Paid invoices only (default) — uses invoices, ignores bank-import income lines
• Bank transactions only — uses transactions, ignores paid invoices
• Both — advanced — only safe when invoices were paid in cash you never deposited; triggers a confirm dialog

Expenses are always included regardless — the double-count question is income-specific.

Where to find it

Dashboard → tap the indigo Tax Summary button → pick the year. Underneath the income/expense numbers, you'll see three colored export buttons:

• Schedule C PDF (blue) — for your CPA
• QuickBooks (IIF) (green) — for QuickBooks Desktop
• Xero / Generic (CSV) (cyan) — for everything else

Each downloads the file directly. On Android, files go to your Downloads folder. On Windows/Mac, you'll get a save dialog. Email the file to your accountant or load it directly into their software.

A reality check

The exports won't replace your accountant. They will dramatically shorten the conversation. Instead of 4 hours of "what was this Home Depot charge for?" you have a categorized CSV they can import in 5 minutes and use as the basis for the return.

Pair this with the Schedule C summary PDF for a complete year-end packet. Many accountants reduce their fee when you hand them clean data — it's worth asking.

Frequently asked questions

Does this work with QuickBooks Online?

QBO doesn't accept IIF directly, but it does accept CSV through "Banking → Upload from file." Use the Xero CSV export — it imports cleanly. QBO will ask you to map columns the first time; subsequent imports remember the mapping.

What if my accountant uses something else?

The Xero CSV format works with Wave, FreshBooks, Sage, ZipBooks, and most other accounting packages. If yours doesn't accept it, the CSV is also human-readable in Excel — your accountant can copy/paste rows manually as a fallback.

Will my categories survive the import?

In the IIF format: yes, embedded in the account name. In the CSV: yes, in a dedicated Category column. Whether your accounting software uses them as-is or remaps depends on their chart of accounts.