This article addresses the concept of merging typical Profit & Loss type of accounts in your bookkeeping software.

There probably will be times throughout the history of your bookkeeping that you will, eventually, have expense or income type of accounts that are not needed any longer and perhaps could be merged with very similar other, and more relevant, expense or income accounts in your books.

Be careful when merging accounts however, as this task is certainly irreversable once you complete the process. This process also can affect your financials dating back several years, so consult with a CPA before taking on this task.

However, some of the more common reasons I have seen over the years that small business people merge accounts are:

• Tolls & Parking merges into Ground Transportation
• Computer Software merges into Office Supplies
• Merchant Fees merges into Bank Service Charges
• Salaries merges into Wages (or vice versa)
• Contract Labor merges into Subcontractors
• Income merges into Sales (or vice versa)

Merging expense and income accounts in either QuickBooks Desktop or Online is a simple process.

You simply just need to:

1. Consider which two accounts you want to merge, then decide which name you want to keep.
2. Now, out of the two accounts to be merged, go to the account whose name you want to change and click on “Edit”.
3. Once you are in the Edit screen, within the name field, just simply type in the name of the account whose name you want to keep (out of the two accounts to be merged of course).
4. Then, click on Save and you should get a pop-up warning message from QuickBooks about another account have the same name and thus asking you if you would like to merge these two accounts.
5. Click on “yes” and now you are done.
6. But verify your Chart of Accounts and your Profit & Loss report to ensure all is the way you now want to see it.

Note: AccuraBooks is a bookkeeping firm only, so please consult with your C.P.A. for verification and clarification about the contents of this article.