How to Connect QuickBooks Desktop to Kindful

There are two version of QuickBooks: QuickBooks Online and QuickBooks Desktop. QuickBooks Desktop is an application that runs locally on a user's machine, or may run on a server that your organization manages in your office, or in another office. 

This article explains how to connect Kindful to QuickBooks Desktop.

Linked Articles

- Kick Off a Sync with QuickBooks Desktop

- Troubleshooting QuickBooks Desktop

- Setup Automatic Syncs

How to Connect QuickBooks Desktop to Kindful

FIRST: Inside Kindful, go to Apps > App Directory on the left sidebar, then scroll down and click on Learn More for the QuickBooks Desktop option. Finally, to Connect, reach out to a Kindful team member and we can enable the feature for you.

1. In Kindful, verify your current integration settings are what you want them to be (Click the "Settings” button to review.)
2. On your QuickBooks Desktop Machine, (if you don’t already have it installed) install QuickBooks Web Connector (QuickBooks Web Connector is a tool that Intuit provides that allows you to connect Quickbooks Desktop to third party application such as Kindful.) Download QuickBooks Web Connector here from Intuit   (NOTE: It's important that your QuickBooks Web Connector version is compatible with your QuickBooks Desktop version. See Intuit's support for more information about this. The minimum version of the Web Connector required is 2.2.)
3. Download your unique Kindful QWC file from your Kindful Integration Settings & save it to the same machine on which QuickBooks Desktop is running. 
4. In QuickBooks Desktop, (if you have more than one company file), make sure you open QuickBooks to the Company File you want to use.
5. In QuickBooks Desktop, Open the Web Connector (in top menu bar, click  File -> Update Web Services).
6. If your Kindful QWC file isn’t already on the same machine that is running QuickBooks Desktop, move it to that machine now. (The file is named something like kindful_integration.qwc)  (NOTE: If this is NOT the first time you've connected your Kindful account to your QuickBooks Desktop account, for example, if you are moving QuickBooks Desktop to a different machine, then you may need a new Kindful QWC file. If this is the case, please contact support@kindful.com for assistance.)
7. In QuickBooks Web Connector, click the "Add an application" button in the bottom right.
8. Choose the Kindful QWC file and click open.
9. The Authorize New Web Service dialog should appear. Please review and press OK. It should look something like this:

10. If this is the first time you have ever connected your QuickBooks Desktop to Kindful, a QuickBooks Application Certificate dialog should appear. Please choose "Yes, whenever this QuickBooks company file is open" or "Yes, always" and click continue.

Note: an option appears to ask if personal data should be shared. Kindful does not need access to this information. You may leave it unchecked.

11. The Access Confirmation dialog should appear.
12. QuickBooks Web Connector should now show a "Kindful production" row with a password box in the second to the last folder. It should look something like this:

13. Enter the password found in your Kindful Integration Settings into the password column and press Enter. (NOTE: Do NOT enter your Kindful User Password or your QuickBooks Desktop Password. Those are something different.)
14. You should be prompted to save the password. Please do this.

At this point, you should be connected.

How to Manually Kick Off a Sync

Now that you've connected your Kindful account to your QuickBooks Desktop account, you may want to kick off a sync. 

First, make sure your QuickBooks Integration Settings are what you want them to be inside of Kindful.

Then, in QuickBooks Desktop, choose the application checkbox for Kindful production and then press Update Selected in the top bar.

A QuickBooks sync will commence and will look something like this in QuickBooks Web Connector:

Inside Kindful's Integration Settings > QuickBook Desktop Settings, there is a Status dialog where you can track the progress of the sync as well:

About the QuickBooks Desktop Sync

Depending on the size, this may take anywhere from 5 minutes to many hours. Last Run should show OK when it's complete. Note: Kindful is able to query for changes only, so subsequent syncs will be much faster.

Once complete, it may take Kindful some time to finish processing the sync. The status can be reviewed using the Status button.

You can schedule a sync to occur automatically. 

Updates more frequent than once an hour are not supported and will cause your data to stop syncing over completely.  

If you need to cancel a sync, the Web Connector doesn't provide a way to do this. Clicking on the Status button provides a way to cancel.

How to Set Import and Push Dates for the Integration

You can manage your QuickBooks connection by setting your Import and Push dates for the integration. Use these to smartly tell Kindful when to begin pulling and/or sending data to and from QuickBooks. This can be helpful when you have already imported data to Kindful prior to connecting QuickBooks.

Head to Apps > App Directory and located your connected instance of QuickBooks Desktop. Click App Settings

Next, click on the QuickBooks Sync Settings button

Choose your settings, including an Import and a Push date.

Syncing Historical Data

When choosing to setup the integration and choose a date prior to “today” when syncing data to QuickBooks or Kindful, this warning will appear:

“Your integration settings are set to sync historical transactions. If the sync dates are not correct this can potentially cause duplicate transactions in either QuickBooks, Kindful or both accounts. If the sync dates are correct, click Ok to continue with the sync.”

This is also the case when selecting the “sync all data” option.

Integration Best Practices

• • Credit, CC, or Credit Card
  • Check, Cheque, or CK
  • Electronic Fund Transfer, ETF, or ACH
  • Paypal (if you plan to use this type)