My accountant sent back a list of adjusting journal entries after the return was done — how do I get them into my books correctly?

What is the preparer's list, and what is it not?

Your preparer's list is a set of debits and credits, dated at the end of the year the return covers, that move your balances onto the figures the return was built from. It comes after the return because the preparer settles those figures while preparing it. Each line adjusts a balance you already hold; none is a new sale, bill or payment to enter from scratch.

If the preparer's adjusted trial balance did not come with the list, ask for it, with the balances before adjustment alongside. The adjusted trial balance is the target your books must reach.

Check the basis before posting. IRS Publication 538 says that under the cash method you generally report income in the tax year you receive it and deduct expenses in the tax year you pay them; under the accrual method, you generally report income in the tax year you earn it, regardless of when payment is received. If your books are on the cash basis and an entry creates a receivable, payable or other accrual, ask the preparer whether it belongs in your books before posting it. How books and a filed return are compared is a separate question.

Has the preparer already posted any of them?

Posting an entry the preparer already posted doubles it silently. Ask them in writing which entries, if any, they entered in your file, then confirm in the file, because the answer sets the job:

To confirm, run your trial balance at the adjusted year's end date and compare each account an entry touches with the preparer's balances before and after adjustment. Treat an entry as posted by the preparer only when you find the entry itself in your file, on its date and with its accounts and amounts, and every account it touches has reached the after figure. If only some of its accounts match, or an account matches because of something you entered yourself, run the checks in the next section.

A balance does not show who entered an entry, so have the preparer name each entry they posted by number, date and accounts, and find each one in your file before you mark it posted. If the year was locked first, Intuit's "Edit your closed books" page says the Exceptions to Closing Date report shows any changes made after you close your books, and Intuit's "Close your books in QuickBooks Desktop" says changes made after the closing date to transactions dated on or before it appear in the Closing Date Exception Report.

Is each remaining entry already in your books under another account or date?

The preparer worked from the trial balance you sent. Anything you entered after that, or recorded your own way during your close, may already hold the same adjustment. Before posting an entry, run these checks:

• Look through every account it touches, around its date, for the same item.
• Search by vendor, customer, description and the other side of the entry, not by amount alone. The same bill coded to another expense account will not show where the preparer's entry points.
• Start with everything entered after the trial balance went out, because none of it is in the preparer's figures.

Which year does each entry go in, and what does that do to equity and comparatives?

The preparer's date keeps each item in the year whose return counted it.

Intuit's "Lock your books in QuickBooks Online" says QuickBooks Online moves last year's net income to the retained earnings account when a new fiscal year starts, so an entry dated into the closed year should reach this year's opening retained earnings. The same page notes that the retained earnings account isn't the same as the retained earnings line on the balance sheet, so make the tie-out's retained earnings check on a balance sheet run as of the first day of the current year.

If no statements for the closed year have gone outside the business, date each entry as the preparer did. If they have, do not choose by default: ask the preparer whether to date the entries into the closed year or record them in the current year against retained earnings, and see the lender section. The carried-forward form is for accrual-basis books. Under the cash method, IRS Publication 538 says you generally report income in the tax year you receive it and deduct expenses in the tax year you pay them. On cash-basis books, a receivable or payable line set against retained earnings would mean its later collection or payment never reaches income or expenses, so send such an entry back.

Some entries are split: the adjusted year's share sits in an income or expense account and an earlier year's share goes straight to retained earnings. Post the whole entry as written.

How do you post into a locked year and lock it again?

Intuit's "Lock your books in QuickBooks Online" says that if someone tries to change or delete transactions dated on or before the lock date, QuickBooks will either give a warning or ask for a password, depending on your settings. Intuit's "Close your books in QuickBooks Desktop" says Desktop allows you to enter transactions that affect the balance of the closed fiscal year, but either says it is not recommended or asks for the closing date password, if one is set. These steps follow Intuit's QuickBooks Online and Desktop pages; in another system, check its own help pages for posting behind a closing date, the report of changes made behind it, and what a back-dated entry does to a completed reconciliation. Post and relock in this order:

1. In QuickBooks Desktop, post each entry through the warning or closing-date password prompt instead of moving the closing date. Intuit's QuickBooks Online page describes that prompt only for changing or deleting transactions dated on or before the lock date, so if a new entry dated there does not save through it, go to step 2.
2. If the date has to move, have an admin do it: Intuit's "Edit your closed books" page says only a primary admin or company admin can change the closing date and password in QuickBooks Online. Put the date back to the same day as soon as the entries are in.
3. Run the exceptions report named above and check that every change it lists is one you made from the list or one the preparer told you they made.
4. Confirm the closing date is where it was, including when the preparer did the posting.

Setting up the lock itself is a separate question.

What if an entry touches a reconciled bank or card account?

Mark every line on a bank, credit card or other account you reconcile, and note its last reconciled statement date. Entries touching only unreconciled or non-cash accounts go in as above. An entry touching a reconciled account needs one more test, because the reconciliation proved the book balance to the statement: Intuit's page on fixing beginning balance issues in QuickBooks Online says a reconciliation's beginning balance should match the ending balance of your last reconciliation. Find the item on the statements:

In QuickBooks Online, after posting, open the next reconciliation and confirm its beginning balance still equals the last ending balance; if it does not, delete the entry you just posted and raise it with the preparer. In another system, check its own documentation first.

While posting, leave reconciled transactions alone. Intuit's beginning-balance page lists among the causes of a discrepancy a reconciled transaction that was edited, deleted, voided, moved or unreconciled, and a transaction dated before the last reconciliation's ending date that was reconciled manually. Post a new entry rather than changing an old one, and do not mark a back-dated entry reconciled in the register. Do not undo a reconciliation to make room: Intuit's page on undoing reconciliations in QuickBooks Online says undoing one is irreversible and permanently deletes associated reports and attachments.

If the preparer confirms that a reconciled transaction was itself wrong, the reconciliation must be revisited; write down why. Intuit's beginning-balance page says that where a fix requires reconciling an individual transaction, marking it R in the register and reconciling again with the same ending date and ending balance as your last reconciliation both correct the beginning balance, but only reconciling again records the change on a reconciliation report. Use that route, then check that the next reconciliation's beginning balance matches.

What does this look like with a real list?

Take accrual-basis books with a calendar year closed and locked, and checking reconciled through its December 31 statement. After sending the trial balance, the owner entered a late December repair bill of 1,200.00, coded to contract labor. The preparer's list, dated December 31:

Each test gives a different result:

• AJE 1. No depreciation is recorded for the year, so post it.
• AJE 2. Repairs show no 1,200.00, but accounts payable holds the same vendor's bill, dated December 29 and coded to contract labor. It is already in the books under another account, so tell the preparer instead of posting it.
• AJE 3. It credits reconciled checking, and neither the December nor the January statement shows the fee. Posting it would put the books 35.00 below the balance the reconciliation proved, so send it back.

Had the January statement, not yet reconciled, shown the fee, you would post AJE 3 on December 31, leave it uncleared, confirm that January's reconciliation still begins at December's ending balance, and clear the fee when you reconcile January.

Balances at December 31, after posting AJE 1 only:

Each difference traces to an entry held back, and checking still matches its reconciliation. The job is finished when the preparer has answered both and a fresh tie-out leaves nothing unexplained.

How do you prove the books now agree with the adjusted trial balance?

Run a tie-out, account by account:

1. Run your trial balance at the adjusted year's end date, on the same accounting basis as the preparer's.
2. Compare every account with the preparer's adjusted trial balance, not only the totals. In the example, a check of total expenses alone would miss the 1,200.00 in the wrong account.
3. Explain each difference as an entry held back and sent to the preparer, something entered after the trial balance went out, or a question for the preparer.
4. Check the first day of the current year: opening retained earnings should have moved by the income effect of the entries you dated into the closed year, plus any lines in them posted directly to retained earnings. Entries carried forward into the current year change retained earnings from their own date.

The tie-out is done when every account agrees or each remaining difference traces to an entry the preparer is answering.

What do you do with an entry you cannot post as written?

Send it back rather than making it post: an account your chart lacks or that could mean two accounts, an entry that does not balance or has an unexplained balancing side, an amount that conflicts with a reconciled balance, or a date your books will not take. Never add an account, a plug figure or your own rewrite to force it through; that hides the question the preparer must answer and leaves your books off the filed figures.

Write back with the entry number, what the books hold (account, date, amount, reference) and what you need: a corrected entry, the account to use, or a revised adjusted trial balance. Post only the version the preparer confirms in writing. Next year, ask for a numbered, dated list in your account names, with the adjusted trial balance.

What do you keep as support for the postings?

These entries have no invoice or receipt behind them, so the preparer's paperwork is their support. IRS Publication 538 says that, in addition to your permanent accounting books, you must keep any other records necessary to support the entries on your books and tax returns. Keep these together:

• The list and the preparer's covering message or instructions
• The adjusted trial balance
• Your tie-out
• Every entry you sent back, with the preparer's answer

Put the preparer's entry number and the date of the list in the memo of each entry you post. Posted entries become part of your books, so review each before it goes in and ask about any you do not understand.

What changes if a lender or investor already has the old figures?

Dating entries into a year whose statements a lender, investor or other outside party already holds makes your books disagree with what they have, so it is not a purely internal act. Establish whether the revised figures have to be sent to them; what is owed to them is a separate question.

What if the adjusted year lives in a former system?

If the adjusted year exists only in a system you have left, and the active one started from opening balances, both records need the adjustment:

1. Post the entries in the former system, on the preparer's dates, if it still takes entries. Intuit's page on moving from QuickBooks Desktop to QuickBooks Online says that after you cancel your Desktop subscription, you keep view-only access to your historical data files locally for 12 months, and only if Desktop is updated to at least QuickBooks Desktop Plus 2024 (Windows) or QuickBooks Desktop for Mac 2024; a view-only file will not take the entries. Keep the list and adjusted trial balance with the archive, stored so they can be opened without that file.
2. In the active system, post the carried-forward form the preparer supplies, dated on its start date: the same balance-sheet lines, with income and expense replaced by retained earnings, because the adjusted year's income and expense already reached the filed return (accrual-basis books only; see the cash-basis limit in the dating section).
3. Run the tie-out on balance-sheet accounts at the start date, with the preparer's help if that date is later than the day after the adjusted year ended.

AJE 1 from the example, in carried-forward form: