A guide to switching to FreeAgent
This article explains how to bring your accounting data to FreeAgent from another accounting software or from manual record-keeping such as spreadsheets.
Read on to find out how to bring your accounting data to FreeAgent. Alternatively, watch our Switching to FreeAgent webinar.
Whether you’re switching to FreeAgent from spreadsheets or another software package, following these four steps will help you get fully set up and ready to start using FreeAgent.
- Gather the relevant data from your previous system
- Set up your FreeAgent account
- Enter your accounting data into FreeAgent
- Check your numbers match your old system
Useful tip: you can select the blue Help button at the bottom of the screen if you need assistance entering the information in FreeAgent. However, if you’re unsure what information you need to enter, please speak to your accountant for assistance. If you’re not currently working with an accountant, you may wish to find one in our accountant and bookkeeper directory.
1. Gather the relevant data from your previous system
To make the transition as seamless as possible, we’d recommend that you have the following information to hand which you can export or gather from your previous system:
- Company registration number (if your business is a limited company)
- Key accounting dates such as your business start date and accounting year-end date
- Trial balance or a report of all your business’s accounts dated the day before you wish to start your bookkeeping in FreeAgent (most important)
- Exported list of contacts (names and email addresses of customers and suppliers)
- Details of individual debtors and creditors (how much money is owed to the business and owed to suppliers)
- Bank statements from your online banking to add bank transactions in FreeAgent
- Business logo if you’d like to personalise your invoices (optional)
For advice on extracting data from other software packages or spreadsheets, please refer to your previous software provider.
2. Set up your FreeAgent account to get a head start
Once you have the relevant information to hand from your previous system, you can sign up for FreeAgent and follow the steps below to set up your account. If you’ve already set up your account, read how to view and edit your business details and accounting dates.
It's important to select the appropriate business type when creating your account as this cannot be changed later. Read about choosing the appropriate business type and category.
Setting up your account involves entering your accounting dates, Sales Tax details and banking details.
Useful tip: if you don’t have your business’s Sales Tax or banking details to hand, you can skip these steps and add them later.
Entering your accounting dates
You’ll need to enter your business’s key accounting dates. These are:
- your business start date
- your first accounting year-end date, which is the date that you want FreeAgent to prepare your first accounting year to.
- your FreeAgent start date, which is the date you want to start your bookkeeping in FreeAgent from
Entering Sales Tax details
Next, you have the option to enter the business’s Sales Tax details.
- If your business isn’t registered for Sales Tax, or you don't have the details to hand and want to enter these later, choose 'Not Registered' from the ‘Registered for Sales Tax’ drop-down menu.
- If your business is registered for Sales Tax, choose 'Registered' from the 'Registered for Sales Tax’ drop-down menu and enter the relevant details. Please note that if you are registered for Sales Tax and want to enter your details at a later date, you’ll need to enter these details before issuing your first invoice.
Entering banking details
Banking is one of the most important features in FreeAgent.
The software prepares your business’s accounts based on the explanations you give for the money paid into and out of your business bank accounts. FreeAgent’s Guess feature is powered by AI to help you nail the daily admin by automatically categorising new bank transactions based on existing information in your FreeAgent account.
Read more about how to set up your FreeAgent account.
3. Enter your accounting data into FreeAgent
Once you’ve set up your FreeAgent account, the next step is to enter your accounting data into FreeAgent as at your chosen FreeAgent start date.
This includes your contacts, opening balances, which are the amounts that your business has in each of its accounts at the start of your FreeAgent start date, and your relevant business bank transactions. You can also enter additional data such as projects and historical data if you wish.
Useful tip: you don't need to enter everything immediately - start simple, and you can add more later.
Entering opening balances
When switching to FreeAgent from another software package or spreadsheets, you'll have some opening balances to enter when you start using FreeAgent. These need to be entered so that FreeAgent can include them in your accounting reports and keep your records accurate. This may include some or all of the following:
- Money your customers owe you (your accountant might call this ‘trade debtors’)
- Money you owe to your suppliers (your accountant might call this ‘trade creditors’)
- The balance(s) on your bank account(s)
- Opening share capital
- Reserves of retained profits or losses your business has built up over the years
- The balance(s) on outstanding loans
Useful tip: you should be able to generate a report to view your trial balance as at your FreeAgent start date from your previous software or spreadsheets, which will contain the balances you need to enter in FreeAgent.
Your accountant should be able to advise which entries you need to record in your FreeAgent account. Please note that our support team can’t help you with this as we’re not authorised to provide accounting advice.
Customers and suppliers are both called contacts in FreeAgent and need to be added in order to create invoices, estimates, bills and projects. Therefore, you may wish to import your contacts before entering opening balances so that you can then assign individual monies owed to the relevant contact.
You can import your opening balances into FreeAgent as of your FreeAgent start date using our downloadable template or from your own .CSV file. Alternatively, you can enter them manually.
Entering business bank transactions
The quickest and easiest way to import your bank transactions into FreeAgent is by uploading bank statements. Alternatively, you can enter transactions manually.
If your bank account is with a challenger bank such as Monzo, Starling Bank or Revolut, you can set up an integration.
After your bank transactions have been imported or uploaded, you'll be able to view them in the Banking area of FreeAgent and explain them, which tells FreeAgent what each transaction relates to. Once you’ve started explaining transactions, FreeAgent’s popular Guess feature will attempt to explain your transactions automatically to save you time going forwards and reduce the risk of data entry errors.
Additional data that can be entered
Whilst not essential, you can also enter the following data into FreeAgent if you need to:
- Historical sales invoices or bills (supplier invoices) using a third-party integration such as AutoEntry, Dext, Fabio or Zapier.
- Historical expenses in bulk by using a template.
- Projects from .CSV file or Basecamp.
Please note that you would only bring data into FreeAgent that occurred on or after your FreeAgent start date.
4. Check your numbers match your old system
Nearly there! Before you dive in and start using FreeAgent, it’s worth checking that the figures in FreeAgent match the figures from your previous system. We’d recommend checking that:
- your opening balances are correct
- your bank transactions have been uploaded from a bank statement. Read about matching your FreeAgent bank balance to your bank account balance.
Useful tip: compare the figures on your trial balance in FreeAgent with the trial balance or report of all your accounts in your previous system. If they match, you’ve entered all the relevant data from your previous software or spreadsheets into FreeAgent.
If you’re unsure whether your figures in FreeAgent are correct, please speak to your accountant so they can verify the figures for you. If your accountant doesn’t currently use FreeAgent, you can add them as a user.
If you’re not currently working with an accountant, you may wish to find one in our accountant and bookkeeper directory.
Next steps
Great job! You’ve completed the switch and you’re ready to manage your finances and make every move count with FreeAgent’s award-winning accounting software.
To see the time-saving benefits of FreeAgent in action, try:
- adding users such as admins, finance clerks, bookkeepers or employees, and set permission levels
- adding a logo, connecting a payment solution and creating a custom invoice theme, before sending your first invoice
- using Smart Capture to automatically extract the date and amount from your receipts.
- approving and explaining bank transactions in bulk
Useful resources
Now that you’re set up with FreeAgent, you might find the following articles useful:
- An introduction to FreeAgent terminology
- About FreeAgent’s Radar feature
- Manage your business on the go using the FreeAgent mobile app
- FreeAgent efficiency hacks for busy businesses
- FreeAgent automations to get you paid faster
- Business planning in FreeAgent
You’ll also find a link to sign up for one of our live ‘Getting Started’ webinars on our Getting Started page.