Importing transactions
You can import invoices, expenses and credit notes (transactions from here on out) from other accounting systems into Quaderno using our CSV template.
You can do this at set-up time or as a normal Quaderno process after initial set-up, as many times as you'd like.
To import your transactions, follow these steps:
- Go to the invoices, credit notes, or expenses page, depending on what transactions you’re importing, and click Import.
- Drag & drop your CSV file in the modal window.
CSV columns breakdown
The fields contact_name, description and total_amount are required. All other fields are optional, you can either complete them, leave them empty or remove them as you wish.
| Column | Description |
|---|---|
| contact_name | The contact’s name. If they do not already exist in Quaderno a new contact will be created. This field is used to find duplicates. |
| email_address | The contact’s email address. |
| address_line_1 | The contact’s address (first line). |
| address_line_2 | The contact’s address (second line). |
| city | The contact’s city. |
| postal_code | The contact’s postal code. |
| region | The contact’s region, province, or state. |
| country | The contact’s country (2-letter ISO code). Defaults to your account country. |
| tax_id | The contact’s tax ID. |
| document_number | Invoice or credit note number. Defaults to your current sequence in your account. |
| document_date | Date of creation. Must be entered in the format dd/mm/yyyy. Defaults to the current date. |
| reference | An additional reference number (e.g. payment processor transaction id). |
| currency | Currency of the amounts (3-letter ISO code). Defaults to your accounting currency. |
| description | Description of the product or service on the invoice. |
| total_amount | Total amount of the transaction with taxes included, e.g. 120.00 |
| quantity | Number of items of the product sold. Defaults to 1. |
| unit_price | Net price for each item. Mandatory if total_amount isn’t specified. E.g. 99.00 |
| discount_rate | The discount percentage you want to apply to the document. Enter to 2 decimal places, without the % sign, e.g. 10.00 |
| tax_1_name | The name of the tax rate applied to the transaction. |
| tax_1_rate | The tax rate to be applied to the transaction. Enter to 2 decimal places, without the % sign, e.g. 20.00 |
| tax_2_name | The name of the additional tax rate applied to the transaction. |
| tax_2_rate | The additional tax rate to be applied to the transaction. Enter to 2 decimal places, without the % sign, e.g. 20.00 |
| tax_country | The tax country (2-letter ISO code) to be applied to the transaction. |
| tax_class | Tax class to be applied to the transaction. Defaults to your default tax class in the preferences page. |
| payment_date | Payment receipt date, only if the document has been paid. Must be in the format dd/mm/yyyy. |
| payment_method | Specify how your document was paid: creditcard, paypal, cash, wiretransfer, direct_debit or other. Defaults to other. |
Pro tips for a successful CSV import
- The CSV file cannot contain more than 500 rows and its maximum size is 300kb. If the file contains more than 500 rows or is larger than 300kb, you would just have to split this into multiple files to import.
- Leave the header row intact.
- Do not remove any mandatory columns.
- If copying from another system, make sure you use the same column headings, or change them to match.
- If you use a spreadsheet application such as Excel or Google Sheets to create your CSV file, ensure that the application is not auto-configuring some fields into dates in strange formats or they will not be read correctly.
- Special number formats are required for businesses based in Germany, France, Spain or Norway – use the comma as a decimal mark (e.g. 999.99 -> 999,99).
- Date format must be dd/mm/yyyy. Double check this prior to import as your system may be set-up differently depending on localisation and other settings. You may need to reformat the date cells in your spreadsheet.
- Quaderno uses the contact_name field to determine whether or not a customer or a vendor already exists. If the name is not spelled correctly or doesn’t already exist, Quaderno will create a new contact. In other words, this field is used to find duplicates.
- If a contact already exists and you specify email or address details, Quaderno will override the existing info and replace it with the latest.