Basics of Fixing QuickBooks Balance Sheet Out of Balance

Adam Henry
3 min readFeb 13, 2024

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A balanced balance sheet in QuickBooks Desktop is necessary for financial insights and well-informed decision-making. Imagine looking over the company’s accounts and discovering that certain liabilities and assets do not add up. This discrepancy could have an impact on the financial records. Triggering the QuickBooks Balance Sheet Out of Balance error. In this guide, we’ll explore the reasons behind Balance Sheet issues and step-by-step instructions to help you quickly fix them.

While trying to manage independently could seem like a quick fix, there are risks involved.

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What Causes Balance Sheet Out of Balance Error in QuickBooks

Our QuickBooks finance specialists have identified the following as the most prevalent causes of this issue.

  1. Damaged Company Data File: Discrepancies in the balance sheet may result from corrupted or damaged QuickBooks data files.
  2. Incompatible Links or Transactions: Balance sheet issues may arise from links or transactions added into QuickBooks that are incompatible with the current data.
  3. Making Use of the Multiple Currencies Feature: Using different currencies in QuickBooks can cause complications that could lead to differences in balance sheets.

The following blogs can help you: Understanding and Troubleshooting QuickBooks Error PS038

How to Troubleshoot an QB Balance Sheet Out of Balance Error

Now that the causes have been determined, let’s examine the steps that are required.

Step 1: Use an accrual basis for running the report.

  1. Choose Company & Financial and then Balance Sheet Summary from the Reports menu.
  2. Click on Customize Report.
  3. Select Accrual under Report Basis on the Display tab.
  4. Click OK.

Step 2: Imbalance Date

  1. Go to Company & Financials, then Balance Sheet Summary from the Reports menu.
  2. Customize the report.
  3. Take note of the Dates dropdown and choose All under the Display tab.
  4. Select either Cash or Accrual under Report Basis, based on the state of the balance sheet.
  5. Select Year from the Display columns by the dropdown menu in the Columns section.
  6. To find the imbalance date, compare Total Assets to Total Liabilities & Equity.
  7. Go through steps 1–6 again, choosing Month, Week, and Day in order.

Once you have the imbalance date, move on to Step 3.

Step 3: Find Problematic Transactions:

  1. For the specified date, create a Custom Transaction Detail report.
  2. To see Transaction Detail, navigate to Reports and then Custom Report.
  3. Specify the range of dates.
  4. Select an appropriate basis (cash or accrual).
  5. Uncheck Account, Split, Clr, and Class in the Columns section. Choose the Amount. As a result, the report will be simpler to read. Pick the column labeled Paid Amount.
  6. To determine which transactions are generating the imbalance, go over the report.

Step 4: Modify Dates of Transactions:

  1. After troublesome transactions are found, move their dates forward 20 years.
  2. Keep a record of every transaction.
  3. If all went well, the Paid Amount should be zero when you refresh the report.
  4. To re-link the transaction dates, go back to the initial dates.

Step 5: Remove and Re-enter Transactions (Only if Needed)

Try deleting and re-entering the transactions if changing the dates doesn’t fix the issue.

Read More: 6 Easy Solution to fix QuickBooks Unexpected Error 5

For effective financial management, a balanced balance sheet must be maintained in QuickBooks. The QuickBooks Balance Sheet Out of Balance error could be resolved with the above guide. By understanding the reasons behind balance sheet issues. Then, apply the above-mentioned troubleshooting techniques into practice. But after taking the above-mentioned steps, if the balance sheet is still unbalanced, Connect with +18557380359 QuickBooks Professionals to learn more about Advanced troubleshooting.

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