Maintaining QuickBooks data file

Software: QuickBooks

 

Data file is like your car engine, after using for sometime, you need to do maintenance.

Damage to the data file could be due to:

  • Links between data table was not properly remove when a transaction was deleted.
  • Data file was not properly shut down
  • User not properly log out.
  • Systems hung
  • Power failure while using QuickBooks
  • Network loss connection

 There are many other reasons that may cause a data file damage. Some databases may do a self-maintenance; some may require doing a manual data maintenance.

How to do maintenance in QuickBooks?

Before maintaining your file, you should to do a backup; anything can go wrong in the process of maintenance. As a layman, we may not know how to trouble shoot when problem gets more complicated.

Next, you should move your data file down to your local hard drive. Don’t run maintenance over the network. This may corrupt the data file if there is a loss of network between your computer and the server. You may slow down the network if your file is too big or may get error message such as ‘insufficient disk space’ if your server storage space is limited.

When you are ready, go to file menu, select Utilities, and follow by Verify data. This process is to check for errors in your QuickBooks data file. Take note of any error messages prompted. Error message usually will begin with a ‘C=’ value.

After your verification of data, go to file menu, select Utilities and follow by Rebuild data. Rebuild data will help repairing your data file. Before rebuild of data, QuickBooks will prompt you to backup your data file, follow the instruction and backup your file; remember, do not overwrite your previous backup file, you should give it a new name (if you are using QuickBooks 2009/10, the backup file will have a date and time stamp after your company/file name). Rebuilding data stage is very important ensure it completed without errors.

Lastly, do a verify data again. At the end of verification, ensure there is no error found. If error still found on second verification, you should contact the QuickBooks technician to repair your data file.

Once maintenance completed, copy it back to your original location.

You should try running QuickBooks maintenance monthly, for those data file that is more than 100 MB, maintaining your data file fortnightly may be required.