If you used a default QuickBooks template when you created your Chart of Accounts, or someone else worked on the QuickBooks file before it became your responsibility, there is a good possibility that there are accounts in your chart that are not being used. The existence of unused accounts creates opportunities to make mistakes, is confusing, and makes data entry difficult. By removing unused accounts, your work will be more consistent.

In the example below, only "Sales" appears as "Income" on the Profit and Loss report.

Neither "Other Inc" nor " Uncategorized income" appear on the Profit and Loss report under "Income". They are therefore unused and can be deleted from the Chart of Accounts.

All income and expense transactions are applied to accounts in your standard Profit and Loss report for all dates. All Balance Sheet transactions are applied to accounts in your standard Balance Sheet report. Any account appearing in your Chart of Accounts that does not appear on a Profit and Loss or Balance Sheet report has not been used and can be deleted.

Procedure:

1) Create a standard Profit and Loss report by clicking on "Reports", "Comany & Financials", "Profit & Loss Standard" on the menu bar. The Profit & Loss report will open.

2) Click on the downward-pointing arrow to the right of the "Dates" field at the
top of the report.

3) Scroll up the drop-down list and select "All".

4) Print out the report by clicking the "Print" button on the menu bar of the Profit & Loss report window.

5) Open your Chart of Accounts by clicking the "Accts" icon on the icon bar.

6) Scroll down to the first income account on your Chart of Accounts.

7) If the name of the first income account on your Chart of Accounts does not appear on the Profit and Loss report, that account should be deleted.

8) To delete the account, click the"Account" button in the bottom left hand corner of your Chart of Accounts window. Then select "Delete" from the pop-up list.

9) Move down to the next account in the list and check if that one appears on your Profit and Loss report.

10) If it does, continue down the Chart of Accounts until you find the next income or expense account which does not appear on the Profit & Loss report and delete it.

11) Repeat the process until you have deleted all unused income and expense accounts.

12) After you delete the unused income and expense accounts from the Chart of Accounts, do the same with your Balance Sheet accounts.

Note: QuickBooks will not delete an account if there are transactions applied to it. Therefore you will not lose any financial information by trying to delete an account.