QuickBooks Self-Employed is accounting software specially designed for self-employed individuals, such as freelancers, real estate agents, Uber drivers, and independent consultants. It lets you track income and expenses, mileage to and from clients, and file your taxes with its QuickBooks Self-Employed Tax Bundle. It offers three pricing plans that range from $15 to $35 per month.
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What We Recommend QuickBooks Self-Employed For
QuickBooks Self-Employed is popular accounting software for managing business income and expenses, creating invoices on the fly, and tracking mileage. We also recommend it for freelancers and other self-employed individuals who need federal tax support.
You can try it free for 30 days and explore its features before you purchase it.
QuickBooks Self-Employed Is Good For
- Freelancers (3.50 of 5 points): QuickBooks Self-Employed has helpful features for freelancers, such as quarterly tax estimating, automatic mileage tracking, and mobile invoicing. For other popular accounting options for freelancers, read our guide to the best accounting software for freelancers.
- Businesses looking for easy-to-use software: You can set up and use your account quickly with no unnecessary features in its dashboard.
- Businesses looking for a mobile app: Create invoices, automatically track your business mileage, and view your profit or loss on the go with the QuickBooks Self-Employed mobile app. Choose QuickBooks Self-Employed or explore our other best mobile accounting apps.
- Real estate managers and investors: Easily track your self-employed income and expense, including miles driven between your real estate locations. See our guide to Real Estate Accounting Software for other great options for real estate professionals.
QuickBooks Self-Employed Is Not a Good Fit For
- Businesses needing financial statements: While QuickBooks Self-Employed has profit and loss accounts, it doesn’t have a balance sheet or track assets and liabilities.
- Frequent invoicing: QuickBooks Self-Employed doesn’t store customer, product, or service information, so you have to add the recipient and sales information every time you create an invoice. If you need a powerful invoicing solution, check out our review of the best invoicing software.
- Payroll: Another drawback to using QuickBooks Self-Employed is that it has no payroll add-on to help you calculate employee checks or track payroll taxes.
- Growing businesses: QuickBooks Self-Employed is built primarily for freelancers and independent contractors. Since it is a single-entry accounting system, it cannot be rolled over to a double-entry accounting system, such as QuickBooks Online.
Looking for something different? Read our guide to the best small business accounting software and check out our top picks.
| QuickBooks Self-Employed Overview | |
|---|---|
| PROS | CONS |
| Separate business and personal expenses paid from the same bank account | No integrated payroll |
| Track mileage and expenses on the go | Lacks a balance sheet |
| Calculate quarterly estimated tax payments | Can’t track unpaid bills |
| Transfer schedule C information to TurboTax (available in Self-Employed Live Tax Bundle) | Limited invoicing functionality |
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QuickBooks Self-Employed Pricing
QuickBooks Self-Employed has three pricing plans that range from $15 to $35 per month, depending on whether you want tax returns included and live tax assistance from an enrolled agent, certified public accountant (CPA), or lawyer. All of the plans include tracking of income and expenses, tracking of mileage using the mobile app, and invoicing customers.
Pricing & Features | Self-Employed | Self-Employed Tax Bundle | Self-Employed Live Tax Bundle |
|---|---|---|---|
Pricing ($/Month) | $15 | $25 | $35 |
Create Customer Invoices | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
Track Mileage | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
Separate Personal Expenses From Business Expenses | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
Calculate Quarterly Taxes Automatically | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
Pay Quarterly Taxes Online Directly From QuickBooks | N/A | ✔ | ✔ |
Unlimited Live Help From TurboTax Tax Experts | N/A | N/A | ✔ |
TurboTax Tax Experts Can Review Your Final Return | N/A | N/A | ✔ |
QuickBooks Self-Employed Features
QuickBooks Self-Employed includes many features that help you organize your income and expenses. These features include the ability to track your mileage, connect your bank and credit card accounts, separate personal from business expenses, upload receipts, and print profit and loss (P&L) reports.
Its dashboard provides an overview of your important numbers, including profit and loss, expenses, accounts, invoices, mileage, and estimated tax.
QuickBooks Self-Employed’s dashboard.
The QuickBooks Self-Employed dashboard has the following information:
- Left menu bar: Navigate to each area of the program using the left menu bar.
- Profit and loss: View total income and expenses for any timeframe you specify, such as this month, last month, this year, or last year.
- Expenses: View your total expenses for a specified timeframe.
- Accounts: View the current balance of all bank and credit card accounts.
- Invoices: View customer invoices owed to you.
- Mileage: View the total mileage recorded using the QuickBooks Self-Employed mileage tracker app.
- Estimated taxes: Review the estimated taxes you owe, based on an automatic calculation performed by QuickBooks Self-Employed based on the income and expenses you have recorded.
Here’s a quick overview of QuickBooks Self-Employed’s features:
Mileage Tracking
If you drive for business reasons, you can deduct a standard rate per mile or actual vehicle expenses. QuickBooks Self-Employed has a mileage tracker app that you can download on your Android or iOS phone. It will track the start and stop locations for all of your trips automatically.
Here is a screenshot of the QuickBooks Self-Employed mileage tracker app:
QuickBooks Self-Employed Mileage Tracker App.
(Source: Intuit)
Bank Feeds
You can download your bank and credit card transactions directly into your QuickBooks Self-Employed account. From there, you can categorize each transaction to the appropriate expense category or designate it as a personal expense.
Expense Categories
It’s easy to separate your business and personal expenses by setting up a category for personal expenses during the bank account setup. Any payments from your bank account not related to your business should be categorized as personal expenses so that they are not deducted on your tax return.
For example, if you pay your personal mortgage or rent from your business checking account, those transactions will be downloaded automatically into QuickBooks Self-Employed with your banking activity. It’s important that you classify the mortgage or rent payment as a personal expense so that it’s not deducted for tax purposes.
There is no law preventing a Schedule C business from paying personal expenses out of their business checking account, but it isn’t a good practice. It’s better to keep business and personal activity in separate checking accounts with a periodic transfer from your business checking account to your personal account as needed for personal expenses. An IRS audit will go much smoother if the government can see your business activity separate from your personal activity.
Receipt Capture
The QuickBooks Self-Employed mobile app for iPhone and Android allows you to take a picture of a receipt and attach it to a transaction directly from your mobile phone. Not only will this save you time, but it will provide the necessary documentation required by the IRS to deduct an expense.
Quarterly Tax Payment Calculation
Based on the tax profile that you complete during setup, QuickBooks Self-Employed will project your annual profit, calculate your estimated tax payment, and alert you of tax due dates. This valuable tool helps protect you from an underpayment penalty as a result of not making the required quarterly estimated tax payments.
Income and Expense Summary Printing
You can view and print a summary of your taxable income and expenses. If you aren’t subscribing to the Tax Bundle, you can use this summary to input your Schedule C information into a tax program of your choice manually.
Schedule C Import to TurboTax
The QuickBooks Self-Employed Tax Bundle includes a subscription to TurboTax. You can transfer all of your Schedule C information automatically into TurboTax to complete your tax return. You should choose this plan if you prepare your own taxes.
Federal & State Tax Filing
QuickBooks Self-Employed Tax Bundle includes both a federal and state tax return for $120 per year ($10 per month extra). Purchased separately, TurboTax Self-Employed is $120 and does not include the state return.
Quarterly Federal Tax Online Payment
While QuickBooks Self-Employed will calculate your quarterly tax liability, the Tax Bundle allows you to pay the quarterly tax online. QuickBooks Self-Employed Tax Bundle may help avoid a federal underpayment penalty but does not include state estimated tax payments, which might be due depending upon where you live.
Customer Service and Ease of Use
QuickBooks Self-Employed has a newly-designed dashboard that is easy to navigate. It displays six charts that give you an instant view of your financial data. The tabs on the left side of the dashboard make it easy to explore the other features. Meanwhile, Intuit offers multiple customer support options, including a built-in live chat, video tutorials, a help center called Learn & Support, an in-software automated assistant, QuickBooks blogs, and a community forum.
QuickBooks Self-Employed Alternatives
Best for: Most small businesses looking for cloud-based accounting software | Best for: Creating professional-looking invoices | Best for: Businesses looking for a free accounting software with an assisted bookkeeping option |
Software from: $25 | Software from: $15 | Software from: $0 |
Bottom Line
If you are a freelancer or solopreneur with no employees or contractors, QuickBooks Self-Employed was made for you. You can sign up for the standard version and then upgrade to the TurboTax bundle whenever you’re ready.
If you are ready to ditch that Excel spreadsheet and get your income and expenses organized, sign up for a 30-day, risk-free trial of QuickBooks Self-Employed and check it out for yourself.
Jaydra Donaldson
Hi Tim,
Thanks for this review. Very helpful. A few more questions:
1) Do you know if the Tax Bundle option (and its automatic transfer of info into TurboTax) automatically fills in a Form 2210 for the Annualized Income Installment Method (to explain uneven estimated tax payments throughout the year? Which most freelancers have to explain to avoid penalties)?
2) Does the one Federal and one State filing included in the Tax Bundle option cover amendments (Form 1040X)? Or do we have to pay extra to file an amendment?
3) Finally, what happens if we try the software for a year and then decide to cancel? We probably lose access to uploaded receipts, etc. and other information that would come in handy if the IRS decides to audit us 3 years later?
Many thanks in advance,
Jaydra
Tim Yoder
Hi Jaydra,
I’m glad you found my review. As for your questions:
1. TurboTax will not automatically annualize your income on Form 2210, but you will be able to print profit and loss reports in QuickBooks Self-Employed for whatever periods you wish. So, you can print a profit and loss for January – March to determine the business portion of your AGI to input on Form 2210, page 4, Line 1(a).
2. Form 1040X is included with TurboTax. If you purchase the 2019 TurboTax, you can use it to compute and print a 2019 amended return in later years if needed. However, you won’t be able to amend earlier years in the 2019 TurboTax. You’ll need tax software for whatever year you are amending. Amended returns cannot be e-Filed, so another option is doing the amended return by hand if not too complicated.
3. You can export your uploaded receipts by following these instructions. Your data should be available for one year after your cancellation, but I’d recommend downloading all your receipts before cancelling.
I hope this helps!
Tim
Jaydra Donaldson
Thank you, Tim. I appreciate so much your clarity. Another question about your review, if you don’t mind. You write:
“It’s better to keep business and personal activity in separate checking accounts with a periodic transfer from your business checking account to your personal account as needed for personal expenses.”
I do already do this, and facilitate a personal withdrawal between the two accounts via wire transfer each month. But how would QBSE with TurboTax bundle track this? Would I connect both personal and business accounts to QBSE and then let TurboxTax sort it out?
Many thanks,
Jaydra
Tim Yoder
Hi Jaydra,
I’d recommend only connecting the business account to QBSE. Then classify the transfers to your personal account as either “Owner Draws” or personal expenses. I hope this helps!
Tim
Peter Nagel
I am self-employed as a Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist in North Carolina. Is QBSE & TurboTax bundle HIPAA compliant? Is my account information transferred through an encrypted software program?
My wife and I are also co-hosting an Air-B-n-B in our home. Would we be able to include this additional business in QBSE also?
Thanks,
Peter
Tim Yoder
Hi Peter,
Thank you for the question. I’m not sure about HIPAA compliance, but I am confident that QuickBooks and TurboTax both comply with the IRS’ data protection standards. Here is a link to QuickBooks help where the discuss security:
https://quickbooks.intuit.com/learn-support/en-us/new-subscriptions/how-secure-is-online-banking-through-quickbooks/00/186296
As for the Air-B-n-B, a weakness of all the QB Online products, including self-employed, is that each account can only handle one business activity. You definitely don’t want to combine your practice into the same business activity as your BnB. You might want to check out some free software for your BnB activity:
https://fitsmallbusiness.com/best-quickbooks-alternative/
One more suggestion for your practice. If you file a separate tax return for the business (such as 1120S or 1065) you may wish to use QuickBooks Online instead of Quickbooks Self Employed so that you can generate a balance sheet in addition to an income statement. If your business is reported on schedule C of your personal return, then you aren’t required to have a balance sheet.
I hope this information helps!
Tim
Shalene
Everything I read says that with QB Self Employed, I should be able to run a Profit & Loss Report. I have looked and clicked EVERYWHERE, and don’t seem to have that option.
Any ideas?
Crystalynn Shelton
Hey Shalene!
I looked at my QuickBooks Self-Employed test account and I could not locate the Profit & Loss Report either! Did you try to contact the support team at Intuit? If not, that’s what I would recommend. There should be a profit and loss available in this program according to the list of features on the Intuit website. You can contact the Intuit support team to get them to help you.
Let me know how it turns out. I’m curious as to where they have that report hidden..lol
Crystalynn Shelton
Shalene
I’ve been in contact with them. So far, I just get the run around. It’s all VERY frustrating. The keep telling me that we don’t have the Self Employed. I keep telling them that it says right here on the statement/ receipt that I do.
They did recommend this- (That didn’t work, of course. Maybe it will for you, or others)
“To double-check, go to Report in the left navigation panel and click View. I’ve attached a screenshot for additional reference.
If you’re still unable to see any report, let’s check if the browser’s cache is causing the data not to load up. To isolate the issue, you’ll need to switch to private browsing mode.
A private browser does not store files and history from previously visited sites. Here’s a list of the keyboard shortcuts depending on the browser you’re using:
Safari: press Command + Shift + N
Google Chrome: press Ctrl + Shift + N
Mozilla Firefox: press Ctrl + Shift + P
Internet Explorer: press Ctrl + Shift + P
If this works, you can go back to your regular browser and clear the cache. You can check out this article for the detailed steps:
How do I clear the temporary Internet files and cache?
https://d2gcv4sxt84gxu.cloudfront.net/uploads/assets/101647/original.PNG?1523584321
Please update me as to how things go. I’m here to find another way out.”
I’ll let you know how it all turns out.
Crystalynn Shelton
Hi Shalene, first of all I’m really sorry that you have had so many issues with getting this resolved. I decided to send out a Tweet to see if anyone else had experienced an issue with running the Profit and Loss Report in QuickBooks Self-Employed. As a result, someone from the Intuit Customer Support team responded to me! I’m working with that person to see if he/she can help me locate the report in my account. I would be happy to provide the step by step instructions to you or better yet have them contact you directly. Can you send me an email so that I can have them reach out to you? My email is: cshelton@fitsmallbusiness.com. You can also follow me on Twitter @CrystalynnPens.
Have a great weekend!
Best-
Crystalynn Shelton
Nichole
I need to cancel my subscription! I hit the button to cancel it 2 mo this ago and I’m still getting charged monthly how can I receive my money back and stop further payments
Laura Handrick
Hi Nichole,
Here are the instructions to cancel a QuickBooks account, but if you’ve already tried that, then consider going online to the website, and use the online Chat feature or email support feature (from the website) to ask them to help you cancel your QuickBooks account.
Good luck.
Cancellations
Cancellations QuickBooks Online software is guaranteed easy. If you want to, you can cancel your subscription from within QuickBooks Online:
Sign in to QuickBooks Online as normal
Click Your Account (towards the top right of the window)
Click Cancel Your Subscription (near the right side of the screen)
Follow the instructions on-screen to cancel your subscription
If you cancel within your free 30 day trial period, you won’t be charged anything. If you’re a paying subscriber and you cancel your subscription to QuickBooks Online Service for any reason, Intuit is unable to provide you with a pro-rata refund for the rest of the month that you paid for up front. You will continue to get the QuickBooks Online Service for the remainder of the month you paid for which is when the cancellation of the subscription is made effective and when you will no longer have access to the service.
Aline Roy
Hi Crystalynn, I currently use quickbooks desktop pro 2018 but like a lot of the features of this self-employed program, mile tracker etc. If I were to use quick books self-employed could I intergrade with my quickbooks pro? Thank you
Crystalynn Shelton
Hey Aline! That’s a good question. Unfortunately QuickBooks Self Employed will not integrate with any of the QuickBooks desktop products. It is a standalone product. In addition, it does not have many of the features that QuickBooks Desktop has, like the ability to manage your bills. QuickBooks Self Employed also has limited reports available. Before you decide to make the switch, make sure that you can do everything you need to in QBSE.
Thanks so much for reading!
Crystalynn Shelton