Turning on Multi-currency in BILL, QBO & Expensify: Read this First

There are many factors involved in enabling multi-currency in BILL. Make sure you’re aware of the functionality before turning it on: it cannot be disabled.

Multi-currency in BILL

• Once the multi-currency feature is enabled in BILL, it cannot be disabled 
• Requires turning on multi-currency in QBO
• Vendor records (name, address, etc) need to be updated to the desired currency
  • If the vendor has already been paid in USD, it’s locked down, and you will need to create a second vendor to enter bills in a different currency.
  • You can simply use the same name on both, and put USD after one and the other currency code after the other.
  • You can still use the identical proper name in the “Pay To” field
  • Do not merge these vendors, or you will create sync errors.
• Multi-currency is not supported with recurring bills
• USD equivalent for your foreign currency bill payments will be deducted from your bank account

Multi-currency in QBO

• Once the multi-currency feature is enabled in QBO, it cannot be disabled
• You will set a Home currency for QBO
• The Currency list will be added to QBO, and the exchange rates are updated every four hours from Wall Street on Demand
• Chart of Accounts, Customers, and Vendors are assigned a native currency; once a transaction is posted to it, you can no longer change its currency
• Any different exchange rates on a bill transaction vs a bill payment transaction will be recorded to the Exchange Gain or Loss account in QBO
• Reports convert all foreign currency to Home currency amounts and automatically reflect exchange rate changes.
• Exchange rates used by BILL or QBO can be overridden at the transaction-level in QBO
• “Home currency adjustments” recalculate the home currency value, not the foreign currency units
• Behind the scenes, QuickBooks records every transaction in both the home and foreign currency and captures the currency and exchange rate for each transaction. You can modify a Transaction Journal report to show both entries behind the scenes of the transaction by adding the Currency, Exchange Rate, and Foreign Debit and Credit columns.

Contact Redmond Accounting for a demo account of QuickBooks Online Multi-currency to test or think through any workflows. We have access for training purposes and can walk through it with you.

Multi-currency in Expensify

Expensify employs multi-currency functionality line-by-line and converts to dollars on their expense reports. So all Expensify amounts will be pushed to QBO 1:1 in USD.