INTEGRATIONS · INTUIT QUICKBOOKS
Intuit QuickBooks, Wired to the Claim
A claims operation bills from its claims. Without a connection, somebody types each invoice twice: once from the time and expenses on the claim, and again in the ledger your bookkeeper closes the month in.
VCA Software builds service invoices from the time and expenses logged on each claim and exports them to Intuit QuickBooks, so each invoice is entered once.
- Out: The Service Invoice, to Intuit QuickBooks.
- Without it: an invoice is keyed twice, once from the claim and once in the ledger.
IN THE CLAIM
Billable work happens on a claim long before it closes
An adjuster logs a site visit. A mileage expense goes on a claim that a client will be billed for later. Each one is a fact about the claim and a line on an invoice at the same time, and it has to read the same way in both systems.
ONE INVOICE, FOUR STAGES
- Logged on the ClaimAdjusters log time and expenses directly in the claim, under activity codes and billable expenses that can be set up for each client.
- Invoiced From the ClaimVCA builds the service invoice from those entries, with the client's rate or fee schedule and any co-insurer split applied.
- Exported to QuickBooksThe invoice goes to QuickBooks, where your books are kept.
- Payouts From the Same NumbersThe same invoices are the basis for adjuster payout reports, with the payout parameters you set.
WHAT MOVES
What Posts, and What Stays Put
Direction decides who administers what. Your finance team keeps the chart of accounts in QuickBooks, your claims team keeps the claim in VCA, and neither learns the other's software to finish its own work. How invoices export and which accounts they land in are worked out with your controller in discovery, the first step of every implementation, before anything is configured.
| What | Which Way | Where It Lands |
|---|---|---|
| Service Invoices | Out of the claim | Invoices in QuickBooks, built from the time and expenses logged on the claim. |
| The Claim Record | Stays in ClaimsCore | Reserve history, notes, documents, correspondence, and who did what when. |
| Your Chart of Accounts | Stays in QuickBooks | Which accounts an invoice lands in is your controller's call. |
WHO FEELS IT
Three people touch this connection
Only one of them works claims for a living, which is why a finance integration tends to get evaluated last and complained about first.
- The BookkeeperStops retyping invoices that were already built on the claim. An afternoon of transcription becomes a review of invoices that arrived from VCA.
- The ControllerGets invoices built from the claim's own time and expense entries, with the client's rate or fee schedule already applied, instead of somebody's spreadsheet of them.
- The Claims ManagerGets asked fewer billing questions. The time and expenses on the claim are what the invoice is built from, so a billing query stops being a claims call.
OFF THE DESK
What Comes Off the Bookkeeper's Desk
None of it is glamorous, and all of it sets a ceiling on how many claims an operation can carry before it adds an administrator.
- Rekeying an invoice into the accounting system after it was already built on the claim.
- The bridge spreadsheet that exists only to carry billable hours from the claims system to the books.
- Billing rules from memory, where an adjuster has to remember which client allows which expense.
- The month-end hunt for which hours belonged to which claim, and which client they get billed to.
THE BOUNDARY
Two Layers That Agree with Each Other
The claims layer and the finance layer stay separate on purpose. VCA's goal is not to replace your accounting system. The claim holds the time, the expenses and the invoice built from them; QuickBooks holds how the business records it. When an invoice line is questioned, the answer is the claim behind it, with the entries already there.
It also means nothing in your finance stack gets ripped out to make room for claims. QuickBooks stays where it is, and ClaimsCore is the claims layer beside it.
Start the Connectivity ConversationHow Implementation Runs →
WHAT TO BRING TO THE CONNECTIVITY CONVERSATION
The person who owns the chart of accounts, a sample invoice in the form your ledger expects, and your clients' fee schedules, which is enough to walk one invoice through both layers.
Questions Finance Teams Ask About This One
Does VCA replace QuickBooks?
No. QuickBooks stays the accounting system and VCA stays the claims layer: its goal is not to replace your accounting system. The invoice is built on the claim from the work recorded there, and exported to QuickBooks, where it is accounted for.
What ends up in QuickBooks, and what never leaves the claim?
The service invoices. VCA builds each invoice from the time and expenses logged on the claim, with the client's rate or fee schedule applied, and exports it to QuickBooks. Claim content stays in VCA: the reserve history, the notes, the documents, the correspondence. Your bookkeeper does not work inside claims and your adjusters do not work inside the ledger.
What does an accountant see on their side?
Invoices in the ledger they already close the month in, each built from a claim's logged time and expenses. Nobody retypes an invoice from a claims screen.
Who owns the chart of accounts?
Your finance team does. Which accounts an invoice lands in is a finance decision, made by the people who close the books.
Is this the same as DataBridge?
No. The QuickBooks connection exports the service invoices VCA builds from each claim. DataBridge is a separate VCA add-on that delivers your claims data into your own data warehouse, on a schedule you set, where it can sit beside your financial data for reporting.
We run something other than QuickBooks. Now what?
Sage and Bill.com take the same service invoice export. Claim transactions are stored on the claim and reachable through VCA's APIs, so a custom API connection can link the claim to the accounting system you run. Bring the chart of accounts and a sample invoice to the connectivity conversation.
Bring us a claim where the promise was hard to keep
Pick an invoice your operation sent last month and trace it back to the claim it was billed from. It makes a shorter meeting than a feature list, and settles more.
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