Intuit Intelligence Books Close Automation: The Setup Path That Works
Firms running Books close in Intuit Accountant Suite can hand routine month-end work to Intuit Intelligence, with admin roles and review steps required.
Accounting firms that manage client books in QuickBooks Online now have a dedicated place to send routine month-end work: Intuit Intelligence, the assistant built into Intuit Accountant Suite. Its Books close automation runs in the background, drafts the routine entries and reviews, and then stops short of finality. Every drafted action waits for a person to approve it. The setup path is specific, and two gates decide whether a firm can use the feature at all.
Two gates before anything else
Books close automation is not a switch inside the client file. It lives on the firm side, and it is available only when the firm has added Books close to Intuit Accountant Suite Core or Accelerate. The second gate is role based: onboarding requires Primary Admin or Company Admin rights. Firms that hit a dead end in the menus can usually trace it to one of those two, the entitlement or the role, rather than to anything wrong in the client’s books.
Onboard the client close
From Intuit Accountant Suite, go to Work, then Books close, and select Onboard close client. The onboarding screen walks through a short series of decisions. Under Select client & close period, pick the client and the period. Under Template settings, choose a Close template. Under Select close assignees, name a Preparer, a Reviewer, and an Approver. The final card, Close books faster at scale, is where automation gets its invitation: leave it Enabled and the client is set up to use automation, with the card listing the Books close skills that automation covers. Turn it off and the client is onboarded without automation, which can be changed later. Finish with Save and start close to begin the period right away, or Save to stage the close for another day.
Turn automation on for the client
Automation is opted into per client, and there are two routes to switch it on. Open the client’s books close engagement from Books close by selecting Open for the client and period, then open the Automations menu. That menu reads 0 active when automation is off, and Add automation brings the client into the automated pool. The second route runs through the Streamline your books close process banner on the Books close page: select Automate books close, and in the Automate your Books close workflow window choose Add clients now. That opens Manage client automations, where you search for and select the clients you want automated; selected clients show as Active. Select Apply and the engagement picks up automation.
What lands in Needs attention
Once automation is running, Intuit Intelligence reviews the books and drafts actions rather than executing them. The drafts surface in the engagement under Needs attention. Each item carries an action such as Post, Review, View duplicates, or View depreciation. Open the item, look over the details the assistant prepared, then approve, post, or send the work. Write-offs get a shortcut: review each item one by one, or use Send all and let the batch go without item level review. When an item is finished, mark it complete so it clears the queue.
Skills, schedules, and running on demand
The automation is built from skills, and firms can manage them directly. From a client’s Automations menu, Manage skills opens the Skills page. Under Enabled skills, each card shows what the skill does, how many clients it runs for, and its schedule. Run executes a skill immediately, View shows its details and past runs, and Create builds a new skill from scratch. That last option is how a firm tailors the close beyond the defaults, for instance aligning a recurring review with its own internal calendar.
Subscription status and the audit log
Firm administrators get two more levers under Books close, Settings, and the Subscription status tab. The page shows firm-wide active clients, actively automated clients, and a list of clients with each subscription status. Add or Remove changes automation for a single client, and Add Close client onboards someone new. The Actions menu holds Manage automations, which changes which clients are automated across the firm, and View audit log, which keeps a record of the actions the assistant has taken. That log is the paper trail to check whenever a drafted entry looks unfamiliar.
The design keeps a person between the draft and the books. Intuit Intelligence handles the routine drafting, but the approve button stays with the Preparer, Reviewer, and Approver named during onboarding. The practical read for firms weighing it: the automation removes the drafting, not the judgment.