Bank of America .QBO file not working in QuickBooks
There is a specific reason this bank trips people up more than most. Intuit's
institution directory does not hold one Bank of America entry. It holds four,
under four different names, with four different id numbers — and only one of them is the
Web Connect entry that a .QBO import will accept.
🔒 Build a .QBO with the right codes — drop in a Bank of America CSV or statement and the Web Connect header is written for you. Free, runs in your browser, nothing uploaded.
The four Bank of America entries, and which one is right
These are the rows as Intuit's own directory lists them, verbatim:
| Listed in the directory as | Id | Use it for a .QBO import? |
|---|---|---|
Bank of America - QB WebConnect | 11162, also 5358 | Yes — this is the Web Connect entry |
Bank of America - CashPro | 71648 | No. CashPro is the corporate cash-management platform, a different product |
Bank of America QBDT | 71659 | No |
zzz-Bank of America - New | 69546 | No. The zzz- prefix is how the directory parks entries it has retired |
The same number goes in both the FID and the INTU.BID
field of the file. Where two ids are listed, as here, the second is a fallback: if
11162 is refused, 5358 is the one to try next.
Why the wrong entry produces “cannot verify the financial institution”
A Web Connect file announces its bank in its header. QuickBooks checks that announcement against the directory it ships with, and if the pair does not resolve to an institution it recognises for this purpose, it stops and says it cannot verify the financial institution. The statement data inside the file is usually perfectly good. The rejection is about the label on the envelope, not the contents — which is why the error feels so disproportionate to what is actually wrong. There is a fuller account of that error, and the codes for every other institution are on the FID and INTU.BID lookup.
If Bank of America gave you a CSV instead of a .QBO
Bank of America's download screens offer several formats, and which ones appear depends on
the account and on how you reached the page, so it is common to end up with a CSV when
QuickBooks wanted Web Connect. A CSV holds the same transactions; what it lacks is the
.QBO envelope — the header naming the institution, and a unique id on every
transaction. Converting the CSV writes both, using the Web Connect
codes above. The CSV to QBO guide covers the
mechanics in general, and the CSV format
requirements cover what QuickBooks expects when importing a CSV directly instead.
If the file imports but no transactions appear
That is a different problem with the same bank, and nothing to do with the codes. Every
transaction in a .QBO carries a unique id, QuickBooks records the ones it has
seen, and silently skips repeats — then reports the account as up to date.
Re-importing a Web Connect file explains
what to do.
A caution about any code list, including this one
Intuit changes the directory without notice, and the four entries above are what it held when the data was last fetched, not a permanent fact. If a code here is refused and a different one works, the one that works is correct and this page is stale. We are not affiliated with Bank of America or with Intuit, and nothing here is endorsed by either.
Sources
- Intuit's QuickBooks financial institution directory, fidir.txt — the four entries and their ids are read directly from it.
- The same directory, searchable, for institutions other than this one.