Keep track of all those old financials and tax return files.

Many people keep their tax returns and file them in case they may need them in the future. This information is critical in a couple of different ways. They are useful for next year's return and proof of the corresponding years return. The most dangerous would be making sure these records do not find an unscrupulous person when we discard of the old machine and that we keep these files in case of an audit.

We often get questions on how to move old tax and financial information, like Money, Quicken, TurboTax, Tax Cut, etc..) and the reality is there never seems to be a simple and straightforward manner in dealing with these files. Here are some generic tips for easy transfers and the publisher would be the best support for a specific product.

Commonly, tax returns are filed in different versions of the same software for the specific tax year. Uncommonly, these files need the software affiliated with them to open and review. Future releases of the software usually will not open these files and we would not want to alter them after the final return for the year anyway.

Tax laws change from year to year and as a result the returns for these specific years are important to keep with the corresponding version of the software. Naming conventions can make this easier by putting the year of the return in the file name. This can make it more difficult then a regular office document, but much safer for your confidential information.

Transferring: Our IntelliMover product has a useful tool to pack up and move these tax files. You will need to use the File Transfer Utility to move your data to your new machine and it requires a couple of steps.

1. Exporting: You will need to open your tax file in the software that produced the file (make sure it is the correct year and version) and under the file menu, export it to a file, commonly saving it to the desktop. This changes the file format for security reasons. The software in the new computer will now access the file correctly.
2. Install and Initialize (open) software for each year on the new computer so the registry on the new machine can catalog the tax software versions.
3. You will need to open the File Transfer Utility on both mchines to move this file to the new computer. Find the file on the old machine, commonly on the desktop, and move it to the new machine in a specified location.
4. Importing: You will need to open each software program and commonly under the file menu, import the document affiliated with that years tax returns. You should now have access to your old returns. Verify access to the file.

Removal of confidential Data: We recommend ensuring confidential data is removed from any computer that leaves your control. Disk scrubbing software will remove these files and this would be one of the most important examples of data we would want purged from an old machine after we ensure we have a useable copy on our new machine.