Categories and chart of accounts
FreeAgent categories map to the YionStack chart of accounts with the correct VAT defaults and reporting positions for UK accounts production.
Move from FreeAgent
Your books and projects — wired into one operating system.
Export your FreeAgent data — contacts, invoices, bills, expenses, projects, bank accounts — upload it to YionStack, and the AI-assisted Import surface maps every record into the right table. UK MTD VAT scheme preserved. See every supported source →
File-based — you upload an export from your old system, we map it. No connection to your old account.
At a glance
accounting- From
- FreeAgent
- How
- Upload an export
- Records
- 7 types come across
- Steps
- 3-step migration
- Stays put
- 5 items intentionally
- Residency
- UK (europe-west2)
What lands in your business
The records you depend on, in their right places.
Contacts
Customers and suppliers collapse into the unified contacts table. Default payment terms, billing currency, contact addresses and any custom contact-level notes come across.
Invoices and recurring invoices
Sales invoices (open, paid, written off) plus recurring invoice templates come across. Original invoice numbers are preserved as the external reference; new YionStack invoices continue the sequence.
Bills and expenses
Vendor bills and out-of-pocket expense claims (including mileage with HMRC-approved rates) come across with full line-level detail. CIS deductions on subcontractor bills are preserved on the line.
Projects and time entries
FreeAgent projects map to YionStack projects, with time entries landing in the projects time-tracking ledger so historical billable hours stay visible to project P&L.
Bank accounts and transactions
Reconciled bank lines come across as historical context. Live bank feeds (including the NatWest/Mettle bundle) re-authorise in YionStack through Open Banking under your own consent.
Timesheets
Approved and submitted timesheets attach to their projects so utilisation reporting carries on without a gap on day one.
How it works
Three steps. Reversible at any point.
- 1
Export from FreeAgent
From FreeAgent, use My Data → Export to download CSVs for each entity (contacts, invoices, bills, expenses, projects, bank transactions). Zip them into one archive if you’d like a single upload.
- 2
Review the mapping
YionStack’s AI-assisted mapper reads the column headers and suggests where each row lands. You approve or adjust before any data is written.
- 3
Run the import
The job runs in the migration dashboard. Progress is live; any rows that need attention surface as the job finishes.
What stays where it is
We are honest about scope.
A migration is not the same as a clone. The records below are intentionally out of scope — either because they belong with the system that produced them, or because their meaning changes once they live inside an operating system instead of a point-tool. You can still reference the originals while you run YionStack alongside.
- —NatWest, Mettle and other live bank feeds — re-authorised in YionStack through Open Banking, owned by your YionStack business under your own consent.
- —Self Assessment filings — HMRC holds the submission record. Past SA returns stay with you as PDFs; the next return is prepared from YionStack’s books on the same UTR.
- —Self Assessment payments on account — preserved on the imported tax category but the actual payment record sits with HMRC, not the bookkeeping tool.
- —FreeAgent Payroll — if you ran payroll inside FreeAgent, the payroll history moves separately through the YionStack Payroll onboarding so the year-to-date figures stay HMRC-correct.
- —Mobile receipt-capture app — re-installed on the YionStack mobile surface; existing receipt attachments come across with the bills/expenses they’re attached to.
Common questions
Straight answers.
Will my MTD VAT registration carry across?
Yes. Your VAT registration is unchanged — HMRC holds the registration, not your bookkeeping software. After the import, the next VAT return is prepared and submitted from YionStack’s accounting module on the same VAT number.
What about my UTR and Self Assessment?
UTR is preserved on the business record. Past Self Assessment filings stay with HMRC and are referenced as PDFs. New returns are prepared from YionStack’s reporting layer with the same income, dividend and expense data.
Can I keep the NatWest free-for-customers FreeAgent bundle?
You can keep paying nothing — NatWest provides FreeAgent free to its business banking customers. The import is a one-way copy by default; you can leave FreeAgent connected and run YionStack alongside, then decide when to cut over.
What about project profitability and utilisation reports?
Projects, time entries and project expenses all come across so YionStack’s project P&L starts populated. The reporting layer can recreate FreeAgent’s utilisation report (billable hours / available hours) once the historical timesheets are imported.
How long does the import take?
A five-year FreeAgent file with ten thousand transactions completes in fifteen to twenty minutes. The job runs in the background; you do not need to keep the tab open.
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