Capital One CSV to QBO, without uploading it.
A Capital One card export puts charges in a Debit column and payments in a Credit column. Drop the file here and Plainsum turns that into one signed amount per transaction, with charges as money out, and writes a credit card QBO for QuickBooks. Nothing leaves this tab.
Your file is never uploaded. Columns, dates and signs are detected and can be fixed, every export carries stable transaction IDs, and it is free for 30 transactions per file.
CSV and Excel converter
Drop your CSV or Excel file here
The file your bank or card issuer lets you download (.csv, .tsv, .txt, .xlsx, .xlsm and .xls). It is read inside this page and goes nowhere else.
Add another fileNo upload. This page's security policy forbids network connections, so your file cannot leave it. See how to check that yourself.
1Check how your file was read
2Preview and totals
3Account settings
4Download
Free: every format, the first 30 transactions of each file. Pro ($19, once, the same key as Plainsum Statements Pro): no limit, several files at once, saved column mappings.
How it works
Drop the card CSV
The headings include Transaction Date, Posted Date, Card No., Description, Category, Debit and Credit. The account type switches to Credit card by itself.
Check the charges
A Debit is a charge on the card, so it appears under Money out. A Credit is a payment or refund and appears under Money in.
Download QBO
The file is written as a credit card statement. Import it into a credit card account in QuickBooks. QFX, OFX, QIF and CSV are on the same screen.
Download the CSV from Capital One
In Capital One's online banking, open the account you want, find the option to download or export account activity, choose CSV as the file type, pick a date range and save the file. Where that option sits and what it is called changes with the bank's website and app, so this page does not give menu names that might be out of date. If you cannot find it, search the Capital One help for "download transactions".
Download a date range for the card that you have not imported before. If you hold more than one Capital One card, download each one on its own, because Plainsum suggests the last digits of the Card No. only when the whole file has one card number.
If Capital One also offers a QuickBooks or Quicken download for your account, that file can be imported without any conversion. This page is for the common case where the CSV is the only thing you have.
How Plainsum reads a Capital One card CSV
The layout used for testing has the headings Transaction Date, Posted Date, Card No., Description, Category, Debit, Credit, with dates written 2025-01-17. A line has a number in Debit or in Credit, never in both, and the other field is empty.
| Column in the file | What Plainsum does with it |
|---|---|
| Transaction Date and Posted Date | Both are dates, and Plainsum uses Transaction Date for the transaction. If you want the posting date in QuickBooks instead, choose Posted Date under Date in "Which column is what". |
| Card No. | Not a transaction field. Its last four digits, 4321 in the test file, are suggested as the account digits, and the Account type is set to Credit card. |
| Description | Becomes the payee (first 32 characters), with the full text in the memo when longer. |
| Category | Not used. It is not carried into the QBO file; categorize inside QuickBooks. |
| Debit | A charge on the card. Becomes a negative amount, which is money out. |
| Credit | A payment or a refund. Becomes a positive amount, which is money in. |
The words debit and credit mean the card's point of view here, which is the reverse of how some people read them on a bank account: a Debit adds to what you owe. In the 18-row test file the preview shows 1,436.64 money in (payments and credits), 1,011.47 money out (charges) and a net of 425.17. There is no balance column in the file, so the stamp says Not checked, and the totals and the count are your check against the card statement. Free downloads include the first 30 transactions of each file, in every format. Pro is a one-time $19, the same key as Plainsum Statements Pro, and removes the limit.
What to check before you download
- Account type. It should say Credit card. If it does not, choose it. It decides whether the QBO is written as a credit card statement or a bank statement.
- Charges under Money out. Every purchase, fee and interest charge should be in the Money out column of the preview, and every payment in Money in. A row in the wrong column means the Debit and Credit columns were mixed up under "Which column is what".
- Total of charges. Money out is the sum of the Debit column. Compare it, and the Money in total, with the new charges and payments on your card statement for the same dates.
- The date column. The preview's Date column should show the transaction dates, not the posting dates, unless you chose Posted Date on purpose.
- Dates on an old file. This layout uses year-month-day dates, which cannot be misread as day-first. A file that used 03/04/2025 style dates could show a Check the date format warning instead.
Import the .qbo file into QuickBooks Online
- Sign in to QuickBooks Online and open Transactions, then Bank transactions.
- Open the Link account menu (the arrow next to it) and choose Upload from file. In some versions the same option sits under the Update button of an account you have already added.
- Drag the .qbo file into the window or choose Browse, then select Continue.
- Pick the QuickBooks account the transactions belong to. For a Capital One card file, choose a credit card account in QuickBooks (an existing one or a new one) rather than a bank account. Select Continue.
- Choose which transactions to import and finish with Import. They arrive on the For review tab, where you categorize and accept them.
Menu names change between QuickBooks versions and countries. If you do not see these, search the QuickBooks help for "upload bank transactions from a file".
QuickBooks Desktop and Quicken
The QBO file uses a generic bank ID, not the one Intuit assigns to Capital One, and Account type Credit card writes a credit card statement instead of a bank statement. QuickBooks Online accepts a file like that through Upload from file. QuickBooks Desktop may ask you to pick a bank or may refuse it. The same screen also gives you a QFX file for Quicken. Quicken, like QuickBooks Desktop, can be stricter than QuickBooks Online about which institution issued a file, so import a few rows first. In Quicken, look for its option to import a downloaded bank file and search its help for "import a QFX file", because the menu names differ between versions and between Windows and Mac. If a program asks for a bank ID, you can enter one in Advanced settings below the preview.
Import a small file into a test company or a spare account first and compare the transaction count and totals with Capital One. Imported transactions wait on the For review tab and change nothing in your books until you accept them.
Questions
How do I convert a Capital One CSV to a QBO file?
Drop the card CSV on the box at the top. Plainsum reads the Debit and Credit columns as one signed amount, switches the account type to Credit card because of the Card No. heading, and you press Download QBO. The file is built in your browser.
Which column is a charge, Debit or Credit?
A Debit is a charge on the card, such as a purchase, and a Credit is a payment or a refund. In the preview, charges are shown under Money out and payments under Money in, and they are written that way in the QBO file.
The file has Transaction Date and Posted Date. Which one is used?
Transaction Date. The Posted Date is ignored unless you choose it under Date in "Which column is what". Use whichever your bookkeeping follows, and stay with the same choice on every import so that IDs and dates stay stable.
Does the Category column come through?
No. Plainsum does not carry the issuer's categories, because they would not match the categories in your books. After the import you categorize on the For review tab in QuickBooks.
Why does it say Not checked?
There is no running balance in the file to compare the amounts with. Compare the Transactions count, Money in and Money out with the new charges and payments on the statement for the same period instead.
Is the file uploaded, and what does it cost?
It is not uploaded; the page blocks every network connection. Free downloads include the first 30 transactions of each file, in every format. Pro is a one-time $19, the same key as Plainsum Statements Pro, and removes the limit.