Poolside Chat: Alicia and Dan’s Intuit Connect 2026 Recap

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Alicia Katz Pollock: Hey, everybody, this is Alicia Pollock from royal.com. And in this week's edition of the unofficial QuickBooks accountants podcast, we have a special recap of Intuit Connect. That's the conference that happened in Las Vegas from October 26th through 28th. So after the conference was all said and done, Dan and I headed out to the pool to nap. [00:00:30] But of course, we wound up chatting about all of our impressions and thoughts, from the keynotes to the exhibits to the conversations that we had in the hallway. I do want to apologize in advance that my audio is a little tinny on it. I had the mic attached to my bathing suit, but I was turned and facing my head was turned and facing Dan. So my audio was a little off, so I apologize for that. Then after my conversation with Dan, we're going to treat you to a series of exit interviews from people that I met in [00:01:00] the hallways where I asked them what their favorite takeaway was from the conference. So without further ado, here's Alicia and Dan's poolside chat summing up our experiences at Intuit Connect 2026.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Dan, what was taken away from the conference?

Dan DeLong: It was really interesting because I came into this conference thinking, is there a world without QuickBooks [00:01:30] in it? You know.

Alicia Katz Pollock: It's an interesting way of thinking about it.

Dan DeLong: There is a lot of people in the industry that are trying to find that out. You know, how can we build our own general ledger or build because now they can, like, they have the tools and utilities to be able to, to do that.

Alicia Katz Pollock: And then, Sharon, for your podcast for the power hour. Did that breakdown of the different [00:02:00] ledgers? Yeah. And I never got a chance to see it. It's like on my watch list. Yeah. What was her conclusion?

Dan DeLong: Yeah. There's a there were two definite winners. Um, it really just depends. Right. Like, in most cases, it's all about what aligns with firm owners, practitioners in the way that they do business and the way that they are going to do business.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Yeah. So, so with [00:02:30] what you said about like, you know, anybody can build their own general ledger now, is that realistic or.

Dan DeLong: Well, that's, that was always my concern. Like, you know, because I, I've dabbled with trying to create utilities and tools that work with QuickBooks, with Claude. And, you know, it gets to a point where, you know, really you should be using the AI or really you should be using or I'm sorry, the a p I, not the AI okay. [00:03:00] Using the API, using the API instead of the just AI in general to really get the best use out of it.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Meaning that the API gives you more access to the behind the scenes, right? Okay.

Dan DeLong: There's a little bit more structure to the rules of engagement, right? Rather than like exporting a report or, you know, something like that. Right. Um.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Well, I mean, one of the things that they announce is that QuickBooks is now going [00:03:30] to have native integrations with ChatGPT and five of the, what they call the frontier. Yeah, yeah.

Dan DeLong: And yeah, and like those types of things, you know, could basically and like what Hector was talking about in the panel about, you know, if he could wave his magic wand, you know, he would have, you know, the structure and. Framework of data protection that Intuit has, but basically being something [00:04:00] that is the foundation and then putting all the things that they that that firm practitioners need on top of that, that isn't necessarily, you know, created by Intuit. But but they set the table. But, you know, are there other players out there that are doing, you know, trying to trying to take that away from Intuit? So, you [00:04:30] know.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Well, I mean, the, the big uphill battles that QBO does so much that it's really different for every, everybody has a different experience using it because you customize it to. Yeah, it's just business.

Dan DeLong: It's just like, you know, any project that you start from an idea to the how and the what and the how of it is, oh, these are there's barriers, there's roadblocks, there's things that are in the way that weren't thought about or weren't realized until you got to that point. [00:05:00] You know, I, I've had countless arguments with AI over, um, you know, where something shows up, shows up or how. And, and then at that point, you know, my ADHD brain goes, oh, forget it.

Alicia Katz Pollock: We'll just it's not that.

Dan DeLong: It's not worth it. Right?

Alicia Katz Pollock: But, you know, I suppose, I mean, I wonder if it's like, you know, that that same thing that I always recommend that if something doesn't work, revisit it in a few months and see if it works. [00:05:30]

Dan DeLong: Yeah.

Alicia Katz Pollock: And that's, yeah.

Dan DeLong: Very.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Much true for AI.

Dan DeLong: Very well could be, you know, and I pick up those chats again and there's a new model underneath that is not so argumentative.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Right. So I was actually looking back, I was laughing because when Dolly first came out, the the image Manipulator. That's what we were using to make the images for the podcast. And at first it couldn't spell. You know, back in the days when everybody had six fingers. Right. And that I was putting out [00:06:00] images with, you know, gibberish writing that was close to the unofficial QuickBooks Live count, but not. And my team was like, you can't put those out. And I'm like, they're getting more engagement than when I spell it, right. And so, you know, I was actually kind of disappointed when I learned to spell exactly.

Dan DeLong: An unintended consequence of accuracy.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Yeah. I mean, in the end, of course, I'm happy because we can we can get throw out a lot, a lot easier and [00:06:30] not have to spend so much time struggling over that. But. Right. Um, I mean, that for me, it's not relevant to QuickBooks, but that for me, with all of AI, my biggest concern is that there's no objective point of reality anymore.

Dan DeLong: Right.

Alicia Katz Pollock: That it used to be you knew what was real because you had a photograph of it or a video of it, or somebody said it and you had a recording of it. And now all three of those can be so easily faked or manipulated that you can go down to the pixel level [00:07:00] and tell, but you can't when you're just sharing it on social media.

Dan DeLong: Yeah. I mean.

Alicia Katz Pollock: So, you know.

Dan DeLong: The test of wave your hand in front of your face is not going to be a test anymore because it's going to figure it out. And so I was watching this, this video where the guy was talking about, uh, you know, to a cow, right? Uh, you cannot explain the concept of currency or money.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Right, right, right.

Dan DeLong: So a [00:07:30] cow will never be able to understand why it's being bought and sold for it, just as being a cow. Right. So his thing was, you know, the way AI is going to kill us, it's not going to be creating its own robots and shooting us all. It's going to turn us into a cow that can't understand the things that it's doing, right? Like, um, for example. [00:08:00] Right. Like the best banker, if you asked, can you remember every transaction that has gone through your bank? The answer would be no. Right. But an AI banker can't, right. So there's going to be things that, uh, you know, that are future states where that we, we can't even imagine the possibility, right. That maybe we won't even understand it. Right. Like that's, that's the, the thing. It [00:08:30] could be a wally world, right? Where we're just sitting around on a huge cruise ship waiting for the science of life to show up.

Alicia Katz Pollock: So that was one of my takeaways from that last keynote. And what was his name?

Dan DeLong: Zach Cass. I think I was just listening to his audiobook.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Okay. That I liked what he said, that, you know, when he got when they could get three of the same diagnoses because it was assisted by [00:09:00] technology, then the decision on which doctor to go with became which had the best bedside manner. Right. And who did you feel was trustworthy. And I liked that. His point was that once we take the technological what the intellectual part out and we can use the technology so that we're not working off of opinion, we're working off of facts, then who we are as kind, generous human beings, which is kind of lost in today's polluted right social media world. Maybe [00:09:30] that gets to come back again and thrive.

Dan DeLong: Right, right. And I, that's what resonated with me too, is that, you know, humanity is what's going to make us human, right? I mean, that's.

Alicia Katz Pollock: I mean, it sounds like a no brainer, but unfortunately it's not. Yeah. Yeah. And as far as like what Intuit is doing with, um, with all of their development, I mean, just on the surface, the first thing that I want to share with everybody is that, [00:10:00] um, they, they've now got definitions for pilot beta and GA, which is going to be so helpful. That pilot is they have this idea that they're trying out and they've got a few and then a dozen and then two dozen firms actually putting it through its paces to see if it's beyond minimum viable product MVP and see if it's going to work. And then they put it in beta, where they expand it out so that they can test it and develop it and make sure that that the assumptions [00:10:30] are solid and then it becomes GA or generally available. And that's when it hits and stays.

Dan DeLong: Yeah. And that's an example of, you know, Intuit in this case, creating something that we I mean, we could have imagined it, but we didn't envision it. Right. Uh, because a lot of people wanted to see QuickBooks labs come back, right.

Alicia Katz Pollock: That entire episode about.

Dan DeLong: That, right? Like, so, I mean, bringing [00:11:00] something back that you felt worked, but in this case, it's, it's different and potentially better, right? Because it has those three phases. And then then you can.

Alicia Katz Pollock: So pilot features, you're not even going to see unless you're in the pilot. Yeah. Beta will be labeled with beta and then GA. There's no there's no beta tag on it. I did catch though that they also talked about early access, and it wasn't clear if that was just in enterprise suite or if that was going to be across [00:11:30] the whole thing. But they were talking about an early access program where you can opt into it. So that, which was essentially was.

Dan DeLong: Yeah, I mean, as far as the minutia, details of what is available, when, to whom and in what product. I took all of those coming soon events to be subject to change until we. Yeah, until we see them.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Yeah.

Dan DeLong: Um, but yeah, I, I imagine, you know, based on everything I saw here that [00:12:00] is, is going to get everything.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Mhm.

Dan DeLong: And then things will trickle down, uh, to advance to, you know, in maybe bundled packages or, you know, different versions will have less of whatever is not available.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Right. I mean.

Dan DeLong: Enterprise suite.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Nasa gave us Velcro and Tempur-Pedic beds. Exactly. But I was, I was kind of surprised that they didn't actually [00:12:30] call attention to nail the basics, because I know that that's the phrase in the program that they're using internally. And I didn't realize it wasn't really an external.

Dan DeLong: Term.

Alicia Katz Pollock: But. So I expected to hear. Nail the basics and I didn't. But I really did hear from a lot of people out into it that they are really strongly paying attention to the bugs and the dissatisfaction bits so that they can erase those. And so everybody's having a positive experience, which is really [00:13:00] needed if they're going to make whether these changes in the technology that people are going to be loyal.

Dan DeLong: Right. I was very pleasantly surprised, maybe, I guess, about the overall vibe of the, of the announcements from Intuit. Um, and even just the, the general feel, right where the past couple ones have been. Here's [00:13:30] what we're doing. Isn't it great? Mhm. You know where this is much more collaborative. You know, they use the term co-build a lot. Um, so very, very keen on the, on the collaboration aspect as opposed to here's the feedback we heard. Here's what we did about it.

Alicia Katz Pollock: You know? Yeah.

Dan DeLong: Hope you like it.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Right, right.

Dan DeLong: Um.

Alicia Katz Pollock: And because whenever I see [00:14:00] those, here's what we heard. I'm like, who said that? Yeah.

Dan DeLong: Who, who are you talking to?

Alicia Katz Pollock: So so.

Dan DeLong: You wouldn't hear that from.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Me. It's like what we wanted to do, what we think we probably think we're solving. Yeah.

Dan DeLong: Yeah. So like when Suzanne led off with, you know, you are the customer, right? Um, I, I felt like he could have framed that a little better. Um, but coming from, you know, [00:14:30] Intuit inside the Intuit walls and knowing that in every iteration of Intuit's values, the customer is in there somewhere, right? Right. There is that. You know, it started with, you know, customer driven innovation, right? Right. That was one of their core operating values when I worked there. And from the from the beginning. But now it's customer obsession, right? Like that's what it has evolved into. So [00:15:00] I felt like that when he just started talking about you are our customer as a, the accountant profession. He could have, he could have framed it a little bit differently, you know? So that this is a good thing because I think some people.

Alicia Katz Pollock: As long as it's not in the framework of like, oh, the customer is somebody that you're selling to.

Dan DeLong: Yes.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Right. Well, I mean, one of their missions was powering prosperity around the world. Yeah. Now we're not the vehicle for getting them processed [00:15:30] for Intuit, helping the customers be prosperous. Powering our prosperity as well.

Dan DeLong: Yeah. I mean, they realized, I think, that they can't do this alone, right? They can't do this by themselves. Uh, they need, you know, champions out there. And the thing about, you know, the business units, you know, the internal structuring of QuickBooks or Intuit in general has always been around [00:16:00] who their ideal customer is or who their customer is for that. So weird part about accountants is there is no one customer track. You know, they're one accountant could be using the entire suite of Intuit services across the board. Right. So how do you, uh, how do you make an accountant customer, right? That fits everything because essentially [00:16:30] they're super customer, right?

Alicia Katz Pollock: Well, that's what I'm really liking about Intuit Accountant Suite, as I'm getting to know it, is that it really is now a management portal or it will be, you know, it's still version 1.0, but it's I think they're really heading in the right direction with that. And you know, now that I have a bookkeeping incubator and all of a sudden I'm a bookkeeping firm, um, the, the things [00:17:00] that we're doing in Slack and in double being able to move that over to Intuit, I'm interested in helping them being one of them and being one of the pilots on that one and being one of the behind the scenes firms where I'm actually trying it out and building it and saying, hey, in order for me to do this, I need this, this and this. Can you put it in there? I'm like super interested in being a pilot on that.

Dan DeLong: Yeah. One of the, I think one of the dangers of having things, having everything under [00:17:30] one product, one suite, right, is what's yours and what's theirs and what's your clients, right. Like bank rules, for example. Right. You spend a lot of time setting up bank rules for a client. They leave, they take your rules with them. Right?

Alicia Katz Pollock: Well, there's a lot of I mean, that's I love it when that debate shows up on in any of the Facebook forums of like, okay, I'm separating [00:18:00] from that client. Do I delete my rules? Do I leave my rules? Yeah. Um, and a lot of people say that, you know, the rules are your tools that you put in so that you can do the work. And I think it really depends if who's running the bank feed, if the client is running the bank feed the client's rules and you're running the banks and they're your rules. Yeah. Um, I had one client where I just turned off all the auto ads, so he had to actually, like, you could see that I was actually working here. Yeah.

Dan DeLong: Funny. [00:18:30] Um, but yeah, I mean, that's always a concern. And I was, um, and one of the advantages of something like double or, um, you know, a practice management thing that's outside of Intuit accounting suite is that it's just that, that you can set up those SOPs in that system. And then when the client leaves, it's still your, it's still your work. Um, I was pleased to see [00:19:00] that, you know, when agents, when, when you're able to start creating your own agents, that's in. Oh, right. That's in accounting suite.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Yeah. So that's internal to you and it's affecting the client's books. Right? But then if they separate from you, those agents no longer function. Right. That's an interesting point. Yeah. Yeah.

Dan DeLong: So they, they are taking that page that. The client. You know, who owns what is is still [00:19:30] available, you know, and separated from you and the client and into it in general. Right. But, um, yeah, I, I definitely got a, a, I definitely got a good vibe, you know, from, from the conference itself. Right. Um, certainly didn't continue to have this thought of like a world without QuickBooks, at least not in the near future. When I came in. So, um, because [00:20:00] I, when they were announcing the things that they were going to be doing, there was actually some like, like in years past, it's been definitely, definitely quiet.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Mhm.

Dan DeLong: When they announce something, you know, like they, they'll say they'll give something and they'll hold for applause and then None came here. It was actually there was some reaction to to what they were, what they [00:20:30] were doing.

Alicia Katz Pollock: I don't think they got the roars that they were expecting. Yeah. But it was better than last year. Oh, yeah. Definitely better than last year.

Dan DeLong: Right.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Um, one of the things that they.

Dan DeLong: I think last year was that there was, there was a lot of uncertainty, right about like, what is this AI and is it going to take my career away from me?

Alicia Katz Pollock: Right. Yeah.

Dan DeLong: You know, so.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Just coming out.

Dan DeLong: The way that those things were delivered last year were [00:21:00] not the right time. You know, that was not the right message. I think that a lot of people were.

Alicia Katz Pollock: One of the things that I that I saw that I really, really liked. And this is just in pilot. This is an idea that hasn't come out yet, but they're aiming for the when the new, the when the Go Pro partner program is the. The new matchmaking?

Dan DeLong: Yes.

Alicia Katz Pollock: And so they basically are going to take the customer on the client side. They're going to have the whole profile, [00:21:30] but the AI is going to go scrape their, their, their state, their state registrations and their online presence and their website and any public communications and all public knowledge and find out like what the, what the company's niche is. The company can specify what they are looking for in a bookkeeper. And then you go into your profile and you pick the things that you are interested in. And are you local or global? And then it does a matchmaking service [00:22:00] and it offers up three of us that are the best, best fit. And then if you don't respond to the inquiry within two days, it goes to the next person. And so they're actually trying to use the technology to find actual matches. I think a lot of that's going to depend on you. And that's all and that's all.

Dan DeLong: And that's all done within the product. So, you know, this, uh, this situation of, uh, of getting a lead from [00:22:30] the ProAdvisor website for, you know, obvious scamming things, right. Uh, should be reduced. I, I am sure there are, you know, there are ways to get around that.

Alicia Katz Pollock: I'm sure because it's no longer an external website. It's in, it's in product and that that makes sense. I mean, I used to get a lot of traffic off of the, off of the proadvisor.com. And then it just became, hey, I want you to train my [00:23:00] three daughters on these for their three companies on this list of things that you're going to spend eight.

Dan DeLong: Hours, we'll pay you an exorbitant amount of money. But, uh, but yeah, they would have to do that within the software to begin with, with data, right? Like, so, you know, nobody's going to be spinning up a trial. Uh, I mean, they can be. I mean, this will just reduce that. I'm sure people will be finding ways, new and creative ways to exploit that as well. Um, [00:23:30] but there should be new, new ways to stop that as well. You know, and, and identify that I, I brought that up when I was talking to the ProAdvisor pro partner folks and they're like, that's really great feedback, you know, and it wasn't like I was talking to some staffer who was, uh, you.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Know, I'll be curious. I mean, and I don't know if there's any way that we can find out data on this, but if the, um, you know, like the [00:24:00] same companies get recommended or if it's on size or on ratings or popularity or how the, the, if it's really based on match data, in which case somebody who's small kittens just starting up can still compete.

Dan DeLong: Yeah, I, um, like I did a, a blog article about the new pro partner program and included a calculator so that people could see how they, um, how they could, you know, what level are [00:24:30] they expected to be in? Uh, because there's.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Do that right in the, in the product.

Dan DeLong: Well, that's, that's what, that's what occurred is that they saw my article and they're like, why is there a calculator? We should have a calculator, you know? And I said, well, and it said that there was one coming, but it wasn't available then. So I'm like, okay, I'll, I'll create some quick one. And, um, and then Intuit saw it and was like, [00:25:00] we'd like to, you know, talk to you. And I thought I was like going to the principal's office and getting in trouble. Oh, but it was actually like, this helped us, you know?

Alicia Katz Pollock: So, so you were, you were the genius.

Dan DeLong: I was the catalyst, I guess, or I don't know. I mean, I could be. They could have already been thinking about it. They just didn't implement it. Yeah. But it was, uh, they appreciated, you know, the, the article and in and of itself as a, as a, as a resource.

Alicia Katz Pollock: So [00:25:30] yeah, so we'll put the link to your article. And then the article that I just did for, for the future.com on, on in the show notes.

Dan DeLong: Yeah. Sounds great. But yeah, I mean, with, uh, with this idea of you are the customer, it, it definitely weaved its way through. I think the, the messages that they were delivering all, all, all conference long and the way they treated you [00:26:00] at the booth and those types of things, uh, were, were definitely, you know, a good feeling.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Yeah. I mean, for me, this conference was, was weird this year because now that I was a sponsor, I was an exhibitor. I literally didn't leave the exhibit hall from eight in the morning until seven at night, except to go to the mainstage and see most of the mainstage. And even last year, you know how I went around to every single [00:26:30] booth in the in the Intuit Circle to find out everything and what it took us three months to go through everything. And so this time I only have a couple. Like I only had time to hit a few of them because I was spending my time talking. But I missed out because I didn't get to hear all the speakers and what the, um, what, uh, all the breakout sessions were about. Did you go to any.

Dan DeLong: I did not. Um, I, I don't come here to go to the breakouts. Um, so I didn't, uh, [00:27:00] didn't go to because I wanted to.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Yeah.

Dan DeLong: Um, but that, you know, you bring up the exhibit hall. A lot of booths were telling me about how little traffic they got, you know, and that was very sad for them, you know, because it's it's pretty costly, as you know.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Sure. Yeah.

Dan DeLong: And, uh, I couldn't even find you. Right. [00:27:30] I, like Jamie had to point me in the right direction.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Yeah, my my booth was over by the coffee corner. Yeah. But they had the the orientation set up so that you didn't see that there was a backside to the booths. Yeah. So the only vision that I had was people in line for the coffee, but we maximized that. Like Jamie would go and give, um, we would give um, um, eyeglass buds or royal wives on one side and the unofficial QuickBooks Live. On the podcast on the other side. So we would give them [00:28:00] out to people in line. And I was doing a book signing and giving away free books. And so we'd say, hey, after you get your coffee, come on over and grab a book or have somebody hold your place and come over and hear what we do. So we were actually able to like, generate some traffic. But if you were looking around the room, you couldn't find us. And I had people saying, we were trying to find you and didn't see you anywhere. Um, and so, but hearing what you were saying about them not having a lot of traffic, I thought we were at a deficit, but maybe that was a benefit where we were that we [00:28:30] had coffee line to go up.

Dan DeLong: Yeah, yeah. At least you had, uh, a captive audience, so to speak. Right.

Alicia Katz Pollock: And everybody's coffee drinkers. So we have that in common. Mhm. Coffee fans. Those espresso martinis are great, right?

Dan DeLong: Yeah. That was my first impression when I walked into the exhibit hall that there was a lot of open space.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Mhm.

Dan DeLong: You know, so I didn't know if they did that intentionally or if that was a byproduct [00:29:00] of, you know, their sponsorship levels. Uh, or if that's what they were hoping. You know, to to occur.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Well, it's kind of nice that everybody's not on top of each other. It's all set up like islands instead of rows.

Dan DeLong: Yeah.

Alicia Katz Pollock: So I like that about it. And it kind of makes it fun to wander because you'd see different things from different directions. But I'm sad to hear that, that the other vendors felt like it wasn't trafficked.

Dan DeLong: Yeah.

Alicia Katz Pollock: I mean, they [00:29:30] even had the scavenger hunt and, um, like, you know, find a creator, find an innovator. And so we had a couple people scan our creator badge and, and win because of us. But that's something that they could build more.

Dan DeLong: So to kind of, you know, wrap up the way that I'm processing what the last couple days. This was not what I expected. Oh, interesting. Um, and [00:30:00] it's, uh, it's gonna, it's going to be interesting how you know, because like, what is what I foresee happening is that the time between announcement to general availability of something will be shortened. Mhm. Um. Doesn't mean that everything's going to work perfectly, you know, right out of the box.

Alicia Katz Pollock: But nothing new there.

Dan DeLong: But they, you know, that's that's kind of par. Right. Right. [00:30:30] Um, but it's going to be different. They're going to be doing things differently than they have done. Uh, and I think that is ultimately going to evolve the way that accountants do their work. Right.

Alicia Katz Pollock: And for me, kind of my biggest observation was that their biggest areas of development aren't on the client side. It's really on the accountant side. Yeah. That while I mean, with eyes and like major, major innovations in terms of [00:31:00] inventory, for example, it's now almost comparable and maybe has even some new stuff that desktop didn't have. So that part's huge. But you know, all the work that they're doing to create tools for us that never existed before is really cute.

Dan DeLong: Yeah, it'll be an interesting year ahead.

Alicia Katz Pollock: Yeah. Well, thank you for doing an exit interview by the pool with me. Absolutely. Yeah. Well, Dan, what's going on in your world?

Dan DeLong: Well, we have rebranded [00:31:30] our the cube power hour to the cube or the, the power hour. Okay. Um, just because we dropped the cube doesn't mean that we drop talking about QuickBooks. Okay. Uh, it is just we are expanding to talking about other general ledgers as, as well. Okay. So that's a big news there. Um, and then school bookkeeping, uh, this, this coming year, I'm going to be focusing on what works with QuickBooks [00:32:00] and how, Because I think that's what a lot of, um, accountants and bookkeeping pros and small businesses really want to understand about apps. Yeah. Applications and integrations that integrate with QuickBooks. But how do you know what are the settings that, that, that you're able to, to, to work with? How do those transactions show up into QuickBooks and in what way?

Alicia Katz Pollock: The nitty gritty of working with the app. Oh, that's hugely valuable. Yeah.

Dan DeLong: Yeah. So that's, uh, that's something that [00:32:30] we're, we're going to be working on and I'm going to have the apps help me, you know, really create those, uh, those, those, uh, content, that content.

Alicia Katz Pollock: All right. So that was Dan DeLong and I, and our unfiltered, unfettered breakdown of our experiences and thoughts that we were left with at Intuit Connect 2026. Now I want to hear from other people. So if you have any thoughts about the [00:33:00] topics that we talked about? Please either head into our LinkedIn group, to our YouTube channel or email us at unofficial QuickBooks podcast@gmail.com so that we can continue the conversation. Now, your impressions of Intuit Connect are far more than just Dan and I. So I also did a series of exit interviews the day after the conference or in the afternoon of the conference, where I asked people what their favorite takeaway was. So without [00:33:30] further ado, here are some of your colleagues giving you their impression of the favorite things that they saw at Intuit Connect 2026.

Jane: Hi, I'm Jane Zook, I'm from Juno Financial Solutions, and I just spent a few days here at Intuit Connect. One of the cool new features that I saw is Intuit Accountant Suite is the ability to set up user groups. So if you have a pod team working on certain clients, you can actually assign [00:34:00] those clients to the work they're going to be doing on to your team, to those clients using the user groups. I thought there was a super cool feature to make it easy to set up your team for success. Hi, this is Shirley Coss with Orca Advisor, and I'm here on the ground at connect. And Alicia asked me, what's my biggest takeaway? So my biggest takeaway this week has just been the amazing conversations in the hallways. I think there's something really [00:34:30] to be said about taking the time to catch up with everybody else that you don't get to see throughout the year. And just a quick hello or hey, what are you working on? Or, hey, can we work on something together? So thank you so much, Alicia and everybody enjoy the wrap up for this conference.

Scott: My name is Scott Scarano. My company is Pageant Business Services, and the coolest innovation I saw was a robot.

Megan: I am Megan Turner [00:35:00] with Daisy consulting, and I am really excited about the things that are theoretically rolling out in the nonprofit edition of IES. We're getting automatic releases from restriction. They are financial reports that actually look like the way we use them without a whole lot of manipulation. Um, I think finally, they may actually be paying attention to nonprofits in the way we work.

Alicia E: My name's Alicia Eastvold and I [00:35:30] work for the human accountant. And the thing I was most excited about that I saw at Intuit Connect was when Carla Caldwell showed what she was doing, the use cases for Intuit Intelligence. I felt like I finally could see the agents acting in coherent ways that I could see so many use cases for. And I loved watching accountants raise your hand, say, could do that. And she'd be like, I don't know, we'll try. And then it could. And it just I think it's going to spark all sorts of new creative [00:36:00] ways that we could start thinking of accounting. And I think it's going to set off a lot of momentum.

Sean: Hey, I'm Sean Duncan with SMD Consulting and Accounting. We're an advisory focused firm, and best takeaway is actually multifaceted. I found that I balanced the networking with other individuals business development. I actually even got a client lead while I was here. But in addition to that, the classes themselves, the two that I really like were Tony Proctor's and Nick Boches, both of those really focused on how to be more efficient and grow a firm and have a firm that runs without you, which I just want to be lazy. I just want [00:36:30] to play video games and let people do work. So that's what I'm working on.

Jennifer: Hi, I'm Jennifer Johnson with JJ Accounting and Consulting and here at Intuit Connect. I think I finally understand what AI agents are and how I can deploy them in my firm to save time for me and for my clients. I think watching the agenda books clothes process is definitely going to be a great value add.

Anastasia: Okay, my name is Anastasia I'm with Optimus Pro out of Maui, [00:37:00] and I'm excited to be here and learning about the agents inside of QuickBooks that are being developed is very exciting thing. There was just one demonstrated about bill pay and anomalies that come with clients. Missed parking things.

Danielle: Hello, my name is Danielle Heinerman i own Heinerman CPA advisory, and CPA advisory is what I'm really diving [00:37:30] into for my business. So I was really excited to see the AI and the little sparkle at the upper right corner, and how you could use AI to direct steps that are previously really difficult, but also their reporting feature is getting so much more robust that we can put a lot of actionable Focus call outs and make them just a lot more professional looking. What's something specific.

Alicia Katz Pollock: That you.

Danielle: Went, whoa, the NSF [00:38:00] in one of the breakout rooms, they showed us how you can use the AI tool to have the system fix the problem for us. Like right away. Yeah. Bounce checks like move the payment to something else that it would create and then add a line for the fee. So that was pretty cool. Yeah.

Alicia Katz Pollock: All right, so there you have it. Some of the most exciting innovations to happen in Intuit [00:38:30] history. So we're going to end with our normal segment. What's going on in your world. And I'm excited to announce that I'm actually going to be doing several different workshops at the BDO CAS summit. So if you are a member of the BDO Alliance, I am going to be speaking in the Cast Summit on Friday, November 20th. I'm going to be speaking on Intuit Accountant Suite, and then also all the different ways that you can customize Qbo. So [00:39:00] please do join us for that. I'm also refreshing my payroll class to show you all the innovations in QuickBooks payroll, which is now called QuickBooks workforce and QuickBooks time as well. And then last but not least, I am doing a training with Mariette Martinez for the accounting life cycle. And that's an eight session series where we talk about all the different roles and responsibilities of what it takes to be a bookkeeper. So head over to Roy's dot com [00:39:30] to take a look at any of those classes, or find our links in the show notes. So this is Alicia Pollock from royalties.com, and we will see you in the next one.