retaining history when moving from desktop to online

Hi there.  I appreciate your reply to my community question about migrating from desktop to online.  I am feeling quite confused by the mixed answers I am receiving to my question.  We are in Canada and have Pro 2014, wanting to migrate to Essentials.  It’s a small business, mostly run by volunteers, and as the bookkeeper, I am the one needing to sort this out.

A sales consultant  told me in an online chat that only current year records would survive the migration.  Thus, to see our old activity, I would need to open the old desktop database.  This scenario is unacceptable for us.

Fiat Lux-ASIA advises that if our total targets are less than 350K, all data will be migrated.  We have less than 13K targets, so clearly we fit that requirement and would not need the special steps or a conversion service.  However, I don’t know what exactly is meant by targets and whether our low number means that old transactions, for example, would be accessible in the new online version.  I want to be able to look at invoices, cheques etc from past years.

A fellow bookkeeper who has gone through the process with another business told me that we should first update on desktop so everything is up  to date and then migrate to the online version.  Similarly, the article you referred me to advises that we first update our desktop.  I guess that happens when we use the trial version of desktop?  Can we complete this step without having to pay for desktop as well as online?

I am not a tech wiz, and it’s very difficult for me to determine which approach is correct.  My fear is that I will get the process started in a way that permanently limits my success.  Maintaining easy access to our old transactions is important to us.  Would you be able to answer these questions for me or refer me to someone who can, please?