Small business owners: what kind of accounting software do you like?

[grsthegreat]

Hard to beat Quickbooks for a small business. I'm a CPA and 90% of my small business clients use it. I use it internally and encourage its use. I have about 10 clients using the online version and I really like it too. There are a number of third party applications that interface with QB - our professional time and billing package does.

Does a good job with payroll also.

I resisted QB years ago because part of what makes it easy for non-accountants takes some getting used to for accountants. But the more I used it the more I appreciated it as a very serious product and I prefer it over any others.

QB does a fair job tracking job costs, but doesn't handle progress billings. I suspect I could come up with a workaround, but its not been an issue so I had not given it much thought.

Intuit does not treat CPAs very well. Its because of us that it is the leading accounting package by a mile and yet just to bring in client data files and work with them we have to purchase a separate license for every user in our firm, every year. By contrast, we pay Sage $400 a year and can install Peachtree on every computer we own, including laptops. Peachtree is also an outstanding package, maybe a little harder to learn than QB, and somewhat more rigid and accountant friendly. Job cost is better on Peachtree, but for those clients that don't need it QB is so much easier.

QB won't make an accountant out of you but its a good tool if you learn what you are trying to do with it.

Years ago I purchased Peachtree and it came with 8 hours of training to use it..... Wasnt enough time. Man that is some HARD software to learn. The teacher couldn't get the progress billing to work in that either. I tried this as i couldnt get Quickbooks to do progress billing.

Maybe non of these can without some major work arround.

 

[MoKelly]

My wife uses Quickbooks for her tennis club. Does everything she needs and is user friendly.

MoKelly

 

[Alan L.]

Years ago I purchased Peachtree and it came with 8 hours of training to use it..... Wasnt enough time. Man that is some HARD software to learn. The teacher couldn't get the progress billing to work in that either. I tried this as i couldnt get Quickbooks to do progress billing.

Maybe non of these can without some major work arround.

Its not really progress billings per se but keep in mind that in both QB and PT you can code invoices to jobs and at any point you can run job cost reports that show the revenue vs the costs of the job. You can have an unlimited number of invoices per job.

 

[Western]

Hard to beat Quickbooks for a small business. I'm a CPA and 90% of my small business clients use it. I use it internally and encourage its use. I have about 10 clients using the online version and I really like it too. There are a number of third party applications that interface with QB - our professional time and billing package does.

Does a good job with payroll also.

I resisted QB years ago because part of what makes it easy for non-accountants takes some getting used to for accountants. But the more I used it the more I appreciated it as a very serious product and I prefer it over any others.

QB does a fair job tracking job costs, but doesn't handle progress billings. I suspect I could come up with a workaround, but its not been an issue so I had not given it much thought.

Intuit does not treat CPAs very well. Its because of us that it is the leading accounting package by a mile and yet just to bring in client data files and work with them we have to purchase a separate license for every user in our firm, every year. By contrast, we pay Sage $400 a year and can install Peachtree on every computer we own, including laptops. Peachtree is also an outstanding package, maybe a little harder to learn than QB, and somewhat more rigid and accountant friendly. Job cost is better on Peachtree, but for those clients that don't need it QB is so much easier.

QB won't make an accountant out of you but its a good tool if you learn what you are trying to do with it.

Alan, I had to take a look again of where you lived:laughing: sound almost like my Accountant.

What my Accountant has done is for us, he made paper forms for us to fill out and/or has us print out various docs from QB, then he or his secretary type in what they need on their forms. I don't have full or par-time employees, but do sub out allot at times, so that may be a big reason.

BTW, I understand QB used allot of CPA and Accountant input to improve QB, since they became so much of the market?

 

[EarPlug]

I vote for Peachtree. I have used it since the DOS days. I find it adheres to more formal (and proper) accounting practices. There is a lot of support options and their tech support is great not only for running the software (the computer stuff) but they also help very well with the "accounting" side.

They also have a version for construction Construction Accounting Software | Peachtree Premium for Construction

My wife uses Quickbooks and we are always having network problems with it. Tech support is so-so and we pay for premium supports. QB tries to make the program easy for anyone to use and I think that it causes some confusion when it comes to the accounting side. If you mess up it can be very difficult to find the problem.

 

[sam5570]

the first thing i would do is go hire a good credible cpa and they will give you the info and set you on the right track i was in business 17 years and them people done so much for me and the best thing i was never audited by state or irs they took care of payrool quartery taxes and i could stay @ work making money. they took care of my investments the whole 9 yards.if your not careful you will spend so much time on book work that you will lose money on work you can't preform.just my opinion it's diferent strocks for diferent folks.:thumbsup:

 

[9973720wb19]

Quickbooks - no question

 

[foggy1111]

I agree that QB is likely the best choice for you.

But.....about 25 years ago.....I began my biz using Cougar Mountain software. We stuck with it until I sold my biz a few years ago. It was really good for job costing and following our manufacturing inventory (a crucial requirement for me). My office manager and purchasing manager really liked it. It may be better today.....but I was unhappy with the software for sales and marketing purposes.

Still....it was good for job costing IIRC. It may be worth exploring for your purposes?

 

[Ron JD670]

I use quick books as a Financial planner. I would recommend getting a good book keeper to help set it up your primary accounts or some tax pros or CPA provide this as part of the service. The big thing IMO is to get the accounts set up properly once that's done the sub accts are easy to add. I no now do my home acctg with it as well. I have multiple revenue and expense channels do to the nature if my business. QB handles it ... Once I got it set up properly. Good luck and best wishes
Ron JD670

 

[BungeeII]

I've used Quickbooks since 1995. Before that, I supported a couple of serious Accounting/Inventory Control packages. QB is very Intuit-ive (nerd humor).

If you're certain you'll be doing payroll, I cannot think of anything better to go with.

The beginning of the year is a good time to buy. Go to Sam's Club and get Pro with 3-person Payroll when it's on sale (usually right around right now). Intuit's price for upgrading the software every year and renewing the payroll subscription is HIGHER than just buying it outright if you only have a couple employees.

For the $300 per year, it really does do a lot.

There are other packages out there... Over the years I've thought frequently about going with a 100% Linux office... It's hard to find one that does everything QB does, especially when Payroll is required.