Just wondering if anyone uses Quickbooks to do their clients work ? If so ,is it simple to use like Sage (for example) and does it support multi-companies - ie would I be able to use it for many clients or is it just single company ?
Sorry, forgot to add to the above ... do you back up like you do in sage and then send the back up to a client so they can restore on their machines ???
I have used Quickbooks for 8 years and absolutely love it.
I believe it is much friendlier than sage and you can drill down into every transaction to see the original input, this is something that I am severley missing with Sage. I am new to Sage and find it frustrating as it does not do what Quickbooks does.
The steps are quicker and less time consuming, the reports are easier to understand, the bank registers are brillaint and again you can drill down into these to see original input.
You can pick up Quickbooks easy, with no training as the steps are common sense. Even my accountant prefers Quickbooks to Sage, he says that most of his clients do as well.
Sorry to harp on but I can't recommend Quickbooks enough, its brilliant.
Oh and its much cheaper and yes you can backup and restore in the same way. And it supports many companies for a fraction of the cost. the payroll subscription is cheaper too.
I would say with Quickbooks would say that if it is the first accounting package you have used it is user friendly from what other people have told me.
If you have used Sage (especially if you have used Sage for many years) or any other accounting package would say it can take much longer to get to grips with Quickbooks.
Would say for any bookkeeper for any client it is best to check with accountants what software they use. If they use Sage and don't have Quickbooks may end up costing your client more in accountants fees if you use Quickbooks and likewise if accountant uses Quickbooks but you have used Sage can cost clients more. I have a client who I was going to use sage for but the accountants don't they have Quickbooks and because I am not a fan of Quickbooks and accountant would have charged more to client if I done in Sage using excel.
It is true I guess that you like what you use. I am having many problems with Sage not doing what I want it to do but I guess you could have the same problems with QB if you are a sage user, although I doubt it cos it is so perfect, ha ha !!!!
Just checked intuit.co.uk for Quickbbooks prices, the QB Pro used to have up to five companies installed but it doesn't say on the website so may be worth giving them a call to check, the price for Pro is £224, payroll is about £50 extra. I will certainly be buying this for home use.
If you read the reviews, its mainly compliants about the newer versions not having items that the older versions had but if you are not upgrading then you won't have a problem, I used Pro 8 and found it brill.
If you need payroll then they do get you to upgrade to a newer version every two years but the cost is still a lot cheaper than Sage and much much friendlier.
I've realised to my cost that putting your eggs in one basket with an accounting package does not help you as a freelance bookkeeper, so I will be trying to use both in order to offer an all round service (well i will when I get my head around sage!) Gerry
yes you are definately right, as a freelance bookkeeper it sort of limits you if you just use one system - bit of a pain really when you have used one system forever then a client uses another !! It's obviously just practice makes perfect I guess with the other packages and to have a play around with a trial company.
I have used Sage for around 10 years so know it well, am a member of the Sage Accountants Club, and the ability to re-sell - I also use VT and have used other software before, am very IT literate so can get to grips easily and quickly so for me no probs, however having looked on the Quickbooks website their pricing for Payroll multi company etc does not seem that cheaper than Sage, so i'm not convinced but I guess it does come down to personal preference!
