QuickBooks Desktop Enterprise

The online version of QB makes it easy to always have the necessary updates and current edition. The file sharing capabilities are the exact tool that is needed for the accountant to easily have a hassle-free exchange of the data they need to keep your books and do taxes. QB payroll that can be accessed through the software and there is easy access to QuickBook loan funding should you ever need it. Anytime, anywhere access is a plus.

The naming convention for some processes are a bit daunting until you learn exactly where they are and what they are called. The updates can cause features to be relocated, making them difficult to find. As with all cloud-based software, sometimes there are issues with the online connectivity.

The QuickBooks software is very affordable with lots of good out-of-box features. AR and AP functions are very easy to use for novice users of the software. There are a lot of templated reports that are very helpful for weekly and monthly accounting tasks (Payroll, Vendor Payments, Sales, etc.). The software also allows you to add on a variety of additional features through plug-ins, which you can access for a nominal monthly fee. For example, the BIll.com integration is excellent for paying your vendors online, eliminating the need for mailing out checks each month.

The biggest issue with QuickBooks is their customer service department. Whenever we have issues that cannot be resolved by an internal administrator, it takes days and sometimes weeks before an Intuit rep returns our messages. We've been using the software a little over a year and have already been passed around to several different account reps. At one point, their response time was so poor I had to request a different rep. The other thing I find cumbersome with the software is the sales reporting. While the templates are helpful, I often end up with a lot of superfluous information, and the reports are not very malleable, even once exported to Xcel. This is an area I feel could be greatly improved with minimal effort from Intuit.

QuickBooks does a fine job with basic accounting functions, is relatively easy to use, and the report suite is more than adequate for small businesses.

QuickBooks Enterprise Manufacturing & Wholesale version simply does not work as advertised, as two examples among many will demonstrate. QB offers 'Advanced Pricing' functionality which enables the user to define and apply pricing rules across their client roster and inventory items list. These rules are intended to allow the QB user to apply a 60% across-the-board discount for clients Ajax and AAA, while clients Acme and Consolidated receive that same discount plus custom pricing on items X, Y, and Z. However, after the pricing rules have been applied and those clients are being billed, changing the invoice or ship date results in the deletion of the shipping cost line-item, and changes to the pricing of items on the invoice. Research with QB support revealed that Advanced Pricing suffers from a bug that was known to Intuit for at least 1 month prior to when I invoked the Advanced Pricing functionality, and a full month later Intuit has been unable to remedy the bug. After invoking the 'Advanced Inventory' feature-set, which automatically creates a drop-ship warehouse site, I learned that product being purchased from a supplier and shipped directly to our client was being removed by QB from the count of physical inventory resident on our premises. Intuit tech support rep's response was (paraphrased) "That doesn't seem right, but I don't know much about Advanced Inventory - you should call back tomorrow morning, as the day-shift staff have more tenure and are more knowledgeable".