Tips on how to choose accounting software for your small business

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Years ago, keeping books was a tedious and difficult job which involved tons of papers, pens and pencils, ledgers, and commonly the carpal tunnel syndrome, because accountants and small business owners used pen and paper to record all the financial transactions a business was making. Today, however, things are significantly different. We live in a world where everything moves very quickly, and every minute is important. With the advancement of technology, we have been able to computerize almost every task we have, and this includes bookkeeping.

Why is accounting software so important to utilize?

Well, we will start from the obvious reasons – saving time, saving money, and eliminating the human error factor from the equation of bookkeeping. Aside from the obvious reasons, there are many more reasons related to the performance and success of your business. For example, you can see different trends in your business practice, such as financial reports from the past quarter, your stocks, predictions for the next quarter, and so on.

What should you look for when choosing business accounting software?

Here is a list of things to look for when deciding which accounting software to go for:

• Price – The first thing to think about is the price. There are some open-source accounting programs available, but it is always better to go for a paid software application. Find one that has a reasonable price and go for it.
• Ease of use – It is very important that the accounting software you go for is easy and intuitive to use, especially if you have to do your own bookkeeping. There are accounting programs that are very complicated, and there are those that are pretty easy to use. Try a few out and see which suits you most.
• Features – The features offered by the accounting software you choose will make all the difference in your daily schedule. Namely, not all the programs will offer you the same options and tools, and you should choose the one that has everything you need in order to run your business smoothly and without any hiccups.
• Ask your staff – If you have accounting staff, you should consult them regarding which accounting software to choose. They might have previous experience with this, and you should also take into account their opinion if they are the ones who will be using this software the most.

QuickBooks 2013 is a very good choice

While you are doing your research you will surely come across accounting software called QuickBooks, and there is a very good reason for this. QuickBooks 2013 is probably the best choice you can make when trying to find the perfect accounting software for your company. This program has all the features you can only wish, and QuickBooks Pro 2013 training will help you master all of them. It is important to know that QuickBooks Pro 2013 is very easy to use and intuitive as well, so mastering all the tools within the program should not be very difficult and shouldn’t take you a lot of time.

About the author: Jack offers Quickbooks pro 2013 training, both for corporates and individual clients. He has been in this field for last 5 years and regularly travels around the world on training assignments.

Personal Finance Software: Microsoft Money vs Quicken

Both Microsoft Money and Intuit Quicken are leading financial software providers in terms of U.S. market share. The two software packages both come in three primary versions from the most basic to the premier, each with additional functions and features not necessarily available in less expensive versions. Furthermore, both Microsoft Money and Intuit Quicken have a small business management component to their software packages. The two products seem to be competing with each other as their product designs and packages illustrate.

Microsoft Money advantages

• More affordable than Quicken: At $19.99, $29.99 and $49.99 for the essentials, deluxe and premium versions, Microsoft Money software out values Quicken's starter, deluxe and premier finance software packages for PC's at $29.99, $59.99 and $89.99.

• Microsoft engineering: It's probably worth mentioning Microsoft has some of the best and brightest software engineers and programmers in the World. It is quite likely the Microsoft's talent pool, experience in the industry and management know how has had a positive influence on the evolution of 

Microsoft Money software over the years.

• Since Microsoft also designs operating systems such as Windows, it is also beneficial from a functionality and integration perspective that Microsoft Money is made by the same company as many popular operating systems. This can lead to smoother and more familiar features, styles and formatting.

Intuit Quicken advantages

• A primary advantage of Quicken is that the same company also makes tax preparation software and small business management software. The advantage is exporting and transporting data from one file in one software, to another file in another software can be enabled by similar design features. An example of this is the exporting function of quicken to Turbo tax which is also an Intuit product.

• Quicken credit card: A unique differential advantage quicken has to Microsoft Money is the Quicken credit card. This card allows card holders to download financial records and history quickly and easily into the Quicken software without a lot of hassle. In effect, the Quicken credit card allows card holders to consolidate accounts with account record keeping at home.

• Another advantage of Quicken is the company really tries to add value and has some partial success doing so with the add on features. For example, Quicken allows users to print their own checks, download financial data directly from financial institutions and pay bills online through Quicken's bill payer service.

Disadvantages of both Intuit Quicken and Microsoft Money

While Quicken seems to have more capacity than Microsoft in terms of providing services and allowing it's users to organize their finances, the fact remains that neither Microsoft or Quicken are full service banking institutions, data entrists or financial planners. They are merely software packages to help organize and analyze information. Microsoft does not appear to attempt to go beyond this role in the same way Quicken does, perhaps out of knowing the limits of the software's capability. However, Microsoft's software is less expensive perhaps in reflection of the less complete service options.

What both Quicken and Microsoft Money fail to tout is the fact that financial institutions sometimes do a great job of preparing and presenting personal financial information all by themselves. All Quicken and Money do are replicate the data and consolidate it for further review and manipulations. This may or may not be and advantage to someone who already has an organized of comfortable financial record keeping system in place.

Microsoft Money and Intuit Quicken are both well marketed, professionally designed, and multi-generational software packages that have been years in the making. They are both produced by experienced software designers and both serve a similar function i.e. organization and presentation of personal and in some cases, small business financial information. Each software has slightly different advantages and similar disadvantages.

The advantages are in the software capabilities, pricing and formatting and the disadvantages are in the actual real life utility of the software i.e. they are both good software packages but neither one performs financial tasks already existing financial institutions such as banks can't and don't already do via financial statements and reports.