BQE CORE vs. Jira Align

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
BQE CORE
Score 8.5 out of 10
Small Businesses (1-50 employees)
BQE CORE is a business management solution built specifically for professional service firms. BQE CORE is a combination of a billing assistant, project management, and accounting solution. CORE is designed to do the hard work of delivering actionable insights directly to the user's dashboards or inbox. BQE CORE replaces the products Engineeroffice, Archioffice, and BillQuick; the functionality of these applications is now found in BQE CORE.N/A
Jira Align
Score 7.9 out of 10
N/A
Jira Align (formerly AgileCraft) is an enterprise-ready project management solution, now from Atlassian (acquired May 2019).
$27,000
per year
Pricing
BQE COREJira Align
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
Starting Price
$27,000.00
per year
Maximum Price
$3,987,600.00
per year
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
BQE COREJira Align
Free Trial
YesNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
YesNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
BQE COREJira Align
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Top Pros
Top Cons
Features
BQE COREJira Align
Project Management
Comparison of Project Management features of Product A and Product B
BQE CORE
8.1
55 Ratings
8% above category average
Jira Align
7.6
20 Ratings
6% above category average
Task Management8.537 Ratings9.220 Ratings
Resource Management9.138 Ratings8.420 Ratings
Gantt Charts6.716 Ratings8.515 Ratings
Scheduling8.226 Ratings5.716 Ratings
Workflow Automation7.627 Ratings00 Ratings
Team Collaboration8.031 Ratings00 Ratings
Support for Agile Methodology8.712 Ratings9.519 Ratings
Support for Waterfall Methodology8.312 Ratings4.412 Ratings
Document Management7.230 Ratings4.616 Ratings
Email integration7.225 Ratings8.516 Ratings
Mobile Access8.532 Ratings4.513 Ratings
Timesheet Tracking9.355 Ratings9.514 Ratings
Change request and Case Management8.521 Ratings8.918 Ratings
Budget and Expense Management7.343 Ratings8.010 Ratings
Professional Services Automation
Comparison of Professional Services Automation features of Product A and Product B
BQE CORE
8.4
38 Ratings
13% above category average
Jira Align
-
Ratings
Quotes/estimates7.820 Ratings00 Ratings
Invoicing8.833 Ratings00 Ratings
Project & financial reporting8.737 Ratings00 Ratings
Integration with accounting software8.424 Ratings00 Ratings
Best Alternatives
BQE COREJira Align
Small Businesses
Stackby
Stackby
Score 9.9 out of 10
Craft
Craft
Score 8.9 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
SAP Ruum
SAP Ruum
Score 9.0 out of 10
GitLab
GitLab
Score 8.9 out of 10
Enterprises
Quickbase
Quickbase
Score 9.2 out of 10
Miro
Miro
Score 9.0 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
BQE COREJira Align
Likelihood to Recommend
8.6
(148 ratings)
9.1
(20 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
7.2
(8 ratings)
9.9
(2 ratings)
Usability
8.1
(100 ratings)
5.2
(2 ratings)
Availability
8.2
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Performance
7.3
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
7.9
(90 ratings)
7.0
(11 ratings)
Online Training
6.4
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
2.9
(6 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Ease of integration
4.5
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
8.2
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
8.2
(1 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
8.2
(1 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
User Testimonials
BQE COREJira Align
Likelihood to Recommend
BQE Software Inc.
BQE CORE is well suited for a firm trying to get a better understanding of their project performance as a whole as well as better manage time and project resources. It is not the greatest for client management through a project or through invoicing, but it is do-able within the system.
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Atlassian
The Atlassian Jira Align (formerly AgileCraft) tools help keep our scrum teams moving in the right direction. It gives Sr. Executives visibility into the progress of our digital transformation efforts. It provides information to our program manager to create the necessary artifacts to justify continued funding of our initiatives. It also supports the SAFe framework, along with some others. And the Atlassian Jira Align (formerly AgileCraft) tools provide integration to other tools that we use in our portfolio.
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Pros
BQE Software Inc.
  • Invoice Collections within Billing is a great tool because of the ability to take notes and track contact.
  • Invoices are professional looking and easy for our clients to understand the overall progress within each phase of their project.
  • Dashboards are the best tool EVER!
  • The Contact List feature within Clients setup is the perfect way to track multiple project managers within a large company that also has multiple contracts with us.
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Atlassian
  • Effective Sprint planning : Sprint planning can be done using Planning Poker in AgileCraft by clicking Team > Manage > Other > Estimation Games very effectively for distributed teams.
  • Team Capacity Allocation Report: After tasks are created at team or program level, the report from AgileCraft cab be pulled and can be verified that no team member is under or over allocated. A report can be generated by navigating to Team > Manage > Assign Tasks.
  • Effective Requirement trace-ability: To maintain requirements trace-ability follow the steps below:
  • Upload test cases against the story/requirement. once uploaded test cases will be visible under that story
  • Execute Test cases in AgileCraft and mark them as Pass/Fail based on the actual outcome
  • Based on test results, The acceptance criterion's can be marked as “Pass” or “Fail” & if marked failed corresponding defect can be logged & can be attached with the story
  • So against each story we can easily see whether all test cases been executed or not & which acceptance criterion's are failed & how many defects are in open or close state.
  • Daily Scrum: In AgileCraft, the option to run a daily stand-up is available from Team > Manage > Daily Standups. Selecting the sprint number opens the daily stand-up meeting window in which each team member's tasks are visible and hours can be burned against them. Conduct Scrum meetings in AgileCraft, and burn each associate hour against the tasks created during the meeting. The burn-down chart can be generated & viewed during the stand-up to check whether the team is on track.
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Cons
BQE Software Inc.
  • Customizable Reporting
  • Linking Project to Payment all together
  • Assigning contacts to particular roles - such as Invoicing, Contracts, etc.
  • Accounting Functionality - they are basically a project management accounting software, so in my opinion, they could learn some things from other accounting software such as QuickBooks etc.
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Atlassian
  • The initial ticket creation screen lacks some important features, such as assigning "point values" (a measure of effort needed for the ticket).
  • The browser needs to be manually refreshed to see new tickets, which can make things confusing when several people in a meeting are simultaneously creating tickets.
  • The interface on some smaller portions of the software are sometimes difficult to understand.
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Likelihood to Renew
BQE Software Inc.
We have been using Core for a few years now, and honestly started to look at other software systems to see what was out there. What we chose was a nightmare for migration so we never left Core. Now we have added invoicing and payments from Core instead of double entry with QBO. Still only a few cycles in but looks like it will be up to speed soon and working smoothly.
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Atlassian
There is nothing that can be better than Jira but it needs to keep improving certain areas especially the attachment size area.
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Usability
BQE Software Inc.
The foundation is awesome, like I have said before, however the house being built on it, the educational resources being provided to us (more of sales pitches that don't work), and flexible workflow opportunities, is making us look elsewhere for how much we will be spending on per user. It's crazy to think how flexible they are not when it comes to user settings. Lack of integration with other sources is awful.
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Atlassian
Most of the things are easily manageable except certain things that are hidden and you need to ask teammates who are aware of how they can link attachements in the comment section and so on.
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Reliability and Availability
BQE Software Inc.
I can only remember a couple of times in 4 years that Core has been unavailable.
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Atlassian
No answers on this topic
Performance
BQE Software Inc.
This is one area that does need some improvement. It can be slow at time, so we had our IT look at it from our side and we had no issues, so it has to be some slowness on their side.
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Atlassian
No answers on this topic
Support Rating
BQE Software Inc.
As a new employee and CORE user, I talk to support on a weekly basis. I have never had to wait for more than 3 min to get connect with a support rep, and all my questions have been answered. The support representatives are polite and eager to help no matter how simple your question is.
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Atlassian
Overall support from Jira team is good. It comes at an additional price but it is very efficient. There are no long wait times, you get a dedicated team to look into your issues. The support is available throughout the year and they keep a record of your issues. Overall we are very satisfied with the support they have provided us over the years, it has been very effective for the price that we pay.
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Online Training
BQE Software Inc.
Make sure you have someone training you that fits your style of learning.
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Atlassian
No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
BQE Software Inc.
It does take some time to understand the options and to find the best invoice template.
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Atlassian
No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered
BQE Software Inc.
Deltek Vision is far more advanced, more encompassing and offers more flexibility with what you want to do. However, it's also quite difficult to use, whereas BQE CORE is intuitive and user friendly. The trade off is worth it in some arenas but overall it's not suited for a larger fast paced company. Great for smaller companies.
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Atlassian
Microsoft Azure Devops won't have the major functionality of software management like Jira. The customization provided by Jira is having a cutting edge over any project management tool. Adds-on and Plugins feature in the Jira Tool make it as perfect as desired task management tool for any company. One of the best Agile based Project Management Tools.
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Scalability
BQE Software Inc.
This software works on a small and large scale.
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Atlassian
No answers on this topic
Return on Investment
BQE Software Inc.
  • Quick setup of new tasks under a parent project, with immediate hourly billing to it.
  • Monitoring of details of non-chargeable efforts in appropriate detail
  • Validation of hourly cost, billing cost, benefit cost, profitability by person and role
  • Company tracking of write-off's included in corporate and project reporting, no data is "lost"
  • Can track excessive work time as +PTO in lieu of pay for use as future vacation
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Atlassian
  • It has positively impacted our tech teams, allowing them to better organize the tasks and items they are working on and has greatly improved their ability to communicate & review these tasks with other teams.
  • I believe it negatively impacted other departments as lengthy training was required by many associates to attempt using the tool, only to find out it didn't meet our needs, therefore much time was wasted.
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ScreenShots

BQE CORE Screenshots

Screenshot of Core powered by BQE SoftwareScreenshot of BQE CORE Project Dashboard ViewScreenshot of BQE CORE 360* Firm Performance ViewScreenshot of BQE CORE Reporting & AnalyticsScreenshot of BQE CORE Project Time EntryScreenshot of BQE CORE Project Expense Tracking