Basecamp vs. ExpensePath

Basecamp is a wonderful tool for teams of varying degrees of technical knowledge, teams managing lots of different types of "agifall" and waterfall projects, and teams that are remotely distributed. It's probably less useful for more strictly agile-focused development teams, compared to other more flexible software applications like Jira and Asana.

Incentivized

ExpensePath works great for mid-size companies with multiple locations and multiple levels of approval needed. It doesn't have the bells and whistles of more expensive options like Expensify or Concur, but they excel at being attentive to customer needs and simple to use.

Incentivized

• Task management - It is very easy to add, organize and discuss tasks within Basecamp's interface.
• The "Campfire" function is great for communicating when you just have a quick question for someone on the team.
• Notifications - Basecamp lets you decide how often and about what you'd like to be notified. The ability to respond to messages in Basecamp directly via email saves a lot of time.

Incentivized

• ExpensePath responds within minutes and helps solve issues right away. Vik and his team are always open to how they can better their product.
• ExpensePath's app is quite simple and straightforward, making it easy to teach to even our technology averse employees.
• Though we don't use it extensively, we appreciate ExpensePath's internal expense reporting functionality, which provides good insight into our employee's spending.
• They correctly integrated our Sage Intacct GL accounts and dimensions directly into the system, so no additional mapping was needed after setup.

Incentivized

• High Learning Curve. It's true that it can be easy to use, but to use well and effectively takes some time to learn. It's recommended to have an agreed-upon system in your team of what tools to use and when.
• Notification Overload. If people aren't careful they could send a notification to everyone when only a couple people were meant to be prompted. And since emails are sent by default, you could have your mailbox overloaded with unnecessary updates. This is where it takes a bit of training in your team to have an agreed-upon system.
• Lack of organization with Archived Projects. I will often need to reference an archived project to make a new one, but there is only a list of archived projects in alphabetical order, with no way to organize by archive date, or even search.

Incentivized

• They're in the process of developing the ability to directly reimburse from ExpensePath rather than cutting a check through an ERP. This feature would be very helpful.

Incentivized

When I bring new people onto a project, it's immediately obvious how to use Basecamp. I don't have to worry about teaching them the features or walking them through it, it's just incredibly user-friendly. For this reason, I'll continue to renew my subscription even as new people are brought onto production jobs or the client changes.

It is easy to use, even for clients who have no experience with the platform. It can only get a little cumbersome to ensure that a client can't see certain documents you might want to keep in the Docs & Files folders. And sometimes, getting a client to actually use an unfamiliar platform can be a challenge.

Incentivized

I've never experienced downtime while using Basecamp, or been unable to access it when I needed it. That's not to say they've never had downtime, but I've been lucky enough not to encounter any, and I work odd hours, including late nights when maintenance is often undertaken.

Incentivized

For the many reasons I've given, Basecamp is a very strong program. There are a few features I can imagine that might make it even better, but I don't have a basis for comparison to be able to say that there is definitely a better one out there. I've noticed that Basecamp has evolved a bit from the time I started using it until now, so that makes me think that the producer of this program values it and believes in continuous improvement. If you could use the features offered by Basecamp, I would think you could use it with confidence.

Incentivized

Decide the process before implementation - i.e. when it's due 8/9 does that mean 8am, noon, 5pm, 11:59pm? Check your to-do list frequently Set-up templates - just not with the dates (they can be funky)

Pretty good, but [Basecamp] has its drawbacks. Honestly I find the interface non-intuitive and sometimes have trouble figuring out how to change the status of a task. Perhaps it has something to do with the way it was originally set up by the admin, but I'm not sure. I liked Jira's drag and drop obvious functionality, but the project management side of the software was lacking. Smartsheet has excellent project management functionality, but the task management isn't as good.

Incentivized

Expensify was a nightmare. We used it for 8 months and couldn't wait to find something else. Their customer service was unresponsive and rarely got back to us in a timely fashion. They never solved any of the issues we were having with integrating to Sage Intacct, and their "smart scan" feature never worked once. Their app was painful to navigate. On top of the many reasons already listed, we switched to ExpensePath because they're not flashy. ExpensePath delivers a great product without the veneer of many of its competitors.

Incentivized

• It has saved me time when having to get the same message out to multiple restaurants
• It has helped us make smarter operational decisions because we can all collaborate on an answer in a shorter amount of time (instead of calling a meeting!!!)
• The calendar function allows us to plot out our marketing agenda for the month and add/change it together as needed. The chef will post his recipe, the managers will cost it out, the social media manager will post pictures on it, and ultimately we will get that information out on an info sheet to the staff by printing the page.

Incentivized

• The first goal of our finance department is to make all of the tools we use to gather information integrate with our main ERP, Sage Intacct. ExpensePath's integration has been flawless and saved us hours of manual expense entry.
• The second goal of our finance department is to make all of the tools we utilize easily adoptable by new users. ExpensePath is one of the simplest, most responsive apps we've ever seen. Even those on our team who are averse to adopting new technology like ExpensePath.

Incentivized