BigTime Software vs. Emburse Abacus

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
BigTime Software
Score 7.1 out of 10
N/A
BigTime IQ is time and expense tracking software from Chicago-based BigTime Software.
$20
User per Month
Emburse Abacus
Score 6.8 out of 10
N/A
Abacus is a web and mobile application that helps manage employee expenses and reimbursements. Some key features include: Real-Time Expense Submission, Integrated ACH Payments, and Dynamic Custom Reporting. Abacus was acquired by Certify in summer 2018 and is now part of Emburse, formed from the merger of Certify and Chrome River March 2019.
$9
per active user/per month
Pricing
BigTime SoftwareEmburse Abacus
Editions & Modules
Essentials
$20
User per Month
Advanced
$35
User per Month
Premier
$45
User per Month
Projector
$60
Starter
$9
per active user/per month
Professional
Custom Pricing
Enterprise
Custom Pricing
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
BigTime SoftwareEmburse Abacus
Free Trial
YesYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoYes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
YesYes
Entry-level Setup FeeOptionalNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
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User Ratings
BigTime SoftwareEmburse Abacus
Likelihood to Recommend
9.0
(31 ratings)
2.8
(17 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
9.2
(3 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Usability
8.6
(2 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Availability
8.2
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Performance
9.1
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
9.0
(4 ratings)
9.0
(9 ratings)
Implementation Rating
9.1
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
8.2
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
BigTime SoftwareEmburse Abacus
Likelihood to Recommend
BigTime Software
I believe it is well suited for our industry! We are professional services consulting firm and we need this! However if there is a smaller company who does not need to track these items, then they should not use this big of a platform
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Emburse
Emburse Abacus is well suited for mid-market organizations that are open to - or embrace - the concept of real-time processing of expense transactions. Emburse Abacus takes a radically different approach from other platforms that rely on modeling paper-based monthly (or periodic) expense reports containing multiple expenses submitted simultaneously. Emburse Abacus allows each transaction to be very rapidly processed individually so that approving managers and accounting professionals are able to perform review tasks and identify potential problems throughout the entire month, relieving the massive monthly influx of large numbers of expense reports simultaneously.
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Pros
BigTime Software
  • I like the functionality of being able to make payments electronically and the amount of banks and payment methods that are available.
  • Another very useful feature of this tool is that the system allows to set a parameter to perform automatic invoices.
  • I also really like the amount of templates that this tool has. Since it allows us to make customizable reports to our clients.
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Emburse
  • User-Friendly Interface: Reviews from our employees (ages ranging from 20s-70s) are all positive in regards to the ease of submitting an expense and getting reimbursement on Abacus
  • Timely Reimbursement: After final approval, money hits user accounts within 2 days
  • Approval routing: ability to set up multi-tier complex approval routes
  • Syncs with Sage Intacct: pushes entries on a day to day basis in to Intacct and it hits our GL accordingly
  • Abacus is competitively priced compared to the competition
  • Abacus utilizes "by expense" management. Getting rid of expense reports and batch reports (they do have an option where you can batch if need be)
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Cons
BigTime Software
  • For some types of projects, we are unable to use BigTime's invoicing feature. It would be nice if we could further customize invoices to fit our needs. We still have to use Quickbooks to complete certain invoices.
  • Being able to create Purchase Orders in BigTime would be extremely useful to us. We currently use Quickbooks for this.
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Emburse
  • When you upload a receipt to abacus it would be great to port in the information from the receipt to the text fields.
  • It would be good to have a more automated way for Abacus to integrate in with other payroll systems.
  • It would be nice to have more levels of permissions, e.g. manager level, administer level and employee level.
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Likelihood to Renew
BigTime Software
Its been a huge help in saving time and making billing more efficient. Would like to see the product grow and be able to continue to use it.
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Emburse
No answers on this topic
Usability
BigTime Software
Staff adapted to the new timesheets immediately. The invoice platform is nice and tracking WIP is great! Color backgrounds still need work. The new vibrant mode is OK. still trying it out.
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Emburse
No answers on this topic
Reliability and Availability
BigTime Software
BigTime is available 99% of the time. At times there are bugs, but most are resolved quickly
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Emburse
No answers on this topic
Performance
BigTime Software
have not noticed a slow integration issue using QBO
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Emburse
No answers on this topic
Support Rating
BigTime Software
The support is amazing! They are always available through the chat interface in the program. Each support person has fully answered my questions the first time. I have had a positive experience with each inquiry. It is very important to me that I am able to get instant access to help so that I can make the most of the software and all of its capabilities.
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Emburse
I have never had to contact Abacus support and have not heard stories from any of my colleagues having to do so either. Our accounting department stresses the ease of Abacus and has not voiced any concerns with the software or the product support team or the product support process.
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Implementation Rating
BigTime Software
Monte and Tyler have been helpful with report assistance I called on recently
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Emburse
No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered
BigTime Software
I liked the client management, but it didn't do time tracking, billing or syncing with quickbooks. It was too robust for my needs. I tried it for the client management and thought I might use it along with bigtime, but it was too cumbersome and would involve too much double entry. And it didn't track time or bill which are necessary functions
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Emburse
I chose Abacus because of its ease of use and flexible billing. The billing is based on the number of submissions rather than users in the system. Because we reimburse committee members, we have a lot of users in the system, but the activity can vary widely from month to month.
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Scalability
BigTime Software
The product is useful for faster billing and efficient timesheet logs. I do like the report features however there are many options and can be overwhelming for the user. It is most helpful to set up reports speaking to an agent to ensure the right fields are set, etc.
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Emburse
No answers on this topic
Return on Investment
BigTime Software
  • Before BigTime, we were using Excel to track everything, creating invoices, and run reports. Getting on BigTime has saved us tons of time and effort which equates to dollars saved on labor.
  • From a legal standpoint, BigTime has allowed us to be organized and prepared in the event we would need to present financial details to anyone.
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Emburse
  • It is giving reliable services.
  • I am happy with its user-friendly services. Since I have issued the virtual and physical cards, I am getting real-time, and end-to-end control over my employee expenses. They can now easily go to visits and this has built their trust too. Further through receipts and expense details, I can easily control the pre-set budgets and easily configure rules to control spending.
  • I will also like to praise their customer care team they are very helpful and always ready to assist.
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ScreenShots

BigTime Software Screenshots

Screenshot of BigTime Wallet provides clients with a personalized experience to pay on time from anywhere, in one click.Screenshot of A big-picture view into operational insights to make adjustments to how resources are managed.Screenshot of Real-time, actionable insights for professional services firms.Screenshot of The platform is designed to work within existing workflows and software stack, acting as a single source of truth for data.Screenshot of BigTime's invoicing engine supports dozens of industry-standard billing scenarios and enough options to satisfy exacting customer needs.

Emburse Abacus Screenshots

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