Likelihood to Recommend Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT is great for an independent/private school. It integrates well with enrollment and student information systems sold by Blackbaud. For example, you could send data from the student information system straight into the Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT. The caveat of course is that you would need to be using other Blackbaud products to leverage this integration. However, all Blackbaud products utilize open APIs so with a little programming, one can share data across many systems.
Read full review FreshBooks is the perfect tool for businesses who have hundreds of clients and customers whom they invoice regularly. It removes the need to manually send invoices to clients and customers, by streamlining inputted information to create an automated invoicing system which keeps clients and customers up to date with their bills. It is also a great tool for managing expenses, especially for companies with different teams working on varying projects, ensuring these teams do not exceed the budget ceiling.
Read full review Pros Uploading and inputting information is easy due to a clear format and outline. Researching and finding past information is quick and easy to navigate due to searching and filtering options as well as the ability to name the files for quick searches. Pulling project titles and accounts - you can have a large amount of projects and accounts and are able to know them through the system without having to memorize each individual title. Being able to export a general ledger for an account to excel while still being formatted correctly. Having the ability to filter in what transactions are pulled in the general ledger. You are able to easily look at all the activity or only activity in a certain time frame or other specific filters. There is always access to help from Blackbaud services for any sort of difficulty. Learning and the ability to attend Blackbaud classes are readily and easily available so you can increase your knowledge and ability to serve well in your organizations' role. Read full review FreshBooks is pretty intuitive to use. I did have some questions when I first started using the system, but it wasn't a long learning curve. FreshBooks provides more capability than other billing applications such as PaySimple or BlinkSale. FreshBooks does provide an easy invoicing function. It's easy to create invoices that can be sent via email or snail mail to one or more individuals (for example, the decision-maker and the accounting dept). Clients can pay online or send a check and then I note that the payment has been received. If paid by credit card, the system automatically marks the invoice paid. Your business accounts such as bank accounts can be linked to FreshBooks. Then, the system can automatically draw in expenses and will create simple P&L reports, overdue invoices, client history, etc. If you don't have inventory and complex payroll, etc. FreshBooks provides just the right level of capability to make financial tracking simple. FreshBooks integrates with a number of credit card companies. I use Stripe, which has fees similar to Paypal, but much more reliable processing. I can accept all credit cards, including American Express, for a reasonable fee. Read full review Cons Takes some time to set-up for an organization and there is a learning curve Features & updates are constant due to the online cloud nature. An option to update certain features on demand would be nice or an option to delay. Certain credit card bank feeds are not currently compatible Read full review I can brand invoices with my business logo, but I might like to change colours of the invoices themselves to match the rest of my business documents. That isn't a major point at all, but it's something that I'd like to see. Freshbooks doesn't remember the categories that similar expenses were previously assigned to. It would be nice if Freshbooks would suggest a category for an already saved vendor, to ensure the consistency of expense reporting. The home page of a Freshbooks account has a great graph display of expenses and income, but it only shows the last 6 months. This is still very useful, but I'd like to be able to see this kind of graph for different periods of time. Read full review Likelihood to Renew BB seems to forcing changes on customers at a faster rate. This company needs stability because it is understaffed in accounting. There isn't time to drop everything and work up workarounds or even try to judge effects. There also isn't the time to find a replacement suite unless things get really bad.
Read full review At the current needs of our business, FreshBooks suits us perfectly - it allows online access by our accountant to the system for GST purposes, easy input of expenses and tracking of Profit and Loss statements. FreshBooks customer service is great as well - very understanding and accommodating.
Read full review Usability I don't have much to compare it to but if I speak of just the reporting options; sometimes there are so many options I spend more time finding the "perfect" report when a basic report with minimal columns is needed. But I know I can always add to the report if asked.
Read full review FreshBooks is very easy to use even for novices. If you're looking for an online accounting software that is full of features, has great aesthetics and is user-friendly, then this is definitely the software for you. I've been using it for several years now and despite being tempted to switch by other vendors, I like the feel of FreshBooks and it's mobile features.
Read full review Reliability and Availability FreshBooks is easy to use and always works!
Read full review Support Rating No one is perfect, but this support team is as close as it gets. They respond promptly and if the person I'm talking to doesn't have the answer they find someone that does. They also provide documentation and/or resources to support their responses to my questions. The online chat is awesome and usually all I need
Read full review I think the support level for FreshBooks is on par with a 6 because the folks behind this application do a fairly good job at providing support for their customer base. I still don't think they are at an elite level when it comes to supporting but are getting there although too slow in my opinion.
Read full review Implementation Rating The implementation can be easy depending on how familiar you are with Blackbaud products. It is cloud based so there is not a need for IT involvement but you do need to know your business requirement.
Read full review I haven't changed my mind since my first evaluation. Freshbooks is still meeting my needs, easy to use, etc.
Read full review Alternatives Considered Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT is far superior to CYMA. We used CYMA for over 20 years. It was tough to transition because Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT follows GAAP, while CYMA did not the way we had it set up. Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT has more robust fund tracking and allows us to create custom reports.
Read full review We do not consider other options since our client wants the implementation of this platform in order to use it in the two countries where it has operations. At the moment, full integration was not possible and we still share the information with a Mexican system to complete everything necessary.
Read full review Return on Investment The reporting features that include unposted entries and can be run on-demand to see a year to date budget comparison, have certainly made it easier to stay on task and within budget. We have been able to integrate some of the fundraising features into Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT; consolidating to one system for tracking all key financial parameters, has been invaluable. The budget partner (Zai?) is absolutely terrible and a huge waste of time and money; it does not integrate as advertised and is constantly "broken/down" on our end. It is not as advertised and honestly shouldn't be promoted by Blackbaud - it's that terrible. Read full review Freshbooks saves me time compared to when I managed to invoice without an app. Freshbooks make keeping my invoices organized which saves me time. Freshbooks helps me to know who is late on payments. When I was doing this by hand, some invoices would get lost in the clutter and I would not find out I haven't been paid until much later. Mike Calabro Photographer: Commercial, Advertising and Editorial
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