Likelihood to Recommend BlackLine has worked well for our companies, as we have a very old ERP system that is limited to what can be done within the system. Everything was done manually through Excel and binders to keep everything together, and each location had their own way of closing, so there was no consistency. It took longer to complete our close, and it created opportunities for a lack of separation of duties within the process. BlackLine has everything in one place, easy viewing of past months, strict separation of duties implemented (based on your specifications,) easy viewing for an auditor to get everything they need without a lot of hands on from the team, and works the same across all of our global locations, but in their local language and currency. BlackLine may not be a huge assist to those that have ERP systems that can handle doing the Recs, the JE's, the approvals, etc., all within its own system, as long as every location is on the same system. If they are all on different accounting systems, BlackLine can assist in providing consistency across all accounting locations, so processes can be the same no matter where they are located.
Read full review QuickBooks Premier is not well suited to manufacturing industries, as it cannot handle the complicated inventory requirements of raw materials, work in process, and finished goods. Retailers and Wholesalers can use QuickBooks Premier as long as they have an add-on inventory tracking program or Point of Sale system that integrates with QuickBooks. Likewise, restaurants would need specialized restaurant software that integrates with QuickBooks Premier. Non-profits can use QuickBooks Premier non-profit edition, but if they use fund accounting, it will require some complicated work-arounds. QuickBooks Premier is well-suited to most construction trades, personal and professional services providers, small retailers, and rental property owners.
Read full review Pros Saving time! Our manual process became automated the minute we "turned on" Blackline! Focus! By saving time using Blackline, our employees are able to focus on other job responsibilities and profit-generation Support! Blackline's support throughout our implementation and post-implementation has been exceptional. We always receive timely responses and get answers fast, when needed User Friendly! Their system is very easy to navigate. Even individuals in our organization that don't like or embrace change said the transition to Blackline was smooth and painless Read full review The program is easy to learn and use. We can train our clients' personnel how to use the program with out difficulty. It is easy for clients to generate bills and manage accounts receivable. It is easy to manage accounts payable and allows clients to pay their bills electronically. Transactions can be imported electronically for credit card and banking transactions. It is easy to reconcile bank and credit card accounts. We can import data generated by QuickBooks into our tax and accounting software. Read full review Cons Early functionality for Oracle users - a lot of the new products are only for use by SAP users. Access to API data to improve the reporting of data out of BlackLine. Ability to create reports in BlackLine across data sources. Ability to email reports out of BlackLine (either ad-hoc or scheduled reports) as opposed to the current process of having the user access BlackLine to retrieve the report. Read full review I would like to be able to choose how i want to view accounts receivable aging. I would like some flexibility to sort and choose how to present the data. For a seasoned accountant, I would like to see some of the restrictive controls that are in place for novices to be able to be relaxed so that I can easily make some entries and adjust some balances that ordinarily a regular user would not be able to do. I would like to see an easy way to clear old outstanding checks that need to be reversed without affecting prior balances/history. Read full review Likelihood to Renew Because this is a great tool with many possibilities and cool perks. Plus, as an admin - because I am both user and admin - I can say that this is easy to handle, you don't even have to be able to write a single piece of code to do so
Read full review Because we have been extremely happy with the product and our organization tends to be creatures of habit. We rarely leave a product that works this well for the latest and greatest. Typically we follow the "if it's not broken, don't fix it rule". While QB does make changes we typically just roll with it. If we do find something we don't like we work through it until we fully understand its functionality.
Read full review Usability BlackLine could use a little work in getting around the system. The interface is not without its issues including lots of scrolling up and down and a lack of using the entire screen. Importing of the initial setup data could be better defined and reimporting data to add additional fields could pose an issue of overwriting data in a negative way.
Read full review QuickBooks is an amazing tool that provides all of the necessary features needed to run the finances of a company. I would like for QuickBooks to provide better resources for training. There are many features that go unused because of lack of knowledge.
Procore offers chatting and calls on their platform and they make it easy and accessible to get answers and solutions.
Read full review Reliability and Availability We never experienced an outage with BlackLine. The only time the system was unavailable was during planned outages for updates and upgrades usually Friday evening after 6pm pst until Saturday morning at 6am pst.
Read full review This is very reliable software, the desktop version is fast. If there is a problem, it is most likely on your own hardware!
Read full review Performance BlackLine performs rather quickly considering the amount of data we were pushing in and out of it.
Read full review It takes forever to load.
Read full review Support Rating In my experience, the support team is beyond exceptional. They are incredibly knowledgeable and dedicated to the customer. You can expect prompt, professional and succinct responses. I have been working with the support team for BlackLine for more than ten years where I have been a customer four times. If anyone does Support right, it is definitely BlackLine. Not only can you trust your financials, but you can trust the team to support you through all your objectives!
Read full review This is an awesome product and the support team is very knowledgeable. The product is mature, so there are not a lot of bugs and the support team really solves problems quickly. Usually it is a user error issue, but the support desk helps me out. I love the fact that it is US based support.
Read full review Online Training Trainings are available for all topics on the BlackLine U portal. These were incredibly helpful when first starting with BlackLine to get the hang of it. Trainings are useful for any module. I have personally used this to teach myself how to use the tasks and variance modules, which are now fully utilized by my organization. The support team is also very helpful in training our team on anything additional we have needed.
Read full review Implementation Rating You will have to meet up with your final users, approver, internal auditor and accounting policy holder. Everyone has to agree. When you have a well written process, workflow, policy, approval requirement, and control, your implementation process will be much easier
Read full review It is important to do your research. There are tutorial videos online that could help new user of this accounting system. These tutorials are straightforward and easily understandable.
Read full review Alternatives Considered I have not used any products similar to Blackline. However, Excel does offer many similar functionalities to Blackline in terms of reconciling accounts. Blackline offers many benefits over simply using Excel. The reconciliations are organized and easy to find, and they roll over each month on their own. They include the ability to auto-certify if they meet the criteria that your team selects. They also include an audit trail of documentation and approval for each step.
Read full review QuickBooks Premier handles most of my business functions efficiently in one package. It is not my "everything." I use Replicon for time rather than QuickBooks. I don't want my WIP data interfering with my accounting. I use PaySimple for it's web interface and back office processing. I don't have security issues since I don't have any credit card data in my possession. With today's identity theft environment, I have to protect myself as much as I can. Not having credit card data in my accounting software lets me sleep much better at night. Quicken will do basic accounting but does not have all the double entry accounting systems contained in QuickBooks. QuickBooks Online does much of the basic business functions but I don't like the pricing structure. As a professional accountant, that is very important to me. Bill.com provided a good service but the ability of QuickBooks to add bills and receipts to transactions makes it redundant.
Read full review Scalability After implementing BlackLine our company acquired another large company with multiple operations. We were able to use the COVID shutdown to bring them on board with BlackLine with little effort in the setup and training of the users.
Read full review They're getting better. Still room for improvement.
Read full review Return on Investment More insight into balance sheet account balances. Our team is more timely with getting errors fixed and monitoring important accounts. The task management tool helps us ensure that we are completing all accruals and reviews each month. This has led to fewer errors and missing accruals. Our use of BlackLine has greatly increased our efficiency by reducing manual work. Read full review Since our financials are kept very up to date, it helps us compare our financial results to prior years and it is used for our internal goal setting. Due to the accountant copy function, we are able to provide better service since our clients are not waiting on us to fix historical data. They can continue their operations uninterrupted. The import feature certainly speeds up the process of accounting for our payroll. As previously mentioned, it takes about a minute to do our entries for payroll and check them. Read full review ScreenShots