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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Emburse Spend (formerly Abacus)

    Score6 out of 10
    N/AEmburse Spend is a Spend Management platform for small and growing businesses that monitors and controls card purchases, employee reimbursements, receipts, approvals, and expense policies. It connects to supported existing corporate and business card programs, so finance teams can add spend controls without replacing their current cards. Emburse Spend replaces the former Emburse Abacus. Abacus was acquired by Emburse in 2020. That application's capabilities are now completely superseded by…

    $9

    per active user/per month

    FreshBooks

    Score9.2 out of 10
    Small Businesses (1-50 employees)
    FreshBooks is an accounting service for small businesses. The solution enables users to send and manage invoices, track billable time and collect online payments. The vendor’s value proposition this that their solution provides a straightforward service that simplifies the billing process.

    $21

    per month

    Pricing
    Emburse Spend (formerly Abacus)FreshBooks
    Editions & Modules
    Starter
    $9
    per active user/per month
    Professional
    Custom Pricing
    Enterprise
    Custom Pricing
    Lite
    $21
    per month
    Plus
    $38
    per month
    Premium
    $65
    per month
    Select
    Custom Pricing
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Emburse Spend (formerly Abacus)FreshBooks
    Free Trial
    YesYes
    Free/Freemium Version
    YesYes
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    YesNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional Details10% discount for annual pricing.
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Emburse Spend (formerly Abacus)FreshBooks
    Considered Both Products
    Emburse
    No answer on this topic
    FreshBooks
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    85%
    Would buy again
    11 Answers
    69%
    Would buy again
    9 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    89%
    Delivers good value for the price
    8 Answers
    82%
    Delivers good value for the price
    9 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    92%
    Happy with the feature set
    12 Answers
    54%
    Happy with the feature set
    7 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    78%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    7 Answers
    64%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    7 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    100%
    Implementation went as expected
    10 Answers
    62%
    Implementation went as expected
    8 Answers
    Features
    Emburse Spend (formerly Abacus)FreshBooks
    Customization
    Comparison of Customization features of Emburse Spend (formerly Abacus) and FreshBooks
    Feature
    Emburse Spend (formerly Abacus)
    -
    Ratings
    FreshBooks
    9.1
    35 Ratings
    18% above category average
    API for custom integration00 Ratings9.330 Ratings
    Plug-ins00 Ratings9.026 Ratings
    Security
    Comparison of Security features of Emburse Spend (formerly Abacus) and FreshBooks
    Feature
    Emburse Spend (formerly Abacus)
    -
    Ratings
    FreshBooks
    10.0
    41 Ratings
    20% above category average
    Single sign-on capability00 Ratings10.01 Ratings
    Role-based user permissions00 Ratings10.041 Ratings
    Reporting & Analytics
    Comparison of Reporting & Analytics features of Emburse Spend (formerly Abacus) and FreshBooks
    Feature
    Emburse Spend (formerly Abacus)
    -
    Ratings
    FreshBooks
    7.5
    57 Ratings
    4% below category average
    Dashboards00 Ratings9.057 Ratings
    Standard reports00 Ratings8.855 Ratings
    Custom reports00 Ratings4.82 Ratings
    General Ledger and Configurable Accounting
    Comparison of General Ledger and Configurable Accounting features of Emburse Spend (formerly Abacus) and FreshBooks
    Feature
    Emburse Spend (formerly Abacus)
    -
    Ratings
    FreshBooks
    7.5
    56 Ratings
    2% below category average
    Accounts payable00 Ratings8.041 Ratings
    Accounts receivable00 Ratings9.455 Ratings
    Cash management00 Ratings7.03 Ratings
    Bank reconciliation00 Ratings7.02 Ratings
    Expense management00 Ratings6.651 Ratings
    Time tracking00 Ratings7.642 Ratings
    Multi-currency support00 Ratings7.01 Ratings
    Regulations compliance00 Ratings6.021 Ratings
    Self-service portal00 Ratings9.13 Ratings
    Order Management
    Comparison of Order Management features of Emburse Spend (formerly Abacus) and FreshBooks
    Feature
    Emburse Spend (formerly Abacus)
    -
    Ratings
    FreshBooks
    9.5
    49 Ratings
    25% above category average
    Pricing00 Ratings8.839 Ratings
    Order entry00 Ratings9.337 Ratings
    Credit card processing00 Ratings9.741 Ratings
    Cost of goods sold00 Ratings10.01 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    Emburse Spend (formerly Abacus)FreshBooks
    Small Businesses
    Brex
    Score9 out of 10
    QuickBooks Self-Employed (discontinued)
    Score4.3 out of 10
    Medium-sized Companies
    Expensify
    Score9 out of 10
    MYOB
    Score8.3 out of 10
    Enterprises
    Emburse Expense Enterprise (formerly Chrome River)
    Score8.3 out of 10
    Microsoft Dynamics GP
    Score5.3 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    Emburse Spend (formerly Abacus)FreshBooks
    Likelihood to Recommend
    6.0
    (17 ratings)
    7.7
    (75 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    -
    (0 ratings)
    7.6
    (18 ratings)
    Usability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.6
    (20 ratings)
    Availability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    10.0
    (2 ratings)
    Performance
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    Support Rating
    9.0
    (9 ratings)
    6.0
    (11 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    -
    (0 ratings)
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    CPA Rating
    -
    (0 ratings)
    7.0
    (1 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Emburse Spend (formerly Abacus)FreshBooks
    Likelihood to Recommend
    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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    FreshBooks
    I recommend FreshBooks to anyone running a service-based business that needs invoicing, time reporting, and accounting tools. FB is adept in all three of these scenarios and isn't overly complicated like similar accounting packages I have used. I love how I can write estimates and proposals, manage the business development process from the software, and quickly convert prospects to invoiced clients.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    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)
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    FreshBooks
    • Invoicing - FreshBooks basically ensures our accountants spend less time on invoices via its automated invoicing system, which sends invoices to our customers and clients alike and also send them regular reminders for them to pay up their bills.
    • Collecting business insights - FreshBooks enable our company analysts measure our business performances via data reports provided by FreshBooks' intuitive dashboard. Allowing us do a comparative analysis of key business metrics of a current month against past months and determine if the business is growing.
    • Expense tracker - We have recently embraced FreshBooks as an expense tracker for teams at our company branch. Thusfar, FreshBooks has performed very well, making our expense management a perfect operation; ensuring teams do not exceed their planned budget and also eliminating the need for tracking expenses on excel spreadsheets.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    FreshBooks
    • 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
    Emburse
    No answers on this topic
    FreshBooks
    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
    Emburse
    No answers on this topic
    FreshBooks
    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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Reliability and Availability
    Emburse
    No answers on this topic
    FreshBooks
    FreshBooks is easy to use and always works!
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Support Rating
    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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    FreshBooks
    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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Implementation Rating
    Emburse
    No answers on this topic
    FreshBooks
    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
    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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    FreshBooks
    FreshBooks does very well in comparison, especially since it is free software for Barclays bank users. Sage software is much worse than FreshBooks. However, Xero and QuickBooks, the market leaders, are still ahead with usability, additional features, reporting, and connection with third-party software providers. We chose FreshBooks as it does everything we require from this type of software.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Return on Investment
    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.
    Read full review
    FreshBooks
    • In reality, we do not implement all of its use at the moment in order to determine an adequate ROI.
    • In our approach to the use of the system, it seems to us a considerable time saving by achieving the integration of the Mexican subsidiary with its parent located in the US.
    • Financial reports meet the necessary USGAAP requirements.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots

    Emburse Spend (formerly Abacus) Screenshots

    Product screenshotProduct screenshotProduct screenshotProduct screenshotProduct screenshotProduct screenshot

    FreshBooks Screenshots

    Screenshot of the dashboardScreenshot of an invoice overviewScreenshot of an example of a customizable invoiceScreenshot of an invoice appearing across devicesScreenshot of expensesScreenshot of time tracking