Likelihood to Recommend FreeAgent is really suited to the financial management of a small business. Especially an owner managed business as it provides all the tools to keep on top of finances. It can reduce the need for a bookkeeper as it is easy to add expenses and reconcile them with the linked bank accounts. The integrated payroll would also reduce the need for third-party management of such processes. Would still recommend the use of an accountant to advise on more complex financial requirements.
Read full review Wave Accounting was used for a small practice without a lot of the accounting considerations a large company would have. For the price, you really can't beat what Wave offers out of the box. All of the basic tools for things like invoicing and expenses are all easy to use. End of year accounting is easy with exports of data.
Read full review Pros Accounting! As you'd expect. Makes it much simpler andmore cost effective. In-coming and out-goings are recorded and assigned to projects and accounts. My accountant can access my books and reconcile so much more easily than trawling through spreadsheets. Time billing - time spent on projects/client work is recorded and is ready to be invoiced as required. Saves so much time and prevents inaccuracies. Invoicing - again, it should do this well and it does. Non payment reminders are automatic and clients have no excuses for not knowing the status of their account. Account dashboard - gives me an instant overview of the health of the business (am I on track to meet my yearly targets) and my accounts. Eddie May Web Developer & Internet Marketing Consultant
Read full review Reconciliation is very difficult with multiple Wave transactions that need to be deleted or merged before it can be matched to a bank transaction. Payroll worked fine for us but took several days to get it set up. We have switched to another bookkeeping system and another payroll system. Canceling with Wave took several days and they charge $6 for something even though the month was paid for in advance. Credit card processing is nice and worked fine for us. Read full review Cons Reporting on financials, time tracking and project status is a little poor. It's adequate for what what we need, but would be great to see more advanced features. API is quite closed so cannot integrate with our other project management tools. Read full review I know that credit card processing is a way for Wave to make money, but I really wish they offered ACH payment on Invoices. I do cash-based accounting, which means I have to make little journal entries at the start and end of each year to get my books to balance because Wave wants to do everything differently. This should just be a setting to flip, whether you want cash-based or accrual-based. They use Yodlee for bank connection, which doesn't play nice with 2FA. Pretty much every time I log in I have to re-enter credentials, get a code sent to me, reauthenticate, and know that I'm going to have to do it again next week. Not really on Wave, but wish they could get it together nonetheless. Read full review Likelihood to Renew Easy to use for clients with no accounting background and the price is right.
Read full review Usability I spent nearly two decades in IT and am happy to say that FreeAgent's user interface is one of the best interfaces I have ever used.
Read full review I am a professional bookkeeper and I have no problems using Wave and all of it's features. I can see that certain individuals who have no accounting knowledge might struggle with a few different features and entries, but that is why Wave has an emphasis in connecting users to Wave Pro's who will walk them through things
Read full review Reliability and Availability Based in a cloud and never had any issues with down time. I can access from any device
Gavin Percy Registered and Approved Growth Coach for GrowthAccelerator.
Read full review WAVE is always available when we need it ! Peter
Read full review Performance Wave does tend to slow down when filtering your transactions screen especially by date. This is more of an issue when trying to trouble shoot certain transactions or clean-up a set of books.
Read full review Support Rating I never had to call Wave Support as we barely experienced any support-related problems on our side. However, I do know a few people that complained about Wave support. It would be nice as well, though if they could have more in your face tutorials for new users or how-to videos should we struggle to do something
Read full review Online Training easy to use and east to train on ! Our WAVE clients enjoy the ease of use
Read full review Alternatives Considered I used Fresh Books for about three years prior to switching to FreeAgent. It was the accounting functionality that made the difference - in the past two years I've not regretted the switch. Fresh Books is good, but its the UK accounting features that make FreeAgent indispensable to my business.
Eddie May Web Developer & Internet Marketing Consultant
Read full review Wave is FREE for most functions. Payment processing costs no matter where you go (as does payroll or taxes). Wave rises above tools like
QuickBooks Online because they know that for our small firm, being nimble is the name of the game. We don't need exhaustive reporting and management like QB offers and we certainly don't want to pay for it
Read full review Scalability Once they out grow what is ability to move up to a more robust system?
Read full review Return on Investment Professional and uniform offering providing great confident customer service. My clients love it, whether they use it a little or a lot. It's a great piece of software - while sophisticated, it's straightforward to use. Time saving and efficient use of my team's time. Being able to easily share and compare work / tasks. Read full review Wave has been ROI positive for our company. With not having to pay for the service we can use our money for growing our business. The fees on credit card transactions for invoices are reasonable especially as we don't pay a monthly subscription. The invoicing feature has made our lives easier for us and our customers. The invoicing piece and AR tracking has been ROI positive as well. Read full review ScreenShots