Aptean Industrial Manufacturing ERP Traverse Edition vs. Sage 50cloud Accounting

I honestly think that it's extremely outdated and don't understand why anyone would still use it. Especially in a non-profit setting. In our field we have to be able to track revenue and expenses by funds, and with the way those funding streams tend to cross an agency or company's fiscal year, the fact that it is virtually impossible to pull the information in that manner restricts a finance department more than anything.

Incentivized

Sage is great for portability and exchange with external accountants as it is widely used and people will be able to read your data in. It's a very good and complete solution for a little business where one person can handle all of the accounting. I doubt that it scales well to large companies with several in-house accountants working at the same time.

Incentivized

• No confusing reporting.
• Easy to follow interface.
• Simplified experience.

Incentivized

• It has the capability of "Single Click" processes that allows you to turn Quotes into orders, instant invoicing and track A/R in the Order Screen
• I can email Sales Orders directly to my Customer and also remind them of past due from a single screen. I can track Project, Closeouts, Over Seas order by setting up Jobs and clicking the job name in Order Entry.
• You can use recurring entries and copy and paste on the P&L, using masking for department reporting and budgeting
• You can use the BI feature and export into Excel in Pivot format and utilize Timeline and Slicer to see the company overall performance by months, day or years

• Not user-friendly or intuitive in the least. Even with the instruction manual, it's like part of it is missing or you are expected to know certain items before even looking.
• Reporting is very basic and impossible to customize on the user's end. You must have tech support build them for you. Also, no cross fiscal year reporting.
• Can't cut only one check if you have other invoices already entered in the batch.
• The chart of account codes are not independent. You must build your whole GL for each fund source or program, which leaves you with an unwieldy chart of accounts.

Incentivized

• Sage 50 could use some improvement in the Invoicing Module to allow for more flexibility in the design of the Invoice fields. The report customization tools could use some upgrading for easier use.
• Fixed assets management module needs to be included with unlimited number of fixed assets.

I use this rating simply because I have a thriving Sage 50 consulting practice and will continue to keep my expertise in the product. I have consulted on both Sage 50 and QuickBooks for over 25 years so I have to maintain expertise in the solution as well as accounting and verticals.

Incentivized

Sage delivers what it promises. The whole accounting package is user friendly and can be easily picked up by a novice. The support is second to none. They always keep us abreast of new technologies and/or changes to accounting that would impact us. The range of reports fits both small and large companies.,

Incentivized

Although I have only needed to call tech support on three occasions through out the entire time of usage, each time my problem was quickly resolved by people who were obviously well trained and easy to understand. Sage 50 Premium Accounting is a reliable and "bug-free" product that is regularly improved upon.

Incentivized

Sage 50 is a strong accounting software package. It will work efficiently if it is installed correctly. If one puts garbage in, one will get garbage out. Also it is important to train the staff to use Sage 50 properly. It is also important to set up security for each user.

Incentivized

If you've used CYMA, you'll be familiar with the way OSAS builds the GL, however CYMA is light years ahead of OSAS. If you've used anything like Abila MIP, you'll understand the comparison when I say "Abila is like using power tools to build your bookcase, CYMA is like using a hand saw and hammer, and OSAS is using a chisel to carve one out of wood." They all will get the job done and at the end of the day, you have a book case. But depending on which tools you use will either be ready for a library or a couple of small tomes. I didn't select OSAS, and never would it have been given consideration to be used as my accounting software

Incentivized

As we did the conversion almost 10 years ago it is hard to answer this question. At the time it was the ease of being able to produce both cash and accrual financial statements and reporting that led us to pick Sage

Incentivized

I define scalable from two perspectives; 1) the scalability to handle more bookkeepers/accountants using the product, and 2) the scalability to handle increasing customer/vendor/employee and transactional data. Sage 50 does a good job on both fronts. From the single users operating a micro-business accounting for customer invoices and bill payments only, to the multi-staff, multi-location, multi-departmental complex transactional operation. Although Sage 50 is quite expensive for that smallest user, it is quite inexpensive for the larger business entity. So, for the new enterprise expecting rapid growth, Sage 50 is the application of choice.

• We have to do so much tracking of expenses by hand, that using OSAS doesn't save us any money in that respect.
• I believe my predecessor used OSAS for over 15 years so she obviously felt comfortable with it. I can make do with it and at least track my bottom line.
• No real reporting other than basic balance sheets.

Incentivized

• Sage definitely needs to do a better job with customer service. I have had to use them only a handful of times and it was not a great experience but not the worse I've seen. They didn't make us a priority and I felt that they didn't have a sense of urgency. They did address my lack of satisfaction and I can see that they are at least aware of the issues and they are trying to correct them.
• Sage is exactly what we need in my current organization and I wouldn't change it for another system. I have used quite a few in my lifetime and I would say that it fits our needs.