AccountEdge is a small business accounting software for Mac and Windows users. AccountEdge allows business owners to organize, process, and report on their financial information. Its features include accounting, integrated payroll, sales and purchases, contact management, inventory, and time billing. It was acquired by Priority Software in January 2018 to expand that company's small business portfolio.
N/A
QuickBooks Desktop Premier
Score 8.2 out of 10
N/A
QuickBooks Desktop Premier is an installed version of QuickBooks for general business, contractors, manufacturing and warehouse accounting, as well as nonprofits, professional services, and retail.
N/A
Pricing
Priority AccountEdge
QuickBooks Desktop Premier
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Priority AccountEdge
QuickBooks Desktop Premier
Free Trial
Yes
No
Free/Freemium Version
No
No
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
Yes
No
Entry-level Setup Fee
No setup fee
No setup fee
Additional Details
AccountEdge is available to new customers for $399. Optional product upgrades are released every year for $159 single-user upgrade or $249 multi-user upgrade.
If you are handling a large client list, and are selling services, it is dead easy. If you are managing/selling a physical inventory, it seems like it has great options to do that quite well (disclaimer, I do not use those functions, but I have paid attention as that functionality was built into the software). If you want to link your bank account to a bookkeeping platform, this is not the software for you (at least so far).
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.
AccountEdge has a robust report menu that allows a user to slice and dice data for analysis. Report on projects for the life of the project across fiscal years. Report on different departments with segregated income statements.
For users who want to run payroll in house that is easily done through the payroll module. Print physical checks or direct deposit to employee's account, process payroll taxes and file year end W2s.
My personal favorites are time billing and retainers. As a service based business I can at my fingertips review how much money a client has on deposit with me and how much of that will be billed out at the end of the month. The integration with AccountEdge Mobile rounds it all out with being able to log my time on-site.
Last but not least AccountEdge Mobile in general, as the companion app for the desktop software is invaluable. My heaviest use is the spend money feature. Excellent for logging travel receipts & cash expenses while they are fresh on the brain. Really cuts back the data entry at the end of a trip and trying to recall what something may have been for.
My biggest frustration, and one that I've mentioned to Acclivity for many years, is that it only permits opening nine windows at a time (plus the home window). I hit that limit almost daily, and then I have to decide what do I close so I can complete the transaction that needed the "9th" window.
The Accounts section includes two quick reports, "Analyze Profit and Loss" and "Analyze Balance Sheet. These can be filtered for the current month or any prior month in the current fiscal year. And that's fine most of the year, but at the beginning of the next year, when I haven't yet started the new fiscal year, these only go to December of the prior year. The regular reports for these can select "next year;" why can't these?
It would be helpful if the journal entry number would have one or two additional digits available. For example, when I am entering journal entries for a client, I would like to use a number such as CPA2014001, CPA2014002, etc. to distinguish what I enter from the "automatic" entries that AccountEdge does. But that's one more digit than AccountEdge allows, so if I had over 100 adjustments, I would run out of entry numbers.
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.
Without a doubt, when you need to do accounting use the program that will get the job done in the least amount of time with the least amount of errors. Once you are using a program that works you stay with it year after year and you will find yourself even excited about the updates
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.
The intuitive interface does all the tasks we need our accounting software to do. Some tasks are slower to process than I would like but overall very usable. Customizable forms let us choose to either go with the easy ready-made out-of-the-box options or retool them to better fit our specific needs.
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.
One of the finer advantages of desktop software, it's always available. AccountEdge doesn't suffer from outages or sluggish internet like web based applications do. It's always there when you power on your device!
On the few occasions we have needed tech support over the years, they were responsive and worked to get to the root of the issues. However, even though Checkout POS is a separate application, it was pitched to us as a natural extension of the functionality of our AE software that would integrate seamlessly. The company's support for Checkout has been minimal at best, and now totally abandoned. That colors our view of Priority's support unfortunately. And to be honest, that's why it's a 9 instead of a 10. So to be fair, AccountEdge's support itself has been very good over the years.
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.
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.
For Mac enthusiasts, AccountEdge is the complete installed software solution for small to medium-sized businesses, as it has so many capabilities that QuickBooks for Mac lacks. However, it holds your hand less than QuickBooks for Mac does, so you ought to know what your are doing in keeping business books properly. If your needs are simple, QuickBooks for Mac may be a better solution. QuickBooks Online and Xero are excellent cloud accounting solutions that can be used on the Mac equally well as on Windows. QuickBooks Online offers a similar set of features as QuickBooks for Mac, with the addition of anywhere, anytime access. Xero is a great basic accounting solution in the cloud that can also be used equally well on Macs and WIndows, and offers endless customization and flexibility through its extensive third-party app integration for almost any need.
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.
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.
