Sage 500 ERP vs. Sage X3

Sage 500 ERP is great for companies with core accounting needs, distributors, and discrete manufacturers. Some areas, such as process manufacturing, would require a companion product from an ISV for the software to be truly functional. Some areas, such as construction or retail apparel, may simply not be well-served.

Incentivized

I wouldn't suggest this ERP for small organizations, especially if there is no IT staff. While they do offer support packages, they can be costly as certain packages limit the number of times you can call in. Hiring an outside consulting firm to support is another route, however that could become costly as well. Medium to large businesses with savvy tech staff would be a good fit for this ERP.

Incentivized

• Sage is the one-stop-shop for all of our needs. We're able to control contracts, subcontracts, and field reports from the program.
• Another strength is the ability to database all the information and export it to excel. This makes data-based investigations a breeze.
• The ability for Timberscan to be imported to Sage is a huge help with invoice management. Prior to this it all had to be done manually and slowed the process to an essential halt as there are thousands of invoices per month.

Incentivized

• Easy to understand software for new users.
• Journal entry and review process is easy.
• Sage is efficient in tracking multi subsidiary transactions.

Incentivized

• The biggest concern/complaint of Sage 500 users is speed. Some of the screen take a while to load.
• The user interface needs some refreshing. Screens need to be updated to take advantage of shortcuts and to be more intuitive.

Incentivized

• The reports
• Imports

It's too pricey for our size of company.

Incentivized

I have been using Intacct for almost 10 years in 2 different companies and I just simply love it. I tried SAP (GUI) and Netsuite and they dont come close to what Ive seen.

Incentivized

The interface could be a little bit more friendlier and intuitive. Normally end users complain about the ergonomics of the system, even though my experience tells me that is a situation that dilutes itself pretty fast. Another aspect that I think Sage could improve, is the way reports and queries are managed, it seems that at least at some level, there could be a easy drag and drop way (or just by picking fields) to create simple queries/reports. Having to rely on some data base knowledge is not very user friendly. But overall the system is very powerful and a good tool for companies that want to have control over their operations.

The online training courses are not up to date. We experienced technical issues with two of the classes.

Incentivized

Keep your database and application in different servers.
Install Microsoft Office on your application server so you can use some of the data analysis tools in Sage.

Incentivized

500 seems much smoother at handling some of the basic accounting tasks, for example both issuing and later reconciling checks in Dynamics AX seems a little tedious.

Incentivized

Unfortunately, the product was purchased before I began working at the organization. I am unsure what other products they may have reviewed before purchasing Sage ERP X3.

Incentivized

• Positive: The program allows for a lot of data entry and splitting of information. It has the capability of replacing multiple programs and therefore saving cost.
• Negative: The modules are cumbersome and not user friendly at all. As a result not many user are comfortable using it. This means that the program is not being used to its capacity.
• Negative: Although the program has the capacity to be great, the user interface destroys that potential. Sage needs to seriously work on their program to simplify it. It's as if it still uses Command-line entries from 1995. Needs to be updated ASAP.

Incentivized

• Sage was easy to setup when we got started.
• Exporting data out of sage has been extremely hard.
• Sage is quite fairly priced compared to other alternatives.

Incentivized