All You Need Accounting For Start-up Businesses
October 29, 2018

All You Need Accounting For Start-up Businesses

Matthew Gehrman | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with Accounting by Wave

We utilize Wave across the company to manage expenses, invoicing, credit card processing, and 1099 employee payroll tracking. Having one application to handle all these transaction makes the accounting side of the business far less of a headache and with the recent updates it's even easier to navigate.
  • Crisp, clean invoices, and I particularly like the ability to customize the invoice to fit our needs.
  • Custom reporting tools so we can slice & dice our data as needed.
  • Overall interface is incredibly easy to navigate through and you don't have to be a professional accountant or book keeper to make sense of everything.
  • Offering a recurring payment option, credit card processing, and ACH payment options with customer online payment options as well has made our life much easier with the repeat accounts we manage.
  • Adding customers profiles is simple and can be done right in the new invoice tool
  • Setting up vendors is quick and easy to associate to various payable/receivable accounts is simple.
  • Not too much to complain about with Wave although I do wish they kept an audit trail of all invoice reminders sent, changes in the invoice, and have the ability to pull reports with this data. This functionality would be great to review clients as a whole to determine profitability and time spent with these clients.
  • 9% processing fees for all cards which is a bit higher than some of the competitors like Blue Pay. The pro to this though is there's no monthly commitment or monthly service fees.
  • Being as it's free software to use I'd say implementing wave has been a positive return for the business.
  • Providing us the ability to process credit cards over the phone has increased our turn time to receive payments thus saving time overall which equates to $1,000's a year
Across the board Wave takes the cake on price at $0/mo aside from payroll fees and credit card processing. That aside I'd say most accounting systems are fairly similar, however what I like about Wave is just how simple the interface is and the outstanding customer support from both the community and the company.
Wave is an excellent option for small start-up businesses since it's a free application, comparable to others like Xero & Quikbooks, and integrates with most major banks. Where I would see considering to move platforms is when you have more than 10 employees and multiple accounts to balance which at that point may be a good time to consult a book keeper and consider switching software if needed. Side note Wave offers a list of local bookkeeping professionals that work with Wave software in your area so you wouldn't have to change systems.

Wave Accounting Feature Ratings

Accounts payable
8
Accounts receivable
10
Cash management
10
Bank reconciliation
10
Expense management
10
Time tracking
9
Multi-currency support
Not Rated
Multi-division support
10
Regulations compliance
10
Electronic tax filing
Not Rated
Self-service portal
Not Rated
Global Financial Support
Not Rated
Primary and Secondary Ledgers
9
Intercompany Accounting
Not Rated
Localizations
Not Rated
Journals and Reconciliations
10
Enterprise Accounting
Not Rated
Configurable Accounting
9
Centralized Rules Framework
Not Rated
Standardized Processes
Not Rated
Inventory tracking
Not Rated
Automatic reordering
Not Rated
Location management
Not Rated
Manufacturing module
Not Rated
Pricing
Not Rated
Order entry
Not Rated
Credit card processing
Not Rated
Cost of goods sold
Not Rated
Order Orchestration
Not Rated
End-to-end order visibility
Not Rated
Order exception Resolution
Not Rated
Pay calculation
9
Benefit plan administration
Not Rated
Direct deposit files
8
Salary revision and increment management
9
Reimbursement management
Not Rated
Dashboards
10
Standard reports
10
Custom reports
10
Not Rated
API for custom integration
Not Rated
Plug-ins
Not Rated
Role-based user permissions
Not Rated
Single sign-on capability
10

Evaluating Accounting by Wave and Competitors

Yes - Zoho Books was what we used initially until we came across Wave, after that we never looked back. Both applications are fairly easy to use however I really like the layout and ease of Wave.
  • Price
  • Product Features
  • Product Usability
Ease of use, expansion abilities, and all in one payroll, bookkeeping, and invoicing.
I wouldn't change a thing, after researching several systems and then conducting a trial on each system there's not much to change.

Accounting by Wave Support

If they had live chat service then I'd rate this a 10.
ProsCons
Quick Resolution
Good followup
Knowledgeable team
Problems get solved
Kept well informed
No escalation required
Immediate help available
Support understands my problem
Support cares about my success
Quick Initial Response
None
No - They stand behind their product and understand the struggles of a small business owner, after all they were one in the beginning.