Item: Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT
Rating: 6
Author: Kenton Sanders

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT as our accounting package. It has an expense module that allows a direct credit card feed from the bank into the system so that assistants can assign expense accounts and upload receipts. Users can also create invoices with the ability to have multiple levels of approvals. It has the ability to produce customized reporting.

Pros and Cons

Expense management (credit card feed for multiple users)
Fixed assets
Accounts payable

Customer support
Implementation of the system for a new company
Creating custom reports
Cloud system speed

Return on Investment

Significantly reduced time required to close an accounting month
Simplified data entry for assistants
Improved accuracy (reduced data entry errors)
Automated financial reporting

Financial Edge NXT Trust & Compliance

Project code restrictions have helped to ensure that restricted contributions and released funds are accurately booked. Reporting by project codes within Funds allows us to track and audit board-designated funds and donor-restricted funds.

Financial Edge NXT Organization Visibility

I haven't used their dashboards.

Alternatives Considered

Shelby Systems and QuickBooks Desktop Premier

Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT is definitely more friendly for churches and net asset accounting. Its interface is simpler and sleeker. The primary reasons I chose Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT are expense management and reporting.

Key Insights

Do you think Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT's feature set?

Yes

Did Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT live up to sales and marketing promises?

Did implementation of Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT go as expected?

Would you buy Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT again?

Yes

Other Software Used

Blackbaud Church Management, Planning Center, Microsoft Excel

Likelihood to Recommend

It has good and simple navigation, and once set up, works in all areas pretty well. I love the expense management module, as we have 25 credit card users. It assures us that the charges are correct as they are fed directly from our bank. Once created, my customized reports provide me with all the financial information I need. As a church, we use net asset accounting, which Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT handles well. My biggest negative is how the implementation is done. When setting it up, you have to make important decisions about how your system is set up before you have enough information to understand what these decisions mean. Although they provide you with a "sandbox" version, you need at least 6 months using real data in order to be informed about crucial decisions.

Support Rating

Chat support knows less than I do. Wait times for phone support are ridiculous. Several issues I had, no one was able to fix.

Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT Customer Support Pros and Cons

Pros	Cons
None	Slow Resolution Poor followup Less knowledgeable Problems left unsolved Not kept informed Escalation required Difficult to get immediate help Need to explain problems multiple times Support doesn't seem to care Slow Initial Response

Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT - a love/hate relationship

Overall Satisfaction with Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT