Some kinks, but worth looking into
May 05, 2015

Some kinks, but worth looking into

Lindsay Foucht | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 6 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with QuickBooks Online

I currently use QuickBooks Online for several companies that I work with. Some do most of the work themselves and have me review it and correct things; some have me do all of it on my end. It's great for companies that need to have access to their books from any location or by multiples users, especially if they want an accountant to have access to it later.

Pros

  • Multiple location/user access - great for small businesses that don't have networked offices or one solid location
  • Ability to connect to a credit card processor, makes it easier for office staff to integrate how credit cards hit the business' bank account
  • Can be integrated well with an internal or external Intuit payroll account (ie, if you do it in-house or if your accountant does it using Intuit, both can download the transactions and correctly code each part of the paycheck).

Cons

  • User interface seems to change every few months, altering where commonly used features are located. Can be very confusing.
  • Connecting the bank accounts sometimes results in employees doubling up on entries or doesn't always find the correct match.
  • The Accountant version of QuickBooks Online allows us to see several clients' QB under one login, making it a breeze not to whip out the password manual every time we need to work on someone.
  • The ability to direct connect to clients' bank accounts has allowed us to work more efficiently without having to login to bank accounts every five minutes to compare expenses and code.
  • We also use Intuit's payroll and can directly export payroll information to our clients' QuickBooks Online without having to sign in or send a file through email to the client. Great for clients who may not understand how to import it or are too busy and usually end up catching up their QB months at a time rather than day to day or week to week upkeep.
We have clients who have used Sage/Peachtree and Quicken. QuickBooks Online seems a little more user-friendly for the average user, as well as offering a better interface. There seems to be more training and help available for the common person with QuickBooks than with other softwares, so it's easier to send along helpful articles to clients who are having issues with a particular task.
It's easy for clients to switch to (it will upload data files from other bookkeeping software). It easy to set up and train someone new on it as long as it doesn't get too in-depth, and relatively cheap compared to other similar products. It's great for the small business owner who is just starting out, and with a monthly subscription service rather than a long-term contract, it's great for those who don't have a huge start up budget.
  • Fewer than 25% of my clients
If you have inventory or more complex billing, QuickBooks Online is not for you. It does support the feature somewhat, but is not the most intuitive way of doing it. The desktop version is much better suited to this. QuickBooks Online is great for a beginning user because it doesn't expect the user to know how to do double-entry accounting. With some online training, QuickBooks is probably one of the easiest accounting software to learn by the average person who doesn't have an interest in learning the ins and outs of accounting.

QuickBooks Online Feature Ratings

7.2
Accounts payable
8
Accounts receivable
8
Cash management
5
Bank reconciliation
8
Expense management
7
3.7
Inventory tracking
3
Location management
4
Manufacturing module
4
5.3
Pricing
3
Order entry
3
Credit card processing
8
Cost of goods sold
7
4.3
Pay calculation
7
Benefit plan administration
1
Direct deposit files
6
Reimbursement management
3
8.0
Dashboards
8
Standard reports
8
Custom reports
8
7.0
API for custom integration
7
Plug-ins
7
8.0
Role-based user permissions
8
Single sign-on capability
Not Rated

Using QuickBooks Online

It's Easy enough to learn the basic for a new user; though if you are required to go more in depth in recording assets or liability accounts it could get somewhat confusing for the every day user who doesn't know double-entry accounting. It's great for a business that just wants profit and loss information available at their fingertips.
ProsCons
Like to use
Easy to use
Technical support not required
Well integrated
Consistent
Quick to learn
Convenient
Feel confident using
Familiar
None
  • Integrating credit card processing within the system cuts down on having to do what would otherwise be a four step process (process CC, receive payment in QB, record deposit in QB, record processing fee in QB)
  • Connecting the bank account allows users who are inexperienced with manual entry from a bank statement to learn how to code and review information.
  • Recording multi-line transactons (expenses, deposits, etc) can be cumbersome to some because of all the windows that close and open on top of one another within the browser.
  • Running cash-basis balance sheets still show A/R and A/P accounts, which is incorrect and confuses some business owners who aren't sure what to do with those accounts.
Yes, but I don't use it

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