As I’ve often said, it is possible to save quite a bit of money on the more expensive software, such as QuickBooks and Microsoft Office, by buying them from eBay sellers.  I have saved substantial amounts of money that way over the past several years, including some times where I bought an earlier version of a program in order to be able to buy the newest version from the manufacturer at their much lower upgrade price.

The most expensive version of QuickBooks is their heavy duty Enterprise Solutions (ES), which used to come only in a 10 user version that cost $3,500.  I have been using ES for our books here since it first came out, but only because I received a free copy as part of my ProAdvisor membership. For accountants who are not ProAdvisors and who have clients using ES, it could get expensive being able to support them.  Luckily, Intuit recently started expanding the flavors of ES, offering versions for 5, 10, 15 and 20 simultaneous users, costing as much as $9,000 plus another $2,000 per year for their service plan. 

The best aspect to this product line expansion, from a purely selfish sense, has been the introduction of a special single user version for professional accountants that allows us to work with client files from any of the other larger programs.  It retails for only $849.   

I am discussing this now for an even more selfish reason.  As a beta tester for the 2008 program, Intuit sent me a free copy of this special accountant version of the newest Enterprise Solutions program.  Since I already had a copy as part of my ProAdvisor update, this redundant copy has been put up for sale on eBay by Sherry at a huge discount off of the retail price.  The auction expires next Sunday, January 6, 2008. 

I recently took a survey for QuickBooks on their new Client Solution Center as part of their Certified ProAdvisor program.  While I like their new data conversion tool that allows people to import data from Peachtree, Microsoft Small Business Accounting and Microsoft Office Accounting, it does have a serious limitation, which I explained as follows in the request for additional feedback.

Your conversion tool should include the ability to convert from the QB Online format to the QB desktop format.  I have always advised against using your online service because of the inability to do this, and will continue to advise against your online service until it is possible to easily move data from the online program to the desktop one.

Q:

Subject: transferring data

 

I use Quickbooks Pro 2005 and just got dsl at home.  I have it on my work computer also and want to transfer data to my home computer via the internet.  Can I transfer the data on the internet, I have been using pcAnywhere to transfer via phone line, but it takes forever.  Thanks for any information.

A:

I assume you are wanting to access your QB data from both your home  and work computers.  Trying to do that over the internet is going to be a slow and messy process.  Even the official online QB service, which is designed for this kind of direct access, is much too slow for my tastes; one of my many complaints about the online service.

What you need to do is work with the QBW file directly on each computer.  This will require that after each time you work in the file, from either computer, you backup the data into a compressed QBB file.  There are several ways for you to do this and have access to the QBB file from both of your computers. 

One way would be to backup the QBB file onto a portable storage medium, such as a CD-RW disc or thumb flash drive, which you can carry with you back and forth between home and work.  You would then restore the data onto the computer you are using.

Another way, and the one we use with most of our clients, is to store the QBB file on an online storage service, such as XDrive or MyDocsOnline.  You download a copy of the latest QBB file to the computer you are working on and restore it into your QB program and then work on it all you want. When you’re done, you make a new QBB copy that you upload to your online storage.  This gives you the speed of working on the file locally, with access to the data backup file from anywhere in the world. 

These obviously aren’t the only ways to work with a data file on multiple computers, but they are the ones that we have been using for several years.

Good luck.  I hope this helps.

Kerry Kerstetter
 

Q:

Subject: transferring data

 

I use Quickbooks Pro 2005 and just got dsl at home.  I have it on my work computer also and want to transfer data to my home computer via the internet.  Can I transfer the data on the internet, I have been using pcAnywhere to transfer via phone line, but it takes forever.  Thanks for any information.

A:

I assume you are wanting to access your QB data from both your home  and work computers.  Trying to do that over the internet is going to be a slow and messy process.  Even the official online QB service, which is designed for this kind of direct access, is much too slow for my tastes; one of my many complaints about the online service.

What you need to do is work with the QBW file directly on each computer.  This will require that after each time you work in the file, from either computer, you backup the data into a compressed QBB file.  There are several ways for you to do this and have access to the QBB file from both of your computers. 

One way would be to backup the QBB file onto a portable storage medium, such as a CD-RW disc or thumb flash drive, which you can carry with you back and forth between home and work.  You would then restore the data onto the computer you are using.

Another way, and the one we use with most of our clients, is to store the QBB file on an online storage service, such as XDrive or MyDocsOnline.  You download a copy of the latest QBB file to the computer you are working on and restore it into your QB program and then work on it all you want. When you’re done, you make a new QBB copy that you upload to your online storage.  This gives you the speed of working on the file locally, with access to the data backup file from anywhere in the world. 

These obviously aren’t the only ways to work with a data file on multiple computers, but they are the ones that we have been using for several years.

Good luck.  I hope this helps.

Kerry Kerstetter

Q:

Subject: Quickbooks on your wesbite…

Kerry,
 
You mention to stay away from Quickbooks Online and Quickbooks Simple Start, however, it seems in 2007, Intuit has only three options for Quickbooks now, QB Simple Start (I believe it replaces Basic and is $80), QB Pro ( $169) and QB Premier ($319).  Which would you suggest I use then?

A:

It was pure greed on Intuit’s part that made them drop the relatively inexpensive Basic version of QB, which was perfectly suitable for most users.  So, now you are correct that the least expensive version is the Pro, which is what you should buy.

I don’t even consider Simple Start to be a version of QB, so stay away from it.

Having just finished a messy partnership return for clients who use the online version of QB, my disgust and hatred of that service is at an all-time high right now. The “convenience” of having the file simultaneously available to several people ended up costing the clients a lot of money for the extra time it took me to clean up the data over what it would have been if I had been able to work on a normal desktop version of QB.

Of course, any decision as to which accounting program is best for you should be made in conjunction with your personal professional tax advisor; so be sure to check with him/her first.

Good luck.

Kerry Kerstetter

Q:

Subject: Using classes with Quick Books

 

It sounds like you deal a lot with rental property.   I read your article on classes. I am a HVAC contractor and would like to know if this can be useful for my business?  I need to track my service, replacement and new construction jobs for residential and commercial accounts and split the labor materials and equipment to each profit center.

 

I am taking a quick books class on line Friday 

 

Any help would be appreciated

A:

It should be fairly easy to set up QB in such a way as to give you the types of reports you need.

I don’t have time to give you details on this because that process will require some one on one consulting.  You should look for a QB pro advisor on the QuickBooks.com website and see if you can find one with some experience dealing with similar situations as yours.  S/he can then help you set up the file appropriately and train you on how to enter data and produce the reports you need.

Good luck.

Kerry Kerstetter

Q:

Subject: Quickbooks Question

Hello,

I have Quickbooks 2005 Basic and I need to backup just my calendar year for 06 is there a way to do that.
Please help. thanks

A:

There is no way to backup just part of the data in a QBW file.  It’s all or nothing.

I’m not sure why you would even want to backup part of the file and possibly lose the rest.

If your data file is becoming too large for your computer to handle, there is an archiving function that allows you to remove the details from before a certain date that you specify.  You may want to do that for before 1/1/06 and then your file will only contain the details for 2006.  Check the QuickBooks Help function for more details on how to do this.

Good luck.  I hope this helps. 

Kerry Kerstetter