The Online Edition is entering its third year, and has significantly enhanced its feature set since its initial release.
The only significant features (relative to QuickBooks Basic Edition) not available in the Online edition are Inventory, Purchase Orders, and Online Bill Pay.
There are two “Plus packages” available: The Business Plus Package includes Budgets and Class Tracking and the Sales Plus Package includes Time Tracking, Expense tracking by customers, customized invoice styles, and a feature called “delayed charges.” The delayed charges feature allows you to record “charges” as you do work for each customer. Then, when you create an invoice, you can post one or more “charges” onto the invoice. This is similar to how QuickBooks desktop editions work with time tracking except that charges can include time or other “items” that are to be charged to the customer. Also, unlike timesheets in QuickBooks, charges are not specific to a single employee.
For a complete feature overview, visit http://oe.quickbooks.com/features.shtml.
Pricing
Pricing for the Online Edition is based on the number of users as follows:
- Up to 3 users: $19.95 per month
- Up to 10 users: $29.95 per month
- Up to 25 users: $49.95 per month
- An accountant user is free for all pricing levels.
Sales Plus package: Additional $9.95 per month includes:
- Time tracking
- Delayed Charges
- Expense tracking by customer
- Custom invoice styles
Business Plus package: Additional $7.95 per month includes:
- Budgets
- Class Tracking
Why Online Accounting?
Because Online Edition works over the Web, it is most appealing to business owners who want the following:
- Access to financial data from remote locations (i.e., from home, or while traveling)
- Access to financial data from multiple business locations
- Access to the data for the accountant, consultant, or other business advisor.
Web-based accounting helps link multiple users and locations to their finances – anytime, anywhere. Everything you need is online, so you’re always on the latest version. You don’t have to worry about installing software, networking users, upgrading, or backup. Automatic data backup is included.
The Online Edition works similar to the desktop versions of QuickBooks, but instead of installing it on a computer, you, your staff, and your clients access it through a Web browser.
A high-speed Internet connection is highly recommended, and without it, you’ll probably have a negative experience.
Features
Anytime, Anywhere Access
QuickBooks: Online Edition uses the Web to provide more multi-user, multi-location, and remote user access than is possible with a desktop application. It provides Anytime, Anywhere Access to use accounting data remotely by simply connecting to the Internet.
Automatic Upgrades
Because the Online Edition is hosted at Intuit, there’s no software to install, no data files to maintain, and upgrades to the application (which occur throughout the year) happen automatically. This also means that all users are always on the same version of the software, even if they are in different locations.
Daily Data Backups
Backing up business data is critical for all small businesses, and with the Online Edition, it happens automatically every day.
Complete backups of all data are run every night. The backup tapes are periodically moved offsite to a remote location. In addition to the nightly backups, changes to the database are backed up hourly so that even the most current work is saved.
Memorize Transactions and Billing Automation
The Online Edition’s Billing Automation feature allows you to set up an invoice or sales receipt that repeats according to a schedule that you define.
For example, users can select the recurrence to occur daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly, and can define a precise date range over which the recurrence occurs. Users can also select whether or not they want the Online Edition to inform them when recurring transactions occur.
Users can also choose to have the receipt automatically emailed to the customer. By combining scheduling the transaction and the merchant account service, users can set up their recurring sales receipts and collect the credit card payments automatically via the QuickBooks Merchant Account service.
Figure 1 Recurring Transaction setup
Merchant Account (Additional Fee Required)
With a QuickBooks: Online Edition Merchant Account, users can process and authorize credit card transactions directly from the Online Edition. This service functions similar to the QuickBooks desktop Merchant Account service.
Payment information is automatically updated in the Online Edition and approved funds are deposited automatically.
Import from QuickBooks Desktop Software
QuickBooks: Online Edition enables a one-time import of data from other versions of QuickBooks. Existing QuickBooks desktop data will convert to comparable features in QuickBooks: Online Edition where applicable. When comparable features do not exist (such as customer or vendor types), the data will not be converted. In some cases where the features are not exactly the same, data will convert in different formats.
Export to QuickBooks Desktop Software
QuickBooks: Online Edition data can be exported to QuickBooks Pro and Premier Editions 2004 and 2003. Pro and Premier Editions 2002 support the import of lists and balances from the Online Edition, but not individual transactions. Online Edition data is exported and saved in an XML file format; which can then be imported into one of the aforementioned QuickBooks products.
Note that data can be exported from the Online Edition at any time, but can only be imported into the Online Edition when a new account is opened. The Online Edition does not support a continual export-import data exchange with QuickBooks Basic, Pro, and Premier desktop products.
Multiple Simultaneous Users
Up to 20 users can access financial information in an Online Edition company file simultaneously, so you don’t have to maintain a computer network to give access to multiple users. You can add and manage multiple users by simply creating a new log-in account and password and you can set different levels of access permissions for each user.
Support Included
Also included with a subscription is product support, available via a link from any product page. By filling out a brief online form, a user is connected to a Service Consultant who replies by email or phone, whatever the user prefers. The sole product focus of these Service Consultants is the Online Edition.
Figure 2 Customer Overview window
Reports
There are more than 65 reports that can be customized or emailed, and users can be added in a “Reports-Only” capacity. You can export report data from the Online Edition to Microsoft Excel for further analysis.
Location Tracking
A very valuable feature that is not provided in QuickBooks desktop editions is Location Tracking. This feature is similar to classes, but it’s an additional level of categorization.
Budgets
You can create budgets to track revenue and expense by account only, or you can split them up by account and location, class, or customer. You can also create “what if?” scenarios to perfect the budget. There are several Actual vs. Budget reports to compare actual income and expense with your budget projections.
Class Tracking
Track income and expense items more precisely by class. You can categorize income and expenses by department, type of business, or any other meaningful breakdown of the business you want. You can also generate a Profit & Loss report as well as other reports, by class.
Time Tracking
Time Tracking allows a company to track time worked by employees and contractors for tracking purposes, and bill customers for that time as appropriate. Employees or subcontractors simply fill out time sheets from any PC connected to the Internet. To keep finances secure, an unlimited number of users are given “time entry-only” access and can be restricted from seeing their billing rate.
Audit Trial and Always-On Activity Log
The always-on Activity Log automatically tracks every action taken by users in an Online Edition company, telling you who did what and when. All of a company’s file activity is logged and saved.
Figure 3 Activity Log
If the activity is a transaction, the history is an audit trail that shows you exactly what data was changed and when. If the activity involves a list item, such as a customer, vendor, or employee record, the history shows you each date and time the record was changed. It’s easy to find the information you need. For example, you can search by user name or timeframe to locate a specific transaction. You can also filter the Activity Log to show only activities such as logins, or changes to recurring templates, and so on.
Figure 4 Audit Trail screen
New Features
Following are features that are either new or improved in QuickBooks: Online Edition in the past year. The Online Edition is upgraded automatically for all users throughout the year.
Complete Payroll from Intuit - QuickBooks Online Edition works with Complete Payroll from Intuit. General Ledger information is updated after each pay period, and you control the level of detail transferred between Complete Payroll and the Online Edition.
Closing the Books - The Closing the Books feature enables users to restrict access to data in prior accounting periods. Set a closing date and, optionally, a password. If a user tries to change a transaction dated prior to that closing date, they see a warning and must enter the password if one is set. A report called “Exceptions to Closing Date” provides information on all transactions changed after the books were closed.
Audit Trail - QuickBooks Online Edition maintains an audit trail of each transaction as it is added, changed, or deleted. This allows review of exactly what changes were made and who made the changes.
More Advanced Sales Form Customization Options - Customization options include the ability to rename fields, reorder columns, reposition a company logo, adjust margins, use a business letterhead, optimize for window envelopes, and more. You can also change font sizes, add color, add borders, use background images, and more.
Budgets - The Online Edition can create a budget of income and expenses for future financial periods. A budget can be based on existing data from a prior financial period, or can be created from scratch. You can create budgets by customer, class, or location.
More Payment Methods - The different ways payments are received from customers (such as cash, check, or credit card) can be identified. This makes the depositing process easier because the types of deposits to group together can be more readily identified.
Improved Sales Tax Tracking - Your clients can now track which billable expenses are taxable in order to more easily pass the tax along to their customers.
Estimates - you can prepare quotes for your customers that have the same professional look as your other QuickBooks Online sales forms. Once you perform the work, it’s easy to move the estimated charges onto an invoice for billing.
Some Drawbacks Still Exist
Although we’re very impressed with the progress of the Online Edition, it’s worth noting that some negative (relative to the desktop editions) aspects of the product may affect your decision to move to the Online Edition.
Due to the fact that the product uses the Microsoft Internet Explorer, you cannot view multiple reports on the screen at once in the same window. You can open a new explorer window and view separate screens of the same data file at the same time, but it’s not obvious to most users, and it’s not possible to have both views of the data update at the same time.
No graphs available
There is not as much ability to filter reports as we are used to in the desktop editions of QuickBooks.
The Payroll is not included in Online Edition. PayCycle allows for a direct download into the Online edition, but if a client processes their own payroll, the pricing is similar to ADP or Paychex. If the accountant processes payroll, it costs $10 per month per client.
Conclusions
Despite the drawbacks we list above, the improvements made to the online edition are outstanding, and the product is now ready for prime time. Similar to its desktop cousins, QuickBooks: Online Edition is a very solid product.