Creative Financial Software

Intuit sells a variety of QuickBooks products. In is important for the small business owner to know which one of these products (called "editions") is the best fit for your industry and your specific company's reporting needs. Intuit offers the following editions of QuickBooks:

QuickBooks SimpleStart - is a very basic QuickBooks product that allows you to track simple cash flows (e.g. cash received from customers and cash disbursed to vendors). You can create Estimates and Invoices for your customers, but you cannot input Bills for your vendors to be paid at a later date (i.e. Accounts Payable). QuickBooks SimpleStart does not support inventory, multi-user access, or payroll and includes a highly streamlined selection of reports.
QuickBooks Pro - is an affordable alternative to SimpleStart that does allow you to manage Accounts Payable, basic Inventory tracking, payroll, and multi-user access. The standard reports in QuickBooks Pro are robust, but not industry-specific. Most of the 4 million QuickBooks users select QuickBooks Pro. In our experience, we find that QuickBooks Pro is the best fit for small businesses with up to one million in annual sales, though that is not a "litmus test." If you do not manage inventory and you are not a construction company, QuickBooks Pro may be the best choice for your company regardless of our annual income - as long as you need no more than 5 simultaneous QuickBooks users.
QuickBooks Premier - has the same features as QuickBooks Pro, but includes industry-specific features and reports. QuickBooks Premier includes Sales Orders. Using Sales Orders allows you to better manage your shipments to customers, including the ability to track backorders. Other features introduced at the QuickBooks Premier level include billing rates for employees and vendors (sub-contractors), Unit of Measure conversions, and numerous industry specific reports for contractors, professional service firms, wholesalers/distributors, retailers and non profit organizations. Like QuickBooks Pro, QuickBooks Premier allows only 5 simultaneous users.
QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions - is the most powerful edition of QuickBooks, allowing unlimited customers, vendors and item/parts and supporting up to 30 simultaneous users (version 9.0 only). The file administrator can use QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions to set highly specific user access privileges, unlike QuickBooks Pro and Premier. Like QuickBooks Premier, Intuit offers Enterprise Solutions for 5 specific industries (contractors, retailers, wholesales/distributors, professional service firms and non profit organizations). Small businesses usually consider using QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions when annual sales exceed one million, but there are exceptions to this criteria. Consider how many people need to use QuickBooks in your company and your need to limit these users' access to your accounting data when considering QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions.
QuickBooks Online - is a web-hosted application that includes many of the features available in QuickBooks Pro like payroll processing, Accounts Payable and Accounts Receivable. The reporting options are significantly better than QuickBooks SimpleStart, but are not as robust or customizable as reports in QuickBooks Pro. Anytime, anywhere access is the greatest benefit of QuickBooks Online edition. If your company has traveling timekeepers, travel sales reps or traveling decision makers, you should consider QuickBooks Online edition. (Tip: Alternatively, you can use QuickBooks Pro, Premier or Enterprise Solutions with Microsoft Terminal Services to offer remote users live access to your accounting data.) Unlike the other editions of QuickBooks, you do not have to install any software on your computer. Instead, you use Internet Explorer to access the QuickBooks Online website where Intuit securely hosts both your company's accounting data and the QuickBooks Online program. This flexibility allows you and your employees to access accounting data from any web-enabled PC. (Macintosh is not supported).

As the non-accountant's accounting software, QuickBooks greatly simplifies the bookkeeping process. However, in our combined 20 years of QuickBooks consulting experience we find that no small businesses can accurately use any accounting software solution, however user friendly, without some level of training and support.

That is where Creative Financial Software enters into the equation. All of our consultants are advanced certified QuickBooks ProAdvisors and have years of field experience working with a wide range of industries. Creative Financial Software also enjoys a unique and nationally renowned relationship with Intuit - the developers of QuickBooks. Click here for more information.

Our experts are capable of handling your QuickBooks needs, regardless of your level of experience with the program. New users often request data file setup and training services, but we also consult with businesses who have used QuickBooks for years and who want to take their QuickBooks use to the next level by integrating QuickBooks with other applications to meet industry-specific needs like sales force management, dispatching and warehouse management. We also consult with businesses at all levels of QuickBooks experience to make sure they are using the program in the fullest capacity possible and to provide them with advanced and industry-specific reporting options.