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| Microsoft Office Small Business Accounting 2006 | 
 enlarge | From: Microsoft Software
Category: Software
List Price: $79.00
Buy New: $19.98
You Save: $59.02 (75%)
New (9) Used (4) from $15.59
Avg. Customer Rating:  51 reviews
Sales Rank: 673
Format: Cd-rom
Platform: Windows Xp
Media: CD-ROM
Autographed: No
Memorabilia: No
Shipping Weight (lbs): 2
Dimensions (in): 9.6 x 8 x 2
MPN: X11-98506
Model: ZQ2-00003
UPC: 882224036696
EAN: 0882224036696
ASIN: B000A76ZR0
Release Date: August 16, 2005
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: BRAND NEW AND FACTORY SEALED FULL VERSION COMPLETE IN TRIFOLD EASY GET STARTED NOW CASE
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| Customer Reviews:
 go get QuickBook Pro instead May 17, 2006
3 out of 20 found this review helpful
I bought this software for $60 AR months ago, I thought it's a great deal comparing to Quickbook Pro. But it's a total disapointment, it's not user friendly in most of the cases, I had no idea how it worked. So I had to buy QuickBook Pro for $150 instead from Costco, therefore I end up pay more by choosing a wrong product in the begining (trying to be cheap too). I like Microsoft products in general, but this just doesn't cut it, it's a long way to go. I had little problem using Quickbook, maybe I've used Turbotax for years. Just my $0.02.
Good start at a product, much improvement needed May 15, 2006
44 out of 46 found this review helpful
With Office Small Business Accounting, Microsoft is making another attempt to enter a market that has not responded well to its previous entries. Strong points are integration with a SQL Server database, the Office tool set, one banking group (Wachovia), and one payroll service (ADP). Weak points are limited support for inventory, assets, structured accounts, and employee benefits and records.
Ease of use, these days a Microsoft hallmark, is better than QuickBooks (Intuit) and Peachtree (Sage). However, importing from QuickBooks or Peachtree is likely to fail because of design quirks and rigidity in the Microsoft product. If you try to import using accounts that Microsoft is somehow unable to recognize, they will be silently dropped. Our subaccount structures were not imported.
Inventory methods are limited to FIFO, which happens to be what we use. There are 12 built-in accounts; most characteristics cannot be changed. In many businesses they would be useful only as subaccounts, but they cannot be made into subaccounts. Only one level of subaccounts is provided, and subaccounts are not supported at all for cash or bank deposits. Built-in accounts treat credit-card purchases as cash payments at time of purchase. You will not be able to use direct deposit for payroll unless you sign up with ADP for an expensive "full service" option.
The product runs only on Windows XP, not on any of the older systems. Integrated support features that generate forms, export data or use contacts require Microsoft Office to be installed on the same computer. Contacts are fully supported only for Office 2003. Only the appearance of forms can be changed; the content is fixed at whatever Microsoft thought it should be. Microsoft didn't think service invoices should include dates of service, and so they won't. Try that on your clients. Unlike QuickBooks, Microsoft didn't think you should delete transactions you entered by mistake, so you won't be able to. However, you can zero them out and move them to a dead-letter account, which you will need to invent.
To install and activate the product requires a Microsoft Passport account. To set up a Passport account requires disclosing an e-mail address and using it for verification. Although Microsoft is promoting a year of free assistance as an inducement, its Web site for product support is asking $35 per e-mail contact after the first two. The Help menu offers a service to "Find an Accountant" that launches a Web page trying to sell Microsoft products to accountants. On the forum pages you find arrogance toward customers such as the likes of, "Well if QuickBooks will do that, why don't you just stay with them?"
The offer of a year of free support is available to U.S. customers who register before the end of September, 2006, by calling 866-827-1619 (toll-free). Before registering for support you must install and register the product and upgrade to its latest version. Use Help / Check for Ugrades. As of spring, 2006, one upgrade kit has been released. Support is by telephone at the same number, from Microsoft staff in the U.S. This is bound to be expensive for Microsoft to provide; it signals a strong commitment to the product.
By Microsoft standards the documentation is above average, but for the rest of the world it is pretty hopeless unless you are very skilled at both accounting and software. As of spring, 2006, one book on the product was available, an introductory-level book from Microsoft Press just slightly longer than the User's Guide that comes with the product. The User's Guide and the product have several time-wasting inconsistencies, for example, the spelling and capitalization of account types. Mix them up, and you cannot import a chart of accounts. There is no usable information in the User's Guide or the on-line documentation on how to set up accounts for most payrolls. Apparently you do it by experiment, or you pay ADP for the "full service" option as mentioned above.
A warning to potential users who need more than one computer to access accounting records. While Microsoft Small Business Accounting can support multiple users, because it relies on a SQL Server database, product documentation does not explain system requirements clearly. In your My Computer / Folder Options / View properties, on all the computers with access to an accounts records database, you must turn off the option "Use simple file sharing" at the bottom of the properties list, which is turned on by default.
We believe that several so-called "reviews" here are from Microsoft and its vendor network, because the reports are far different from our experience. We do continue to hope Microsoft will give QuickBooks and Peachtree long overdue kicks in the touchas. We managed to work our way around pitfalls of the product and will use it for a year to see if Microsoft will solve its problems while maintaining its strong points. If not, then we will go back to QuickBooks.
 "Dymanic accounting software" Business user United States Export Store May 2, 2006
8 out of 10 found this review helpful
I give microsoft (1) THUMB DOWN because they should have come out with this great accounting software package a few years ago. As a small busines owner with increasing sales I needed a robust software package for my business that could give me up to the minute reports on how my business is going, plus a very simple dashboard for reviewing, and EASY Data entry of the sales and quotes to keep track, As a small business owner we have many tasks and things to do and remember,
And must keep our overhead low so we can compete and make money. After investigating a few years ago when Microsoft did not have one. I came to the conclusion of using quickbooks premier and invested my time and money to learn this system while still operating a manual bookkeeping system, I completed a 4 weeks adult education course on quickbooks and spent days loading it and setting up a test using premier before merging with our on going accounting system. Fornuately for me and my staff Microsoft came out with the SBA 2006 last year in Beta and I used it. And like it, and made money and saved time in my over all business using sba 2006 accounting.
As an added benefit microsoft gives the purchaser UNLIMITED SUPPORT by a LIVE PERSON for (1) YEs ONE YEAR. Unbeleiveable to speak to a live support expert for this Accounting software. I have used it for questions to make me more profitable to utilize all the features.
I can't beleive how " Cheap the Cost to buy it is" for this robust software, It has reports for us and I can see how sales are and all the accounting features of a costly one. It is smooth and uses all the microsoft software to build templates and export to excel for pivot tables and other tools that are easy to use, if you want to build templates. I use the standard ones that come with the software. I like how easy it to view all our chart of accounts, expenses, to do list, like making deposits, paying bills,and seeing how much money I made, and other items I add. Another great feature is the Business contact manager it comes with that is an add in for Outlook. It keeps track of all my contact information including oppurtunities for sales in the opportunity section, and it will migrate the content to SBA2006 from quote to sale to invoice with a few clicks. I suggest that if you purchase Sba 2006 buy 2, give one to a family or friend that is interested in starting up or has an existing business.It is a great tool for any size business. We enjoy it and give it the Software (5)thumbs up.
Rick Jarvis
owner
United States Export Store. com
 Microsoft Office Small Business Accounting 2006 March 10, 2006
11 out of 16 found this review helpful
I had used Quickbook pro for several years. It is a good program but not user friendly. Miscrosoft makes life easy in accounting. It is very easy to import the statements and allocate the expenses to the apropriate accounts. It also has a capbilities to import work created in Quickbook pro. It cost less than the quickbook pro.
Another great MS product March 9, 2006
4 out of 10 found this review helpful
Why was this not available after all the years of headache's with Quickbooks!
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