Sage Peachtree Complete Accounting Review
When it comes to the best accounting software for small businesses, Sage provides some of the most capable and comprehensive all-in-one accounting programs available. Sage’s Peachtree Complete Accounting, our TopTenREVIEWS Gold Award winner, yet again tops our review list. It can do just about everything we were looking for and much more, including audit trail reporting, tools for managing fixed assets, job cost modules and PDF and email invoicing.
Sage provides numerous accounting programs in the Peachtree family of software including Peachtree First Accounting, Peachtree Pro, Peachtree Premium, and Peachtree Quantum and Peachtree Add-ons. Peachtree Pro may be sufficient for some small business, but we found Complete Accounting a more comprehensive package. Sage Peachtree Complete Accounting is also available in a multi-user version.
Even though QuickBooks Pro is likely the most widely recognized name in small business accounting, we discovered that Peachtree Complete does just a little more. For example, it offers a few more inventory options and good fixed inventory tools.
Ease of Use:
This accounting software is not the easiest to configure. The trial version we looked at came with a handful of sample companies that were already configured so we could run reports and so on. However, we noticed that not every company had the same control panel options. What we learned is that you have to first configure a feature and many features actually required the running of a setup wizard. After initial configuration, the button or icon for that feature will appear in the control panel. We found this confusing and sometimes the wizards would not even run. Someone who is new to accounting software may have a hard time getting their company account set up the way they want with automated payroll, project management and automatic deposits. We recommend that you get help when first setting up this software, which is a good idea no matter what accounting software you choose to use.
Help/Support:
Like most accounting software providers, direct contact support requires that you subscribe to one of their support plans. Free support includes a resource center and a comprehensive help section embedded in their software for quick access. Online they have some FAQs, updates and upgrades and some basic accounting information.
To get telephone, email or chat support you have to sign up with one of their three service plans. They also provide Sage University, which requires a Business Care subscription. The university provides anytime and real-time training, lunch and learns and style guides.
Accounts Receivable:
Sage's Peachtree Complete Accounting accounts receivable section is in their Customers and Sales module. Through this control panel you can manage customers, add inventory, set sales tax, and calculate finance charges. You can also deposit funds and perform credits and returns easily. In terms of reporting, you can save time by running one of about 50 pre-defined reports.
Accounts Payable:
Peachtree's accounts payable section is powerful but simple; you can manage vendors, write checks, enter bills, void checks and process credits and returns. You cannot, however, create custom checks per vendor; you can only make global changes that affect the layout and color of all checks.
Payroll:
Sage Peachtree Complete Accounting comes with payroll tools, though we had to consult the help files many times to figure it out. In the employees and payroll tasks sections for one company we only saw three buttons: employees, users and 1099s. When we clicked on one of the employee names it showed their general and additional information but there was not a benefits tab or an obvious way to alter their benefits or pay. After consulting the help pages a few times we discovered that you have to run the payroll set up wizard to add benefit information initially, we found this frustrating. To add to our frustration, running Windows 7 we could not get the payroll wizard to run.
Inventory:
In terms of inventory, this accounting software does just about everything we were looking for, including tracking stock location, re-order quantities, preferred vendors and more. It can also sort by UPC or SKU, which is necessary if you use a scanner and UPC barcodes for identifying stock. One feature that we would have liked to have seen is the ability to add an image to stock files.
Banking:
With Peachtree you can write checks, void checks, make deposits and reconcile accounts. To set up direct deposit you have to use PeachSync and like most programs, the direct deposit service requires a subscription.
Time Billing:
Within this section you can create expense quotes, daily and weekly time tickets, and sales invoices. However, like the payroll tools it took a bit to figure out.
Job Costing:
Finding the jobs or project section in Sage Peachtree Complete Accounting was difficult at first. We opened up a few demo companies and some would offer that section and some would not. What we learned is that you have to set up a section before the option will even appear in the main menu, which is nice in terms of not cluttering up your screen with unused icons, but not so nice when you are trying to figure out how to even configure or set up that section.
General Ledger:
Peachtree has excellent General Ledger Entry choices. You can change accounting periods, make ledger entries, and register accounts. There are seven reports available in this section.
Fixed Assets:
This software application can manage up to 200 fixed assets. It can also calculate depreciation and tax reporting. QuickBooks Pro does not have this module in the Pro version, you have to upgrade to the accountant or enterprise version to get the fixed asset manager.
Conversion and Updates:
Sage provides an easy to use conversion tool for converting from QuickBooks 2008-2010 (Pro through Enterprise) to Sage Peachtree Complete Accounting. Other versions and Quicken can be converted manually by exporting data to a compatible file type.
Reporting:
Peachtree provides quite a few reporting options for all of its sections. For example, in the inventory section there are around 20 pre-defined reports or you can also build customized report groups. It also provides Crystal Reports and a variety of job or project reports. Unique to this program is the audit report, which is similar to a journal entry report; it tracks users, actions, transaction IDs, date, amount and more.
Sage reports that Peachtree Complete Accounting can support up to 200 fixed assets and associated reports. However, we could not find fixed asset reports in the demo version and customer support would not answer our questions about how to run these reports without a customer ID.
Summary:
This software can do almost everything and it is a good all-in-one accounting product. It even includes many useful, printable forms to negate the necessity to have another program to do that for you.
We recommend that you try the free trial version for this software and view a variety of the sample companies so you can get a good idea as to what Peachtree is capable of. In addition, it could be worth the extra investment to have a Peachtree representative help you with the initial configuration of the product so you can get it set up and running with all of the modules and features that you need.
The fact that you may need a bit of helping setting up this software does not mean this software is less than stellar. In truth, most accounting programs are complex and do require a bit of forethought, time and assistance to get it configured perfectly to suit your needs. Once you get Sage Peachtree Complete Accounting working for you though, you will find more time and less stress in your work day.
When it comes to the best accounting software for small businesses, Sage provides some of the most capable and comprehensive all-in-one accounting programs available. Sage’s Peachtree Complete Accounting, our TopTenREVIEWS Gold Award winner, yet again tops our review list. It can do just about everything we were looking for and much more, including audit trail reporting, tools for managing fixed assets, job cost modules and PDF and email invoicing.
Sage provides numerous accounting programs in the Peachtree family of software including Peachtree First Accounting, Peachtree Pro, Peachtree Premium, and Peachtree Quantum and Peachtree Add-ons. Peachtree Pro may be sufficient for some small business, but we found Complete Accounting a more comprehensive package. Sage Peachtree Complete Accounting is also available in a multi-user version.
Even though QuickBooks Pro is likely the most widely recognized name in small business accounting, we discovered that Peachtree Complete does just a little more. For example, it offers a few more inventory options and good fixed inventory tools.
Ease of Use:
This accounting software is not the easiest to configure. The trial version we looked at came with a handful of sample companies that were already configured so we could run reports and so on. However, we noticed that not every company had the same control panel options. What we learned is that you have to first configure a feature and many features actually required the running of a setup wizard. After initial configuration, the button or icon for that feature will appear in the control panel. We found this confusing and sometimes the wizards would not even run. Someone who is new to accounting software may have a hard time getting their company account set up the way they want with automated payroll, project management and automatic deposits. We recommend that you get help when first setting up this software, which is a good idea no matter what accounting software you choose to use.
Help/Support:
Like most accounting software providers, direct contact support requires that you subscribe to one of their support plans. Free support includes a resource center and a comprehensive help section embedded in their software for quick access. Online they have some FAQs, updates and upgrades and some basic accounting information.
To get telephone, email or chat support you have to sign up with one of their three service plans. They also provide Sage University, which requires a Business Care subscription. The university provides anytime and real-time training, lunch and learns and style guides.
Accounts Receivable:
Sage's Peachtree Complete Accounting accounts receivable section is in their Customers and Sales module. Through this control panel you can manage customers, add inventory, set sales tax, and calculate finance charges. You can also deposit funds and perform credits and returns easily. In terms of reporting, you can save time by running one of about 50 pre-defined reports.
Accounts Payable:
Peachtree's accounts payable section is powerful but simple; you can manage vendors, write checks, enter bills, void checks and process credits and returns. You cannot, however, create custom checks per vendor; you can only make global changes that affect the layout and color of all checks.
Payroll:
Sage Peachtree Complete Accounting comes with payroll tools, though we had to consult the help files many times to figure it out. In the employees and payroll tasks sections for one company we only saw three buttons: employees, users and 1099s. When we clicked on one of the employee names it showed their general and additional information but there was not a benefits tab or an obvious way to alter their benefits or pay. After consulting the help pages a few times we discovered that you have to run the payroll set up wizard to add benefit information initially, we found this frustrating. To add to our frustration, running Windows 7 we could not get the payroll wizard to run.
Inventory:
In terms of inventory, this accounting software does just about everything we were looking for, including tracking stock location, re-order quantities, preferred vendors and more. It can also sort by UPC or SKU, which is necessary if you use a scanner and UPC barcodes for identifying stock. One feature that we would have liked to have seen is the ability to add an image to stock files.
Banking:
With Peachtree you can write checks, void checks, make deposits and reconcile accounts. To set up direct deposit you have to use PeachSync and like most programs, the direct deposit service requires a subscription.
Time Billing:
Within this section you can create expense quotes, daily and weekly time tickets, and sales invoices. However, like the payroll tools it took a bit to figure out.
Job Costing:
Finding the jobs or project section in Sage Peachtree Complete Accounting was difficult at first. We opened up a few demo companies and some would offer that section and some would not. What we learned is that you have to set up a section before the option will even appear in the main menu, which is nice in terms of not cluttering up your screen with unused icons, but not so nice when you are trying to figure out how to even configure or set up that section.
General Ledger:
Peachtree has excellent General Ledger Entry choices. You can change accounting periods, make ledger entries, and register accounts. There are seven reports available in this section.
Fixed Assets:
This software application can manage up to 200 fixed assets. It can also calculate depreciation and tax reporting. QuickBooks Pro does not have this module in the Pro version, you have to upgrade to the accountant or enterprise version to get the fixed asset manager.
Conversion and Updates:
Sage provides an easy to use conversion tool for converting from QuickBooks 2008-2010 (Pro through Enterprise) to Sage Peachtree Complete Accounting. Other versions and Quicken can be converted manually by exporting data to a compatible file type.
Reporting:
Peachtree provides quite a few reporting options for all of its sections. For example, in the inventory section there are around 20 pre-defined reports or you can also build customized report groups. It also provides Crystal Reports and a variety of job or project reports. Unique to this program is the audit report, which is similar to a journal entry report; it tracks users, actions, transaction IDs, date, amount and more.
Sage reports that Peachtree Complete Accounting can support up to 200 fixed assets and associated reports. However, we could not find fixed asset reports in the demo version and customer support would not answer our questions about how to run these reports without a customer ID.
Summary:
This software can do almost everything and it is a good all-in-one accounting product. It even includes many useful, printable forms to negate the necessity to have another program to do that for you.
We recommend that you try the free trial version for this software and view a variety of the sample companies so you can get a good idea as to what Peachtree is capable of. In addition, it could be worth the extra investment to have a Peachtree representative help you with the initial configuration of the product so you can get it set up and running with all of the modules and features that you need.
The fact that you may need a bit of helping setting up this software does not mean this software is less than stellar. In truth, most accounting programs are complex and do require a bit of forethought, time and assistance to get it configured perfectly to suit your needs. Once you get Sage Peachtree Complete Accounting working for you though, you will find more time and less stress in your work day.
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