After doing my corp taxes this year with MS Excel, I think that for next year I'll use some software. I say "taxes", but I'm talking about my bookkeeping. I don't trust myself to actually do my taxes... Wikipedia has a "comparison" of packages, but it's pretty light on the details.
I found another review of different programs, but I'm not how much credit I would put into this review... *sigh* A co-worker was using GnuCash but then switched to make things easier for his account, but apparently it didn't make any difference to what he was charged. For lack of an obvious choice, I'll probably just go with QuickBooks since it's popular choice. Does anyone have any preferences for what they have used?
I've used Gnucash in the past to look after my money. I'm currently not keeping track, but I really should to see how much money i'm spending lately. Anyway, I found it quite good at importing bank statements that I had downloaded (TD and RBC). However, that only works if you're running linux. Don't try to compile this one. It has a million dependancies. Just take whatever version comes with your distro. I found it fit my needs pretty well, and it was quite easy to use. I wouldn't choose Quickbooks out of principle, because it's made by intuit, and they have history of draconian copy protection schemes.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,3973,834915,00.asp
Jim, I have been using QuickBooks for a very long time and started teaching it 7 years ago. As a bookkeeper, not only do I use it but recommend it daily to my customers all over the US. I can help you learn QuickBooks Fast and Easy. I'm not into the politics behind anything. I just think it's a great product that will help you to know where your money is really spent, help you keep more of it, and it's not hard to learn. You can download your bank informtion into it which save on data entry time. I just finished writing an E-book - Introduction to QuickBooks. It will be on the web site in a few days. Let me know if I can help.
ReplyDelete[Edit by Jim: I didn't feel comfortable with the plugola as Alex called it, so I changed the url a bit. People will be able to figure out my "code"]
Alice: thanks for the offer to help. Hopefully I'll be able to figure it out okay if I decide to use QuickBooks.
ReplyDeleteI'm still not decided yet. I'm not in a huge rush at this time. Just one more thing to figure out. ;-)
Yeah Alice, thanks for plugola, it was unforgettable.
ReplyDeleteTalking about finances, I recently talked with a tax lawyer. It is amazing how much cash these guys are making, figures go up to 600$/hr. And it seems to be an interesting job too. Just some ideas for you kids out there, trying to figure out what to do with your lives.
Jim, fork out the thousands of dollars for Cognos Finance (this is not a shameless plug, no it isn't). Nicole works on this product and seems to enjoy using it for her finances.
ReplyDeletehahaha... Riiiight.
ReplyDeleteAt this point I'm trying to figure out if I should pay 100 $ for bookkeeping sw, or if I should just "manage" everything in MS Excel.
I know! I'll write my own!!!
(just kidding :-P )
Speaking of writing your own, if you're going to be using excel, you could probably use VBA to program some stuff so that it's automated to some extent. This is why you should probably go with Quicken/MS Money/GnuCash. You can download your bank file and easily enter your transactions error free in a matter of minutes. Doing this by hand is extremely tedious. Most banks allow you to output CSV, which can be used to import to Excel, but that will still require a lot more work then what you will have to do with another tool. Importing stuff into GnuCash is really easy, and all your expenses are automatically categorized based on what you've selected before for similar transactions. Eg. All transactions from Loblaws, get categorized as groceries after the first time you select that. So, each time you load up the data file, it's a quick scan to make sure everything is categorized correctly.
ReplyDeleteI'm pretty sure Kibbee uses Vi, so don't listen to him.
ReplyDeleteha Vi, that's great!
ReplyDelete