Awesome Add-ons for 2012
The Sleeter Group awards the Awesome Add-Ons each year to products that aid small businesses and their accounting firms by providing enhanced capabilities that integrate with small business accounting systems.
The ScanSnap one-button document scanners are a fast and easy way for accountants to digitize any type of paper, including client documents, tax forms, expense report receipts and more. Models include both mobile and desktop devices. The S1500 scans up to 20 pages per minute in color, grayscale, or black and white at an uncompromising 300 dpi resolution. With 50- and 10-page automatic document feeders (ADF), the S1500 & S1300 capture both sides of each page in a single pass. ScanSnap scanners automatically recognize the size of each document, detect and correct for skew, and show images in their proper orientation with blank pages removed. With an easy mouse click, documents can be saved, emailed or e-faxed to clients as well as directly uploaded to client portals or Cloud-based document repositories … not to mention converted to Word or Excel files, enabling content to be edited.
--------------------------
ShareFile for Accountants
ShareFile
www.sharefile.com
Pricing: Starts at $29.95/month (2 users, 5GB storage, 5GB bandwidth)
Target Customers: Accounting firms of any size that need to securely transfer files that are either too large or too confidential to send by e-mail. Whether you are dealing with large QuickBooks files, sensitive Excel spreadsheets or tax estimate vouchers that contain social security numbers, ShareFile can help you communicate with your clients securely, professionally and easily.
Our committee simply loves ShareFile. By specifically targeting the file transfer and secure data sharing needs of accountants and their clients, ShareFile has developed a winning, easy-to-use tool for the profession. This product is a must-have in your client support toolkit.
ShareFile for Accountants was specifically designed for tax and accounting professionals to securely exchange confidential documents and large business files. Accounting firms can make documents available to clients through ShareFile’s encrypted, password-protected, custom-branded client portal or securely through email with ShareFile’s Microsoft Outlook Plug-in. ShareFile’s client portal allows you to create online folders that allow clients to see only those folders where specific access is granted.
--------------------------
Bill & Pay
Skyhill Software, Inc.
www.billandpay.com
Pricing: $16.95 per month, $0.55 per payment transaction
Target Customers: All businesses that want to streamline their Accounts Receivable processes and who are looking for a robust online payment solution.
This SaaS product really helps businesses reduce costs and increase cash flow by automating the A/R collections process. Bill & Pay automatically uploads invoices from QuickBooks, Sage Peachtree, Great Plains and other accounting software into a Web portal where they can be tracked and managed. An “Easy Invoice” feature allows you to create your own invoices without using any accounting software. You can send e-reminders for open or late invoices, accept online payments by credit card or via ACH, and it integrates with several merchant accounts (including Intuit Merchant Solutions). So it doesn’t require extra steps for batching deposits into the bank account. This is a great product at a very low price.
--------------------------
QQube
CLEARIFY
www.clearify.com
Pricing: $425 single-user version, $895 multi-user version (2-users), $195 per additional user
Target Customers: Small businesses that need to develop complex reports and/or “dashboards” that cannot be created with QuickBooks alone. Helps companies develop data analytics, and helps multi-company operations or franchises develop cross-entity reporting.
When we looked at QQube for the first time, it opened our minds to the possibilities for mining QuickBooks data like never before. This is a VERY powerful tool for accountants. What impressed us the most was that QQube is so deeply “aware” of how data is stored in QuickBooks, what the relationships are between different data types, and how it can free us to create pretty much any report imaginable. There is a learning curve, but once you get the hang of it you’ll be amazed at how much you can do with this tool. And think of the new revenue you can generate by providing analytics and mentoring services with QQube. This is a game changer.
QQube is a data extraction technology tool that allows you to drag and drop information into Excel, SAP Crystal Reports, or any desktop/Cloud business intelligence tool of your choice. QQube enables you to create reports or analysis in minutes because it eliminates the need to know tables and relationships, deal with ODBC drivers, wrestle with unrecognized field names, or endure hours of reverse engineering and trial by error.
