Ask HN: What accounting software do you use? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: What accounting software do you use?

#31

Post by than » Wed, Apr 02, 2014, 2:56 PM UTC

molsongolden wrote: post #17

My best online accounting experience so far has been with Xero. Xero has pretty good bank and payroll feed integration, good customizable tracking classes, and it's geared towards the small business user. It ends up being a little pricier than buying a prior year desktop version of QuickBooks but it seems to be the best online package and they're actually pushing and working to make accounting easier vs. QuickBooks o…

Seconding Xero. The freshly released Stripe integration has sealed my decision to park my invoicing and time tracking there, instead of trying to manage 2 or 3 different apps.

Re: Ask HN: What accounting software do you use?

#32

Post by daveclarke » Wed, Apr 02, 2014, 2:59 PM UTC

Full disclosure, I work for Kashoo, but yeah... Kashoo. Super-useful for iPad-toting entrepreneurs. http://appstore.com/kashooaccounting Double-entry accounting (aka, makes your accountant - and god forbid - the gov happy)... but still easy to use (fresh for iOS7). Again, full disc: I'm a Kashoo'er.

Re: Ask HN: What accounting software do you use?

#33

Post by GoRudy » Wed, Apr 02, 2014, 3:03 PM UTC

QuickBooks Online. It's a much better tool than it was even two years ago, really glad we switched over to it and our accountants love it.

Re: Ask HN: What accounting software do you use?

#34

Post by 3pt14159 » Wed, Apr 02, 2014, 3:06 PM UTC

molsongolden wrote: post #17

My best online accounting experience so far has been with Xero. Xero has pretty good bank and payroll feed integration, good customizable tracking classes, and it's geared towards the small business user. It ends up being a little pricier than buying a prior year desktop version of QuickBooks but it seems to be the best online package and they're actually pushing and working to make accounting easier vs. QuickBooks o…

Xero is really good. Really useful if you arn't just doing simple accounting (for simple, non-double ledger accounting, I used to use FreshBooks).

Re: Ask HN: What accounting software do you use?

#35

Post by brianhorakh » Wed, Apr 02, 2014, 3:09 PM UTC

molsongolden wrote: post #17

My best online accounting experience so far has been with Xero. Xero has pretty good bank and payroll feed integration, good customizable tracking classes, and it's geared towards the small business user. It ends up being a little pricier than buying a prior year desktop version of QuickBooks but it seems to be the best online package and they're actually pushing and working to make accounting easier vs. QuickBooks o…

My company decided to eat-what-we-were selling/telling customers to do and went 100% cloud (google apps + xero), it's been awesome.

We still use QB for payroll, planning on moving to ADP (or something else) soon.

Re: Ask HN: What accounting software do you use?

#36

Post by levosmetalo » Wed, Apr 02, 2014, 3:12 PM UTC

I use hledger and hledger-web. It's mostly compatible with ledger with some nice features on top and a web interface.

Before that tried Gnucash, but that was just hassle to use, while pure ledger was not user friendly enough for me.

Re: Ask HN: What accounting software do you use?

#37

Post by nlh » Wed, Apr 02, 2014, 3:16 PM UTC

I use traditional QuickBooks, but I hate it. Problem is switching cost is too high at the moment (when isn't it though).

I'm happy to see that most others aren't using it. It's really a miserable piece of software and is a full 10 years behind in terms of design and UX.

I've heard wonderful things about Xero. Haven't moved yet but that would likely be my pick if starting from scratch today.

Edit: This is for a non-tech business. Few thousand transactions per month, mostly CC.

Re: Ask HN: What accounting software do you use?

#38

Post by jamesdeer » Wed, Apr 02, 2014, 3:18 PM UTC

FREEAGENT!

Re: Ask HN: What accounting software do you use?

#39

Post by robomartin » Wed, Apr 02, 2014, 3:22 PM UTC

Use whatever will work best with your accountant. Unless you are an accountant yourself and that's your function at your company my standard advise is to stop trying to micro-manage everything and move accounting off your desk as quickly as possible. Focus on your product.

Most accountants in the US are setup to ingest from and work with tools like Quickbooks. If you use a tool that provides a low impedance path for your accountant it will make your life a million times easier.

Do. Not. Reinvent. The. Wheel.

Re: Ask HN: What accounting software do you use?

#40

Post by tadmilbourn » Wed, Apr 02, 2014, 3:23 PM UTC

We use QuickBooks Online. As mentioned elsewhere in the thread, the new redesign is pretty slick and catches QuickBooks back up with Xero. In the US, you're going to find more accountants/bookkeepers that are familiar with QuickBooks over Xero...which is very important if you're not an accounting expert (most of us). That being said, Xero is working hard to woo those accountants in the US. I'd recommend doing a trial of both QuickBooks Online and Xero and seeing which one feels the best, syncs with your bank accounts, and saves you the most time.