Customer Reviews

QuickBooks 2009 For Mac [OLD VERSION]

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(11)
1 star:		(29)

 

 

Try the 30-day trial version first, decide if features are worth it

UPDATE 11/22/08 (*also note edits in main review): During my test of the 30 day trial (instructions on where to find it are 7 paragraphs down), I had a crash (the first day). A crash report was automatically generated, which I allowed to be sent to Intuit. Lo and Behold, within a few hours, a Mac-oriented software engineer responded to my crash report with further questions, opening a dialog by email which also solved a vexing problem I'd had with large fonts appearing in reports. He told me this used to happen when QB files were sent to a Windows user and back repeatedly (such as from me to my accountant). You can fix it in the Company Setup sub-menus, something regular tech support had not mentioned when I contacted them some time ago..

This technician, with his kind offer of help in clear, well-written sentences, was a godsend to me. I have such a negative opinion of Intuit and he has started to turn this around a bit.

I did learn that the version of the trial I downloaded was not the most currently available version of the Mac software...believe it or not, Intuit is apparently so large that getting a new version posted by its own people does not happen in a day, possibly not in a week.

But I am assured, and have confidence it's true, that the Mac team is reading all "feedback reports" you can send from within Quickbooks, even if they don't respond to them, and they do try to fix known issues.

Upshot to my update: there is at least one good Mac guy at Intuit, but he's working in a corporate structure which does not appear to care much about Mac users (an obvious example being they don't offer a reduced upgrade cost to those of us who have been running QB for years, we pay the same price as someone just starting to use QB with the latest version).

I still don't know if I will actually purchase the new Mac version, but I'm closer than I was when I wrote the review below....

Original review continues: This will be a long review since I know others rely on these as much as I do before making a purchase (thanks, Amazon!) I also feel this is a significant way for users to get Intuit's attention about the many problems with their product and maybe by 2012 or 2015 they'll have something that works as well as the dozen of other Mac apps I run every day.There are relatively few new features worth paying around $200. for. Details below...

If you are considering this "upgrade", you should definitely run the TRIAL version first (it's good for 30 days, all features apparently enabled). However, you will NOT SEE the trial version link on the main product page of Quickbooks 2009 for Mac over at Intuit. I finally found it on a page titled "switching to Mac" (where it was also offered for sale). Look for that page over at Intuit.

Scroll to the bottom of the page "switching to Mac", and there's a link titled "download free trial of QuickBooks 2009 for Mac". You then have to log in with your Intuit account (or set one up, I suppose) in order to go through checkout for the trial, for which you will be "charged" $0.00. Bizarre, but since I had already registered my 2007 version it went OK and the download proceeded (around 80mb size). (Note: this procedure is an improvement over the rigamarole Intuit had for downloading the 2007 trial version.)

Now for the review:

Let me first say, I'm getting by OK with QB 2007, and I use it almost every day. I don't have payroll, or massive inventory issues, I just use it to invoice and generate receipts for a few items and services, and keep track of who has paid me and who still owes me money. I also use it to generate a sales tax report each month, and I give the data file to my accountant every year for Federal taxes. This more or less works with QB 2007.

I like my invoices and receipts to look a little nicer (they are free advertising pieces), and the 2007 form designer does work, with some glitches...one being that I have found that no matter how I configure fonts on my form, the text will appear in a related, though different font...italic instead of bold for example. By fooling around with it repeatedly, I got to something I could live with. Like I said, Quickbooks works more or less.

OK, I got my 30-day trial version downloaded, and it installed without a single hitch (Mac OS 10.5.4). I had taken the precaution of backing up my entire hard drive to a separate bootable drive, just in case things got really whacky. At a minimum, you want to make a backup copy of your current data file, and let the 2009 version convert THAT, rather than your main working data file. GOOD NEWS: I found I was able to run the new version, and still launch my old version, side by side, so I could continue to do business while testing the new version. Just make sure you know which data file you're in, they look very similar (the logo for the software is identical except for the name).

QB 2009 launched OK, offered to convert my file once I pointed it to the test file, and a couple minutes later I was using it, the conversion went smoothly. The "about" splash screen says I'm running "Version T10.0", however when I run "Check for updates" it says I have "the latest version", QuickBooks 10.0f1627, whatever that means. I would assume Intuit would offer the "patched" versions for download, but who knows. (UPDATE: at the time I downloaded the trial, it was NOT the same latest version which was shipping at that time, an Intuit Mac engineer told me. Your mileage may vary.)

What's GOOD about the new version:
There's a company snapshot feature which is a very quick way to see the status of your payments, invoices, overdue invoices, etc. Very useful, but not alone worth the price.

In spite of what has been said negatively in other reviews, I found a search function in the "Transaction Center", which let me find a client, or even a check number, by typing the first few letters....a list quickly appeared, which got shorter as I typed more letters. Very useful, possibly the most useful new feature I found.

There is a lot more room for description in the invoice and receipt windows (and possibly elsewhere), it doesn't cut you off after a few words in the item description.

I had no problem printing to my Epson 2200 printer, current or past invoices or receipts or reports. (One other user I think reported printing problems, possibly before installing a patch Intuit issued.)

Runs side-by-side with old version (2007) so you can throw away 2009 when you decide it's not worth keeping.

What's BAD about the new version, from my perspective:

My online bank, which appears in the 2007 version "online" listing of banks, is not shown in the 2009 version list of banks. I won't bother trying to find out why, that's another deal killer here. (*update: a later version of 2009 QB does now include my bank, and I was able to use the feature of downloading account data and then importing it into QB 2009. This also works in the 2007 version, it is not a new feature).

"Email as PDF", a useful function I need almost daily in the 2007 version, DOES NOT WORK in the 2009 version. The menu item is there, it just doesn't do anything. During testing, I could "print" a PDF file of an invoice to my desktop, thanks to Mac's basic software, then save that PDF and attach it to an email, but not directly from Quickbooks.

When I clicked a link "tell me more about blah blah blah" in one of the new panels, the help viewer launched but there was no content whatsoever shown in it. However, the help viewer DID work in another area.

There are some new user interface features (such as the "Transaction Center") which are useful, but behind them are mostly the same menu items and displays as in the 2007 version. For example, the accept payments window, the accounts window, the invoice window, all look exactly the same as far as I can tell.

I'm going to stop here...I didn't test every feature, but I found that the ones that concern me most either have not been improved, or are in some cases worse. There is little reason to upgrade if you are already running the 2007 version. If running a version prior to 2007, I believe there would be some benefit to going to the 2007 version which is still for sale here and there. If buying your first copy of QuickBooks/Mac, I suppose no harm would be done buying the 2009 version except it probably costs more than the 2007.


There are other reviews, almost universally critical of this upgrade, elsewhere on the internet. Try google on macworld and/or macnn along with "Quickbooks Mac 2009". 90% of these reviews make it quite clear that Intuit and Quickbooks are despised by most of their Mac users for a poor product, poor tech support, and an apparent lack of interest in trying to do any better over a period of time now stretching into a decade.

*Update: The Mac engineer mentioned at the beginning of this review changed my feelings about all this considerably. I still believe Intuit as a company is not all that interested in the Mac market but I believe the Mac team there is trying hard in spite of this!

What a CON job! I've used Quickbooks for 9 years, switched to Mac, and bought this without READING THE FINE PRINT. Oh, yeah, it there as it talks about what the program will do, only it's at the bottom of the list. YOU CANNOT MAKE A PAYROLL CHECK FROM YOUR COMPUTER BUT HAVE TO SIGN UP FOR A $24 MONTH FEE TO AN ONLINE SERVICE! I know this is unbelievable, but for a small business, it makes no business sense. This Intuit program therefore fits into the category of a con job. Nothing but a con job. What company can use a program that doesn't allow you to make a payroll...for a not so small fee, of course!

Jim

I recently switched from a PC to a MAC. Although, I had just bought the latest Quickbooks for PC only a year and a half ago, I purchased the 2009 QB for MAC and converted over my PC data. What a nightmare!

To start with, this software is so much worse than even the 1999 version of PC Quickbooks without many features -- particularly, the inability to select which credits I want to apply to an invoice or to unapply credits to an invoice to name just one. But even worse, this software is full of bugs. When I received multiple invoices and applied credits, if I went back to look at them afterwards, they were changed -- different invoices were checked, different credits applied, partial payments were created. Payments I received one and two years ago were now marked to pay for random invoices in the future (i.e. a 2007 payment was now marked to pay a 2008 invoice). My books have become completely messed up. I don't know which invoices are legitimately paid and which not. I don't know what payment paid what invoice. And the credits are applied to all kinds of random partial payments.

And it gets worse. I called the tech support department for help and they told me that it was something I had done that messed things up. Even though I told them I'd been using PC quickbooks for years without a problem, they still didn't believe me. He said there was no way there could be a bug in the program and the only way he'd help me was if I'd purchase a service plan. I told him I wasn't going to pay Quickbooks to fix a bug in their program and the guy was very rude. I asked how I could report a bug. I was willing to supply examples and documentation of my problem. He told me there was no way to do this and that the problem was mine, not a bug. I then hired, at my expense, a Quickbooks expert to help me and after hours of trying to clean up my books and having them get messed up again every time I received a payment, she told me she had never seen a problem like this and that the problem was with the program.

I ended up having to throw away this program that I paid good money for, put out more money to buy Windows, install it as a separate partition so I could use my old Quickbooks for Windows. While the PC version is working fine, my data is still all messed up thanks to MAC Quickbooks.

I am warning you -- DO NOT BUY THIS PROGRAM. Not only will you waste your money, but your books and data will get completely messed up.

2/27/2009:

I've read all the reviews here. They're pretty scary, aren't they? And while I believe these reviews are accurate for those folks, I personally have NO problems with this software, AT ALL.

I did what others said, I downloaded the trial. It not only imported my old QB files perfectly, it also imported my accountant's PC back up of my file. Both were perfect.

Some items that I noticed were complained about most by others:
Email PDF - works PERFECTLY.
Template designer - GREAT!
Online banking imports? Also PERFECT.

Honestly, this is the best looking and best functioning version of the software yet. I love it. I was *this* close to getting MYOB after reading the reviews of QB here, but, after downloading their trial I wasn't too impressed with their interface. I much prefer the new QB interface (while it's really only the "home" area that is different looking, it still makes a difference to my user experience as a visual/creative person).

And no, I am not being paid to write this review, lol. I really just am SOOOO relieved after reading all these horrid reviews that actually does work, and quite well.

I am coming from QB 2006 for Mac. Version I had before that was QB6. So it's been a while since I upgraded, and this was was worth the wait. All of those other versions worked great, no crashing, but my QB 6 or 2006 didn't do Email PDF for a while, but, when I upgraded the OS at one point years back it did end up working eventually. But basically those versions never gave me problems either.

If you are wondering I am on a first generation MacBookPro running 10.5.6 with 2 gigs of ram/memory.
(I think ALL negative reviewers should explain what systems they are using, as that will most likely be the culprit of some issues, I'll bet).

That said, I am sure their tech support stinks royally. And hopefully I will never have to call them! ;)

I have been using Quickbooks for Windows through Parallels on Mac for some time and was waiting for the updated MAC version. What a nightmare!! Four crashes, inability to send a copy to my accountant, opening previous company problems (big problem) and many other problems too numerous to mention. When I finally gave up and decided to go back to Windows and converted the file over, the MAC version completely ruined my Windows file. I spent hours correcting everything. It pulled in journal entries from 7 years ago that were already cleared, deleted all my previous reconciliations, deleted or invalidated all my memorized transactions and on and on and on. I am amazed that Intuit would release such an inferior product on the public. They will have to make major corrections before I trust them again!

I bought Quickbooks Accounting 2009 for Mac for my new macbook pro running OSX 10.5.5. I received the disc, inserted it and it was ejected after making some clunking noises. I know the laptop's cd drive works because I have successfully used music CDs and installed MS Office. Calling Tech Support was a challenge: #1 finding a tele number, #2 they want to charge $$ for the call, #3 the two different Intuit Tech Support guys gave me differing info and a promise of a phone call back did not occur.

I opted to return the product to Amazon for a replacement - amazon handled this smoothly. However...product #2 did not install either. What are the chances? I try Tech Support for a 3rd time, is it user error?

3rd call with Tech Support was odd. No user error, just have to replace product. They suggested I return the product (again) to Amazon. Order the product through Intuit instead (so 3rd try) where I would have more benefits at the same price: get a downloadable version to install successfully immediately, receive a physical copy of the product, get a free month's tech support. The catch: this wasn't the same price as what I paid on Amazon and when I pointed this out, the Tech Support guy and I went around in circles:
TS: I'm giving you a free month of Tech Support
KW: But it's not free, I'm paying more $ than what I paid thru Amazon
TS: But you didn't get Tech Support with your Amazon order
KW: True, and you offered me Tech Support for free to mitigate the bad experience I'm having
TS: That's right.
KW: But it's not free, you are charging me more $ than what I paid on Amazon
TS: But the physical copy of the product and Tech Support cost a lot more $$ than the additional money I'm charging you.
KW: please cancel everything.

On the positive side, this version is starting to really take advantage of the Mac platform, but my overall assessment is that Intuit is, at best 2 minor updates, or at worse 1 major release, away from getting this software right. At the moment there are too many bugs to recommend this product. And worse, tech support is PAID ONLY. This is unacceptable for a "beta product" that has this many bugs. Hopefully, the problems with address book sync, the template layout manager, and overall reliability will improve over time. Check back here a year from now. For now, pass over this expensive mess.

0 starts would be more appropriate.
Finally wanted to update from Quickbooks Pro 5 (Mac), and purchased the download version.
After confirmation of purchase the download page resulted in a "File not found" message, no matter how I tried to access it.
There was no option to report a problem! The only customer support was via phone for a fee of $39.-. Unwilling to pay this I cancelled my order and requested a refund - That seemed to work, but according to their website you have to do this within 45 min of purchase!!! It was hard to find. By the time I realized the problem, tried to contact customer service and found the hidden refund info, my time for requesting a refund was almost up!
I will stick with my reliable workhorse Quickbooks Pro 5 for Mac, and forego the improvements I had hoped for (Mac address book tie in. i.e.) At least this old version works.
Don't bother with the download version!

I am a long time Quickbooks user, who recently moved from PC to Mac. The Mac Quickbooks software (2009) has significant bugs. For example, try doing a Report and apply a Filter - CRASH - every time. It's such an obvious bug that I can't figure out how Intuit released this software.

I have used "Email PDF" daily in QB2007. However, this function does not work in 2009. It does nothing. I called support and they said I would have to buy tech support for them to discuss. Give me a break. I just upgraded a day ago and all I could get out of them is to either buy support from them or call Apple for "imac support". They don't know a thing about Macs and they don't seem willing to help out.