Customer Reviews

Summitsoft Mac Freelance

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I really do not do much freelance work, but with the little I do... I had trouble with people understanding basic spreadsheets. I did not want to spend the money for quickbooks, as my freelance work is sporatic and far in between. I saw this software for $40 at OfficeMax and decided to give it a shot.

The Good:

1. Quick and easy to set up
2. Quick and Easy to enter billable items
3. Quick and easy to enter payments
4. Easy to get detailed invoices.
5. Quick and easy to check off which items you are considering your expenses
6. You can select a status per line item (open, billed, paid, voided, closed, etc)
7. Has a timer (stop watch), that you can track per project; for when working on hourly items. Nice to keep track instead of writing down when you started and when you ended. You have to remember to start the timer, but having worked for a company that used a similar timer system (and that was how we got paid) - I am used to doing that.
7. You can email your client an invoice (creates a PDF attachment), and allows you to add a subject and body to the email.

The bad:

1. Crashed on me once. I suggest save often; and backup your database to an external drive.
2. The reports are pretty basic and could be more detailed. Even the custom reports do not let you chose the fields to display.
3. The Reference Manual is pretty basic. Could have more info to help you out on some of the features.
4. No way to produce graphs
5. Don't see a way to export data to bring into a spreadsheet or database (so I can make my own graphs, or reports)
5. while you pick the email System (Apple, Entourage/Outlook) - it uses its own type of engine and does not put a copy in your sent folder. You have to enable to CC yourself - so you can be sure the email was sent. One workaround would be to save the invoice as a PDF and then use your own email system and attach the PDF to your email.

Summary:

This is a basic billing system. Do not think you can run a full company on it. There is nothing for assets, payroll, reports for tracking trends etc. Get quickbooks for that. However, if you do any type of freelancing or side work and you need to keep track of the work you did, produce a clean detailed invoice, and track your payments - per client; with the ability to see all at once.... I think this is worth the $40. You may be able to pick it up cheaper here (Amazon). Also makes my life easier since I did no not have an accounts receivable background - and the last time I even looked at accounts receivable was my high school/college accounting courses.

As a Mac user for many years.. this program is wonderful. It allows customization, tracking and abilities to alter any fees needed.
It integrates well to send the invoice directly to customer and sends one to your file as well. The clean look of the invoices and quotes are very professional..
If you are looking for an accounting software that is simple without all the fluff for a Mac.. this is it!

I'm a freelance writer and editor, and when I got this software, I was looking for a way to invoice my clients a little more easily and professionally than with the Excel spreadsheets I'd jury-rigged. And MacFreelance does indeed make my invoices look incrementally better and is just slightly easier to use than those spreadsheets, which I guess for the $30-ish price tag at the time is something.

I couldn't recommend this software to anyone in good faith, though. There are just too many bizarre little things that don't work. For example, when you're adding a client to be invoiced, if you try to paste their information into the "new client" box, that frequently locks up the software, so that you have to force-quit and reopen it. That's just unacceptably sloppy, especially for Mac software sold at Apple Stores (which is where I bought mine). It's not that manually typing in addresses is such a gross inconvenience -- it's just that having to do so is a good sign that the makers didn't put any care into the most basic details.

And should you purchase MacFreelance, you'll find numerous similar peccadilloes, which are annoying individually and add up to a piece of software you'll only want to use for the most simple tasks, because a genuinely functional accounting program costs more than you're willing to pay. I see that used copies are available pretty cheap, so if you need a minimally adequate, sometimes irritating way to track your freelance billing, I'd get one of those rather than reward Summitsoft for releasing such a shoddy product.