AccountMate - Review 2022 - Harms Hentwonce

Originally a customer/server application when it was created in the mid-1980s, AccountMate partnered with IBM and its minicomputers to power the server one-half of the equation. Now you can purchase AccountMate either on-site or in the deject (though it begins at $iii,125 per user for an on-site installation). But like about of the other small to midsize enterprise (SME) general ledger and inventory management applications we tested in our review roundup, AccountMate'southward sold but through its solutions provider channel. This means you will be dealing with a partner and not with the software company. Do note that this fact volition most assuredly affect its last price for you.

The AccountMate system is completely modular. It consists of a mandatory System Manager component and a selection of other modules aimed at specific business types or processes, each of which tin can be configured to a user's requirements. With the necessary customization, this results in a more or less custom solution. Overall, information technology's a solid arrangement that will exist attractive to many users. But some shortfalls in reporting and a design that isn't equally intuitive every bit others in this category keep information technology backside Acumatica, Intacct, and Oracle NetSuite OneWorld, our Editors' Choice winners in this space.

Thin Landing and Navigation

Unlike almost of the modest to midsize enterprise (SME)-oriented apps I reviewed for this roundup, AccountMate's launch screen is rather barren. Near of the other vendors' bookkeeping systems launch with a screen total of widgets or at least a procedure flowchart for navigation. AccountMate's opening screen is rather sparse by comparison, providing more often than not empty infinite, ii ribbon confined on the pinnacle of the screen, and a vertical panel on the edge.

That doesn't hateful AccountMate doesn't take the same functionality every bit other accounting products in its class, only that they aren't as intuitive at get-go glance. For example, while many other apps put primal performance indicators (KPIs) on the launch page in the form of widgets, AccountMate provides an Executive Summary, with these accessible through the System Toolbar which is at the acme of the screen underneath the chief ribbon bar. This main ribbon provides access to Transactions, Reports, Maintenance, Housekeeping, and Utilities. Clicking 1 of these choices replaces the principal toolbar with one appropriate to the selection. Not intuitive at the get-get, but get through it once or twice and you'll remember how to use it.

The vertical console on the left-hand side of the screen contains a list of installed modules, shortcuts for both the individual using the system and those applicable to a group of users (such as Accounts Payable staff), and other documents, programs, and websites to which you desire like shooting fish in a barrel admission. Shortcuts bring you lot to specific tasks, but they have to be constructed by your system ambassador or whichever solutions provider deployed the software. There aren't any templates provided but, once you have a shortcut ready, you can copy it and modify it into another shortcut.

AccountMate doesn't utilize job or process flowcharts, but these are actually illustrated in some of the extensive instructional videos that make up the assistance system. Likewise included in the Help system is complete documentation for the apps, a Getting Started guide, and context-sensitive Help function.

I didn't see a lot of graphic options in my testing. Almost graphics are in the Maintenance sections of dissimilar modules nether the Analysis tab. But this is first past the ability to hands transfer report data into a multifariousness of output formats including Microsoft Excel, which has first-class graphing and charting capabilities or, optionally, to F9 Report Director, which also provides significant graphing and charting offerings.

One feature that will prove useful to almost every user is AccountMate's drilldown capabilities. From a financial statement or many reports, it's possible to drill down from the study all the mode to the original transaction. AccountMate allows multiple screens to be open up at the same time and these screens tin can be from different modules. To make multiple screens more readable, y'all can tile them.

And for companies that are subject field to audits, in that location's an Audit Trail Report that traces transactions back into the database. You gear up upward which fields yous desire to track and AccountMate records access and change data. This is a feature your auditor will actually appreciate, and is a strong factor for internal command and regulatory compliance requirements such as Sarbanes-Oxley.

Many of the SME bookkeeping systems I reviewed offer multi-currency options. AccountMate does as well and, additionally, the Chart of Accounts makes information technology easy to prepare multiple companies. In that location's a radio push button when you fix an account that asks if the account is for the parent company of a subsidiary (or if y'all aren't consolidating companies, a third pick). Multi-company consolidation requires the optional Consolidated Ledger module.

Dispersed But Flexible Reporting

AccountMate claims to have several hundred reports. That may be true if you are running every single module that's bachelor, just at that place are significantly fewer in simply the System Manager and Full general Ledger modules. That being said, the reports that are present are ones you'll find useful. I besides establish study setup to exist easier than many of the other vendors' offerings, with simple radio buttons to select features such equally comparative reports.

2 things should be noted when discussing AccountMate'due south reporting capabilities. The kickoff is, you tin can choose betwixt Generally Accustomed Bookkeeping Principles (GAAP) and International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS). Several of the SME accounting packages I tested offer this equally well, and it's a critical feature if y'all run a multi-national business organization since the financial report formats are different in countries other than the US.

1 report I missed was a Working Trial Residual, which is very useful during period closings. Just AccountMate has extensive export capabilities (and import capabilities also), so it'south little trouble to consign the bachelor Trial Balance data into Microsoft Excel and add a couple of columns to allow working with adjusting and closing entries. And with the administrator tools, I establish information technology wasn't hard to create a elementary ad hoc report.

The 2nd notable feature is that AccountMate provides the source code to generate all of its reports. Other source code modules may be purchased, but included in the initial purchase are the RPT and PRG files for those modules. AccountMate includes utilities that provide a fair scrap of tweaking on the reports without having to dive into the code. But, if you or your solutions provider have the programming expertise, you can build any report you lot might demand or do all-encompassing customization of the bundled reports.

Expanding Into ERP

Aside from a strong general ledger (Chiliad/L) characteristic gear up, AccountMate is besides a full-fledged enterprise resource planning (ERP) platform. As with some of the other completely modular systems reviewed here, such every bit Acumatica, AccountMate tends to be skewed somewhat towards a specific type of corporate entity. In this case, the selection of modules makes AccountMate a strong selection for manufacturing companies due to the availability of several modules, which extend inventory likewise as strong financial modules for the procurement and distribution process (i.east., Sales and Purchase Guild processing).

Another expanse in which AccountMate is strong is in analysis and reporting. On a macro calibration, the AccountMate Business concern Alerts, powered by its Info-Warning modules, let you lot set parameters for information conditions where you want staff to be notified if a designated level is exceeded. These conditions might be something like a customer has exceed their credit limit or maybe sure purchase orders take not been filled by a promised due date. Some of these functions will be constitute in this and other vendors' divide Sales Order modules, but Business Alerts lets you set these conditions on a macro level for the entire company. You can besides specify deportment that volition be automatically taken when a condition is detected, such as sending out a payment reminder when a credit limit situation occurs.

Every bit mentioned, AccountMate provides Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) in its Executive Summary department. If yous demand more detailed assay and graphic adequacy, you can purchase the AccountMate Business organisation Assay Powered by F9 or the Business Intelligence Module. F9 makes information technology easy to create circuitous belittling spreadsheets from the data contained in AccountMate's database, with a Report Wizard that walks you through the process. And the Business organization Intelligence (BI) module expands the number and types of reports for sales, customers, vendors, and other areas as well, allowing you lot to create custom dashboards that might exist missing from the base modules.

Inventory Management

AccountMate's bones inventory management capabilities can be upgraded via its modular architecture. This lets customers add additional inventory-enhancing modules with more than capabilities and features. These boosted modules include Customer Inventory Manager, which lets you manage your inventory items past using the customers' item and part numbers. And then there's Inventory Specification, which lets yous categorize your inventory co-ordinate to characteristics such as colour, size, texture, and weight equally it tracks costs and quantity past that specification. Finally, there's a kitting module that expands the Pecker of Materials (BoM) capabilities and then they let you group items and create a college-order group that's used as an particular in the BoM. Other optional and inventory-related modules include a Manufacturing module that provides an enhanced manufacturing BoM, and a Materials Resource Planning (MRP) module that's functional but not quite every bit comprehensive some of the MRP modules of other vendors, particularly Acumatica and Syspro. The exam system provided for me for review had all of the in a higher place modules.

Unfortunately, the mode that AccountMate has organized its features in these various inventory modules probably won't salvage you whatever coin. If you're running anything other than a very basic Inventory, and so you're going to need to purchase pretty much all of the in a higher place boosted inventory-related modules to upgrade to a more fully functional system. That's specially true if you lot are running a low-cal production company with manufacturing concerns. AccountMate'due south Inventory, even with the Manufacturing module, lacks comprehensive shop flooring features, although it does offering the power to rails piece of work orders, work-in-procedure, and atomic number 82 fourth dimension equally well as vendor lead time.

An interesting adequacy I noticed in the Manufacturing module is the ability to assign a stride number to a component that'due south used in manufacturing a completed item. You'll want to monitor the stock on these items closely as encountering a stock-out for an important component used in the product procedure tin can bring manufacturing to a halt.

Every bit with most other inventory systems I tested, AccountMate's Inventory has comprehensive costing methods including First-In Kickoff-Out (FIFO), Last-In Kickoff-Out (LIFO), and Average Cost. The organization supports Standard Costing, and you tin extend it with specific detail and series numbers if needed. Multiple warehouses are supported as are bins, and y'all can specify theses every bit well every bit units-of-measure out, revenue code, kit, and other item specifications in an inventory record. Bar coding is also supported.

Full inventory transfer between warehouses is supported, and you tin include freight and other costs (landed costs) in calculating the value of the transferred inventory. You can also create drop-ship warehouses to back up shipping directly from vendors to customers. A useful feature is the power to purchase the aforementioned inventory item from dissimilar vendors past using different costs and even different units-of-measure.

Overall, I was impressed with AccountMate's inventory capabilities. The numerous modules available for inventory and other ERP areas mean you tin build a well-customized organization past choosing which features to enable and deploy. As with other areas of AccountMate'due south ERP app, its inventory modules have a big number of useful reports that are both easy to generate and easy to understand. And, as with the unabridged ERP system, AccountMate does provide source lawmaking, and then your reseller should exist able to customize the organisation at a reasonable price, including creating custom reports and dashboards. The only downside I need to mention is that the exam Inventory system that I was provided lacked avant-garde forecasting and assay capabilities, which are inherent to some of the other vendors' systems, including non just Syspro but also SAP Business organisation One Professional. Yous can do some forecasting in the Manufacturing module just not to the extent available in some of the other vendors' Inventory apps.

AccountMate - Warehouse Inventory Transfer

Not Stiff In All Areas

Few of the ERP systems nosotros looked at are equally stiff beyond the board, and that's certainly true of AccountMate. There's piffling in the manner of true project management (PM), heavy-duty Materials Requirements Processing (MRP), or Supply Chain Management (SCM) features such as Just-In-Time (JIT) inventory. Inventory, even so, is potent in some areas such equally Kitting (though this requires a carve up module) and Bin Tracking.

Payroll is fairly generic simply should be acceptable for many users in the SME space. Though i notable omission is, it has limited ability to assign dissimilar pay rates to the same employee based on the job being performed, something that's necessary in many companies with union contracts. And in these companies, reporting to different unions is frequently necessary as well, which is another adequacy not built into AccountMate (though y'all can work around that limitation with some careful planning and workarounds).

More chiefly, AccountMate does not currently offer man resource (HR) or Point-of-Sale (POS) modules. It'south far from alone in this, as few of the SME ERP systems I reviewed offering extended Hour or benefit administration capabilities. However, equally Hr management software and related tech continues to gain popularity, it would be nice to be able to access such features from within a unmarried, company-broad ERP platform. If y'all need potent capabilities in these areas, you may exist better off looking at another vendor with more vertical versions of their ERP system or investigating some of the tertiary-political party partners and developers specializing in add-ons and vertical implementations that extend AccountMate's capabilities.

Generic or Vertical?

With those limitations in mind, AccountMate offers a option of modules that let you build your own ERP organisation past using just the basic components that use to your operation. It provides multi-company (with the Consolidated Ledger Module) and multicurrency accounting capabilities, and for companies that are centered on manufacturing and distribution, the Kitting, Lot Control, and Manufacturing modules are well-designed and should meet most of the requirements of small manufacturers and wholesalers.

Customer relationship management (CRM) is another cornerstone of well-nigh ERP implementations that'southward often integrated into some kind of sales module. With AccountMate, it's implemented over several discrete modules. There'due south a Customer Relationship Manager module, which provides comprehensive reports on every recorded transaction with a prospect, customer, supplier, contact, or branch function. At that place's as well a divide Contact Manager module that is tightly integrated with Microsoft Office; it lets you create sales campaigns and pull data from financial records to include in customer contact materials. A 3rd customer-related module, Upsell Direction, allows y'all to maintain a list of accessory or upsell items that yous can select to pitch in a current club or specifically target a customer where you lot think there's a chance you lot tin can involvement them in the upsell. I didn't review this particular module, but it's a adept idea and should exist valuable for any company that does straight sales.

Cost Can Chop-chop Add Up

AccountMate is completely modular which means that, in many cases, you'll have to pay extra for the features you demand because they'll exist role of an optional module. And so once again, the opposite is also truthful: if you don't need to perform multi-company consolidations, you don't demand to purchase the Consolidated Ledger Module. Budgeting is another optional module equally are modules for entities that practice distribution and manufacturing.

As mentioned earlier, you can select which version of AccountMate y'all need: either the version that runs on Microsoft SQL or the one that runs on the Express Version of SQL. The AccountMate for SQL Express is the to the lowest degree expensive choice but information technology'south limited to five users. "List price" for the full Microsoft SQL Server version starts at a one-time fee of $3,125 per user, with mandatory maintenance fees in the first yr and optional in post-obit years. That buy-in gets you the System Manager, General Ledger, Accounts Payable and Receivable, Sales Orders, Purchase Orders, Bank Reconciliation, Inventory Command, kitting, Lot Control, and several modules of source code. Of course, like other SME software, these are before the inevitable solution provider's fees yous'll accrue since you can't simply purchase this software from the manufacturer and install it yourself. This requirement tin can considerably add to your final cost depending on how much the partner has to practice during initial deployment and long-term maintenance.

With the SQL Limited version, a i-user Small Business Pack volition price $4,000, and includes the System Manager, General Ledger, Accounts Payable and Receivable, and Banking company Reconciliation.

From an ERP perspective, AccountMate'south many available modules provide a good corporeality of flexibility in the way you can configure the systems to your particular needs, assuming that information technology's not missing any capabilities specifically required in your business. Just information technology also means that the purchase price goes upward with every module y'all add together, and then the ultimate cost can exist substantially greater than the base price. That'southward not a criticism equally most of the ERP systems in this set of reviews are going to put you in the same position. But it does mean that y'all have to carefully look at your needs and friction match them to the capabilities that the base of operations system and each optional module provides. This way, you don't air current upward paying for capabilities and features yous don't need and will never use.

Plain Simply Powerful

Compared to some of the other accounting systems in this roundup, such as Acumatica or fifty-fifty QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions, AccountMate isn't very flashy. And I'm non overly impressed with the navigation, particularly right out of the box earlier a partner has a change to set up shortcuts.

But but using the app, I didn't have much trouble getting around. And I practise like the ease of filtering reports and the fact that y'all can drill downward from many spots in the organisation all of the manner to the original transaction. A full-blown organisation with most of the available modules volition run quite a flake of money, only that's true of just about all of the products in the SME market place. Overall, AccountMate performs well, offers usable features, excellent documentation and e-learning, and is a good value if you can handle the modularity and design.