QBO all under one account

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#1
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My firm has a 25 or so clients for whom we create a P&L and Balance Sheet from their bank and card statements.

I wouldn't even really call it bookkeeping. Technically it is, I suppose, but my point is that it is very limited in scope.

We have been using QB desktop as we do not share access with clients because they just "mess it up" or don't want to be bothered with it.

Again - it is not a service of the traditional CPA/client relationship. It's more like an expense categorizing concierge service.

We are looking to switch to QBO for obvious technology reasons, but I'm unfamiliar with how it works for accountants and their online marketing for it is confusing because it says different things in different places.

I was wondering if we should consider doing it under EACH client name/email/account and paying for it, just in case we decide to give a client access for some reason, though this is very unlikely. If anything, we have been taking less and less of these. It looks like this is $30 per month (after a short discount period). Likely worth it.

It looks like I can pass the billing over to the client and they pay for it - or I can pay for it myself.

I guess what I'm asking is, "is this my best option for software to serve these clients? Is this how it's done?"


But do you think that I should just create one QBO account of my own with "multiple businesses" and handle them all under an email/account of my own? I'm thinking this will be a lot cheaper? Does anyone do this?
 

#2
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ItDepends wrote:But do you think that I should just create one QBO account of my own with "multiple businesses" and handle them all under an email/account of my own? I'm thinking this will be a lot cheaper? Does anyone do this?


I have a "firm" account and provide my staff access through this. I don't think it's any less expensive, but it is very convenient.
I don't like to have multiple people logging in under the same ID/PW.
I probably have 40 or so accounts I access in this manner and for about a dozen of those I perform the same service you're describing.
My preference is to have the client pay for it directly and invite me as the External Accountant. There is a small price break for the QB ProAdvisor to pay for it, but then you have to bill it out to the client, which requires fee discussions driven by Intuit's cost adjustments. I don't have any desire to have my billing conversations driven by Intuit. If QB Online is the right solution for the client, then they should pay for that directly, IMO.

If cost is a consideration, Xero is something to consider. I've not evaluated it deeply, but it's on my list to do this summer. I think it was on my list last summer too :).
~Captcook
 

#3
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Super helpful, as always TYVM!
 

#4
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Utilize QBOA and assign team members to various clients. I stopped giving clients my continuous discounts because I simply got tired of cash flow (despite them paying me in full for it), and having to adjust the fees since Intuit is always changing it. I now only have one client on QBO billing under my Firm and it is because I chose to pay for it myself.
 

#5
Wiles  
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ItDepends wrote:We are looking to switch to QBO for obvious technology reasons...

If you weren't planning on having the clients access it, what are these obvious reasons?

$750/mo is quite a jump from $500/yr (or free if you don't need the updates).
 

#6
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Good point.

Advantages are:

1) Better (easier) 3rd party payroll and bank integration
2) Easy to have admin/data entry employees working form different/multiple stations without networking and yearly installation prowess (and problems).
3) Time savings to back up - I have to oversee constant backing up of desktop files as admin staff works with them
4) Ability to work remotely - I go on 2 quite long vacations each year (not including the holiday season too).

But now that you mention it, I'm not sure if these advantages are worth $9000 per year, however.
 

#7
Wiles  
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For much less than $9,000/year you can set up a hosted QBD system, such as Right Networks. This gives you all the remote access and the backups.
 

#8
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Wiles wrote:For much less than $9,000/year you can set up a hosted QBD system, such as Right Networks. This gives you all the remote access and the backups.


I still have it for QBD and Lacerte via Kamatara and I never feel the backups are sufficient. I am super anal about them and like having multiple, versioned backups.

Loss of data in cloud is still real. QBO allows client files to back up, but not a QBOA file. That is nonsense.
 

#9
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Given the difference in the software expense, I am looking into Right Networks and/or other options.


Thanks for all the replies!
 

#10
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Does the Quickbooks Accountant desktop version still allow unlimited clients? It looks like the price is now $800 per year.
 

#11
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Have you looked at AccountEdge? If I understand you correctly, you would prefer to get away from a desktop solution, so this may also be prohibitively expensive. I last looked at AccountEdge maybe six years ago. My impression then was that bears quite a resemblance to QuickBooks.

If desktop is still something you want, their desktop solution for Windows might be quite affordable.
 

#12
Wiles  
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IDunnoItDepends wrote:Does the Quickbooks Accountant desktop version still allow unlimited clients? It looks like the price is now $800 per year.


I am not sure what the single license costs. It sounds like you may need more than one license. Last year, we purchased:
1. "Intuit QuickBooks Accountant Plus Annual Subscription" for $2,399. This has 5-user licenses.
2. "Intuit QuickBooks Payroll Annual, PAP Enterprise Software Bundle" for $1,649. This has all of these things:
* Advanced Inventory
* Advanced Reporting
* Intuit QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions Accountant Version Protection Current Version
Advanced Pricing
* Intuit QuickBooks Accountant Version Protection Current Version
Accountant Copy File Transfer
* Software Feature Updates
* Intuit QuickBooks Point of Sale Version Protection Multi-store-Current Version
* Intuit QuickBooks for Mac Version Protection Current Version
* Intuit QuickBooks Payroll Annual Enhanced Accountant-
Of which we only need the Payroll and the Enterprise version

But our business may be a little different than yours. We have several dozen clients that use QBD or QBE inside their own offices. They send us their data files when it's time to do our work. We restore it, analyze, post adjustments and then send them back our adjusting entries to import.

We always have to have the latest version because many of our clients will update to the latest.

Since we already own the QB, then we use this to also do any client bookkeeping and a handful of internal payroll processing. We are not really a bookkeeping and payroll type company, but we still do some of that. It helps keep the admin folks busy and it just makes sense for some of our clients that don't have a lot of transactions.
 

#13
KoiCPA  
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A single license of QBD Accounting is 800/year. The ProAdvisor package is the same price, but does include a couple of additional items. The licensing says one license per user, but they only enforce that if two users try to connect to the same company file at a time.

I have plenty of clients on QBO, but I would never recommend it unless it was required for third-party integrations.

As far as alternatives, I haven't made up my mind yet, but I'm seriously considering GnuCash. I need to test out a few strategies for enabling remote access or file exchange like QB's Accountant Copy capabilities.
 

#14
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Hope I amnot to late to this topic.
I have been with QBD and QBO for quite a few years but am seriously looking at Accounting Suite. I am tired of all the ads encouraging my clients to use their services for bookkeeping, accounting and tax preparation.

Mike
 

#15
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CaptCook wrote:
If cost is a consideration, Xero is something to consider. I've not evaluated it deeply, but it's on my list to do this summer. I think it was on my list last summer too :).


If you do manage to evaluate Xero, would you be willing to share an overview of your experience? QuickBooks is starting to get too big for their knickers.
 

#16
eze  
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CaptCook wrote:
ItDepends wrote:But do you think that I should just create one QBO account of my own with "multiple businesses" and handle them all under an email/account of my own? I'm thinking this will be a lot cheaper? Does anyone do this?


I have a "firm" account and provide my staff access through this. I don't think it's any less expensive, but it is very convenient.
I don't like to have multiple people logging in under the same ID/PW.
I probably have 40 or so accounts I access in this manner and for about a dozen of those I perform the same service you're describing.
My preference is to have the client pay for it directly and invite me as the External Accountant. There is a small price break for the QB ProAdvisor to pay for it, but then you have to bill it out to the client, which requires fee discussions driven by Intuit's cost adjustments. I don't have any desire to have my billing conversations driven by Intuit. If QB Online is the right solution for the client, then they should pay for that directly, IMO.

If cost is a consideration, Xero is something to consider. I've not evaluated it deeply, but it's on my list to do this summer. I think it was on my list last summer too :).


I do the same as Cook....but I use WaveApp for very small operations. It's free. It's good for a basic LLC with one property. Or a small proprietor on a limited budget.
 


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