Chris Kofer
QuickBooks Pro, the enhanced version of Intuit's small-business accounting program, integrates time-tracking, estimating, and job-costing features that are not normally found in inexpensive packages. The program is available in versions for Windows 3.1 and the Mac ($189 each); BYTE looked at a prerelease version of QuickBooks Pro for the Mac.
One intriguing feature is QuickBooks Pro's ability to maintain running time sheets for each employee, tallying the number of hours spent on a particular client's projects. Formerly, you had to track this information using a specialized application or spreadsheet or, worse, scrap paper. But with just a few mouse-clicks in QuickBooks Pro, you can transfer billable hours to invoices for individual jobs or clients.
You can also create reports that evaluate the profitability of an employee, client, or specific project. The time sheets are simple to maintain and could be an invaluable tool for businesses that juggle several projects at once. In addition, time-sheet information readily flows to the payroll module for computing pay for wage-based employees.
QuickBooks Pro also lets you produce estimates, a small-business chore that's typically performed on a spreadsheet. You can easily convert estimates to invoices and modify the invoices without changing the original estimates. The program also lets you generate reports that compare estimates with actual sales.
Like Quicken, QuickBooks Pro is designed for people who have minimal accounting skills but need to rapidly and economically manage their business finances. The program is powerful and multifaceted, but it's accessible to the novice. With QuickBooks Pro, you can focus your business on the talents that generate income rather than getting bogged down in ma
naging a paper trail of invoices, estimates, and cost-accounting.
Contact: Intuit; Menlo Park, CA; (800) 624-8742, (415) 322-0573.
Juggle Projects, not the Books
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Juggle Many Projects with QuickBooks Pro
