Express Accounts Plus

4.0 stars

"The absolute best of the free programs I auditioned!"

February 12, 2012  |   By gingerbear7

Version: Express Accounts Plus 4.42

Pros

1. You can design your own chart of accounts (the framework of an accounting system, from which financial statements flow) and, unlike some of the other free programs, use account numbers (a key versatility factor).
2. It employs the "item" concept for billing purposes: this feature allows you to track sales by type; unfortunately, there is no interface with inventories to directly correlate the cost of these sales. If "items" were an option, when distributing the costs of a product-supplier's invoice, this deficiency could be remedied.
3. Unlike some programs that force you into a plus/minus mental mode, this one deals with debits & credits, which is more logical--even for those who think they don't know a Dr from a CR.
4. Minor point: some of these free programs employ foreign date formats, which can cause confusion: e.g., when you see 10-02-12, you think October 2nd, 2012. Wrong! It's February 10th in some of these countries. Using a default option, you can use American dates.

Cons

1. Many businesses like to partition their receivables and payables into categories; with this system you can only use one account for each. Also, there is no provision for account numbers: it is Alpha-driven, which is cumbersome and limits flexibility.
2. There is no direct interface between the receivable and payable modules and the general ledger: you have to continually check that they are in balance; also, you can't apply a check directly to a customer's account, nor a receipt to a vendor's account.
3. When you enter a bill from a vendor, there's no place to log the invoice number.
4. When you pay a vendor, you can't pick & choose which invoices you want to pay; the system is due-date driven and it won't allow you to deviate from it.
5. A minor point: entering transactions is a slow process: you have to use their dropdowns wherever they are provided; you can't hit ENTER on your keyboard to move to the next box, meaning you are continually using your mouse to navigate.

Summary

I retired from the CPA profession a few years ago and was curious about the state of affairs with reasonably-priced accounting software for small businesses, so I sampled a number of the free downloads made available by the kind folks at CNET; and I must confess that the only reason I'm boring you with my opinions is a sense of obligation to CNET for the wonderful services they provide--and I take advantage of.
Deliberately excluded from my auditions were the quintessentials of the genre, QuickBooks and Peachtree; also, I wasn't interested in Payroll, so whether or not a program provided it was of no concern to me (I ran out space in my CONS section so I wasn't able to mention the fact that Express Accounts has no payroll module).
I downloaded several (those that immediately come to mind are: Bookkeper, Express Accounting, Free Accounting, Easy As, Icebergo)
and put them through their paces; and, for one reason or another, deleted them. The only one that warranted a review was this one, Express Accounts.
The two reviews preceding mine mentioned the fact that it is not really free: that it's a limited trial-program. When I downloaded it, NCH stated that it was, in fact, free with no expiration date, but that it didn't have all the features of the purchased product. I really don't know what will happen with mine; I've had it about three weeks now and have not been bugged to buy it, nor warned that it will evaporate from my computer.
A quick little aside, I mentioned that there is no Payroll module: NCH may have one, I didn't bother to check. Because I like inventories, I did download their Inventoria Stock Manager program, but (unlike QuickBooks and Peachtree) it appears to work independently from the accounting one, i.e., no interface: meaning duplication of effort and opportunities for errors and omissions.
All in all, Express Accounts is a nice little program. Would I buy it (I believe it costs about $80), probably not, because for about another $100 or so, you can get Peachtree (a bargain compared to its just marginally-better competitor, QuickBooks). Would I recommend it? If it is really and truly free, YES! Obviously, you have nothing to lose but time, and I really and truly don't believe I wasted mine playing around with it. In fact, I plan to keep it for a month or so longer, to see if it disintegrates, and, if it doesn't, use it for my personal finances.

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