After a couple of years delay, myob are nearly ready to go live with their full cloud product. MYOB have taken a different cloud strategy to it’s competitors which you need to comprehend when comparing the different cloud options. Each product has it’s strengths and weaknesses in which I’ve summarised below.
Quickbooks Hosted, Xero and Saasu are a fully cloud based product. This means that your data file is stored securely and fully encrypted on the cloud and you can only work on the file while you have the internet connected. MYOB AccountRight Live enables you to have the data file sored both online and locally at the same time. If the internet goes down or if you want to work on the file on a plane for example, you just work on the local file and the cloud version will be updated when you next go online. Here’s the basic monthly fees including GST and major product differences for each of the cloud based bookkeeping software :
| Bookkeeping Software | MYOB Account Right Live | QuickBooks Hosted | XERO | SAASU |
| Simultaneous Users | 5 | 1 | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Basic Monthly Package (No Payroll) | $23 | $25.83 | $29 | $20 |
| Medium Monthly Package | $59.50 | $36.25 | $49 | $35 |
| Premium Monthly Package | $59.50 | $36.25 | $64 | $60 |
| Feature Differentials: | ||||
| Purchase Orders | Y | Y | N | Y |
| Detailed Job Costing | Y | Y | Y | N |
| Detailed Budgeting | Y | Y | N | Y |
| Time Billing | Y | Y | N | N |
| Inventory | Y | Y | N | Y |
| Offline-Online Synchronisation | Y | N | N | N |
| Pay Suppliers and Payroll directly from software | Y | N | N | N |
As you can see features offered by each product vary across the range. If your main criteria is ease of use and functionality then Xero may have the edge- it just lacks the power and scope for growth of some of the other providers. A major point of difference that is unique to MYOB AccountRight Live is the ability to pay third parties such as suppliers and staff directly from the software. This allows your bookkeeper to setup all of your payments without the need to be given access to your online banking. You just need to login and complete a simple one-step authorisation process to approve the payments. Of course price is just one factor to consider when deciding which bookkeeping software to go with. Each has it’s own functionality and user interface which you can sample by signing up to a free trial or just give us a call to discuss.
Hi. Will you be updating this comparison chart to reflect 2016 product functionality? Also, why is the ‘Inventory’ line item listed twice?