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QuickBooks 2009: Is it worth the upgrade?

Susan Gunn (http://www.susangunnsolutions.com/) is the author of many good QuickBooks books. She asks, "QuickBooks 2009: Is it worth the upgrade" and says it has few features for professional practices, at http://www.chiroeco.com/chiropractic/news/7102/50/QuickBooks-2009:-Is-it-worth-the-upgrade/.

Susan's big QuickBooks 2009: Is it worth the upgrade disappointment involves QuickBooks online banking problems. I agreed with her about these problems in my many articles and news releases   http://www.typepad.com/site/blogs/6a00d8351542e553ef00d8351542e953ef/post/6a00d8351542e553ef01053627c24d970c/edit. 

On the other hand, this independent Fort Lauderdale CPA,  has been an Intuit insider for 10+ years. I recently spent 30+ minutes talking about QuickBooks online banking problems and related matters with the amazing Intuit CEO, Brad Smith, DURING the Florida - Alabama championship football game, This followed a long series of fast email exchanges and several phone calls with Brad, Terry Hicks (top QuickBooks executive), QuickBooks product managers and Intuit Officers and Directors. Some emails were so intense that Terry twice asked me to take it easy, since programmers were spending time investigating my issues instead of working on assigned fixes.

I also saw and used the upgrades for QuickBooks online banking problems that we recently got and one due December 18. They, and one more update due soon, will more than solve our QuickBooks online banking problems. This actually will make QuickBooks much better in this area. Few know Intuit made these expensive changes because only about 4% of users were using online banking. This is one of the fastest, easiest, least expensive and most accurate ways to save many times the QuickBooks upgrade cost. Intuit testing no doubt show that this percentage will greatly increase once we get used to new changes. They certainly are quickly fixing this one disappointing area http://1234567890.typepad.com/quickbooks/2008/12/quickbooks-upgrade-quickbooks-online-banking-problems.html  

Many QuickBooks 2009 changes make this the best QuickBooks in many years. I could not pre-release test QuickBooks online banking problems due to Bank of America (which has now fixed its problems). However, QuickBooks 2009 was faster, easier and more reliable than any prior version in pre-release tests. Intuit later fixed many minor problems we have had for years.

QuickBooks new features, regardless of whether you have a professional practice, the QuickBooks Accountant Copy and Client Data Review changes will make an incredible difference in providing the fastest, easiest, least expensive and most accurate accountant support. This is the only way to keep your books really accurately, more than one day a year, without wasting lots of expensive accountant time.

The new QuickBooks Live Community user-to-user forums, heavily backed by Intuit tech support, are absolutely revolutionary (though they too need minor fixing). There are thousands of QuickBooks 2009 links to specific threads in the forums, if you do not get instant answers to questions. The forums are Wiki- enabled, so users can largely write new documentation a needed. Intuit did this after finding out that users prefer answers from other users to answers from tech support. In initial TuboTax tests, users gave 40% of answers faster than Intuit tech support. They also, on average, gave clearly better answers. The first time I used these forums I quickly and almost accidentally found two answers to questions I had wanted for years. This all began with my 2002 QuickBooks Advisory Council suggestion, posted to my website in 2003 http://www.blocktax.com/Intuit_change.htm. Intuit has since won international awards for related efforts. That, and the Inside Intuit book you can largely read free at Amazon or books.google, is how I know that your feedback could make the next big change in QuickBooks.

If your company has more than one QuickBooks user, QuickBooks 2009 is much faster partly because it no longer has many network locks. Far more tasks, including backup, can now be done in multi-user mode and without Server Busy messages. You can even remotely log off users when necessary. Now that QuickBooks Enterprise can handle 30 users (up from 20) you can increasingly benefit from using the free (to ProAdvisors) Enterprise Database Manager on your Pro or Premier network. If you are just getting started you alxo can now use the free QuickBooks Simple Start with your accountant and with free Simple Start data from prior years.

I cannot summarize all the QuickBooks upgrade changes here, as it took Intuit more than 35 pages to describe them (about 5 times more than usual). It also took me about 15 articles to list the most important http://1234567890.typepad.com/quickbooks/2008/11/should-you-upgrade-to-quickbooks-2009-outgrowing-quickbooks-quickbooks-addons.html. However, I can say that we feel the "QuickBooks 2009: Is it worth the upgrade answer is a DEFINITE YES. To us the answer is so clear that, for the first time ever, we will only work on prior QuickBooks versions to upgrade to QuickBooks 2009. 

QuickBooks Errors , QuickBooks Problems: -6177,0 errors

QuickBooks Errors (QuickBooks Problems) -6177,0. Reboot the server. See if this solves your QuickBooks Errors (QuickBooks Problems) -6177,0, before doing more.  The other QuickBooks Errors (QuickBooks Problems) -6177,0 steps take around 30 minutes, depending on computer speed and number of users. After each number, try to open the file on the computer with the error.  Continue only if you still have QuickBooks Errors (QuickBooks Problems) -6177,0.

1. QuickBooks Errors (QuickBooks Problems) -6177,0 - Go to the computer with the company
    file. Troubleshoot the server configuration (10 minutes). 
    a. Close QuickBooks if running.
    b. Delete the network data file (QuickBooks recreates it automatically):
        i. Open the folder with the company file.
       ii. Delete a file with company file name and .nd extension (MyCoFile.qbw.nd).
    c. Configure the QuickBooks Database Server Manager:
        i. Click the Start button, Programs > QuickBooks > QuickBooks Database Server Manager.
       ii. Click the Scan Folders tab and the Add Folder button.
      iii. Select the QuickBooks company file folder and click OK. 
      iv. If you do not know where files are, select the entire disk. 
       v. (Optional) Click Add Folder again to add more folders and then OK.
      vi. Click the Scan button. The display shows folders scanning.
     vii. After the scan, click Close.
   d. Ensure QBDataServiceUserXX users have full access to company folders.
       XP http://support.quickbooks.intuit.com/support/Pages/KnowledgeBaseArticle/1004461
       Vista http://support.quickbooks.intuit.com/support/Pages/KnowledgeBaseArticle/1004460
2. QuickBooks Errors (QuickBooks Problems) -6177,0  - Update to the QuickBooks program on
    each workstation and the server (15 minutes per system). All systems using a company
    file must use the same QuickBooks release. To check, open QuickBooks, press F2. The 
    version and release are in the upper left of the window.
3. QuickBooks Errors (QuickBooks Problems) -6177,0 - Turn off hosting on computers not
    having the company data file (2 minutes per computer).
    a. Open QuickBooks on a computer that does not have the company file.
    b. Click the File menu and click Utilities.
       i. If Stop Hosting Multi-User Access appears, click it and Yes to confirm.
      ii. If Host Multi-User Access appears, stop. Go to the next step.
    c. Close QuickBooks.
    d. Repear this on all computers that do not store the company file.
4. QuickBooks Errors (QuickBooks Problems) -6177,0 - If you installed QuickBooks on the
    server then toggle hosting off and on. Open the company file on a local (not mapped)
    hard drive (5 minutes)
   a. Open QuickBooks on the server.
   b. Click the File menu, Utilities > Stop Hosting Multi-User Access, click Yes to confirm.
   c. Close QuickBooks and reopen it.
   d. Click the File menu, Utilities > Host Multi-User Access, click Yes to confirm.
   e. Click the File menu, click for: QuickBooks 2007 or 2008: Open or Restore company;
      QuickBooks 2006: Open company.
   f. QuickBooks 2007 or 2008 only: Open a company file, click Next.
   g. Click the Look in drop-down arrow, select a local hard drive ( C: or D:). Browse
       to a folder with a QuickBooks data file.
   h. Select the company file, open it according to your QuickBooks version:
       i. QuickBooks 2007 and 2008: Open.
      ii. QuickBooks 2006: Open file in multi-user mode, Open.
   i. (Optional) Close QuickBooks on the server.
5. QuickBooks Errors (QuickBooks Problems) -6177,0 - If this does not resolve the issue see
    http://support.quickbooks.intuit.com/support/Pages/KnowledgeBaseArticle/829e206e.html
6. For other QuickBooks Errors (QuickBooks Problems) see:
    a. H101, H202, H303, H505
        http://1234567890.typepad.com/quickbooks/2008/12/quickbooks-errors-or-problems-.html
    b. Network permission QuickBooks errors
        http://1234567890.typepad.com/quickbooks/2008/09/quickbooks-errors---network-permission.html
    c. Shrink files
        http://1234567890.typepad.com/quickbooks/2008/11/quickbooks-2009-upgrade-yes-outgrowing-quickbooks-no-shrink-files-13.html 
    d. Speed Up QuickBooks
        http://1234567890.typepad.com/quickbooks/2008/09/speed-up-quickbooks---quickbooks-performance-troubleshooting.html
    e. QuickBooks Terminal Server
        http://1234567890.typepad.com/quickbooks/2008/08/fastest-easiest.html 
     f. Various http://www.blocktax.com/quickbooks-errors.htm
7. Other QuickBooks Errors (QuickBooks Problems) - Contact Mike Block
     http://www.blocktax.com/Contact_us_for_QuickBooks_Accounting_Software.htm

QuickBooks Online Banking Problems, QuickBooks Errors, QuickBooks Upgrades

QuickBooks online banking problems let only about 4% of QuickBooks users use one of the fastest and easiest ways to save lots of time and substantially increase accuracy. That is why Intuit recently made a big effort to help many more users with these problems. Unfortunately, initial QuickBooks upgrades created many new problems and errors. That made Mike Block temporarily withdrew his strong support of current QuickBooks upgrades. He intensely pre-release tests QuickBooks upgrades, but cannot test QuickBooks online banking due to Bank of America. It rarely upgrades for QuickBooks online banking until long after QuickBooks upgrades.

Intuit and Bank of America are now delivering fixes to many QuickBooks online banking problems and errors, with new QuickBooks upgrades for the Windows version of QuickBooks 2009 Pro, Premier and Enterprise. Many Intuit people have been working long hours of overtime to rush QuickBooks upgrades for these problems and errors. Mike heard this first hand when he got a call from QuickBooks product managers Greg Wright and Angela Cheung, plus two calls from top QuickBooks executive Terry Hicks.

Mike later got a 30+ minute call from the person he refers to as the Amazing Intuit CEO (Brad Smith). This call came during the Florida - Alabama championship football game, which Brad obviously had no time to watch. A DVR made it easy for Mike to say again, "When Intuit calls, everything waits." The Brad - Mike relationship began more than five years ago. Former Intuit CEO, Steve Bennett, asked Brad to contact Mike even before Brad reported for work. By then Steve was well on his way to tripling Intuit sales and quadrupling net, in only seven years, with minimal price increases. Steve knew Mike so well he wrote, "Keep raising hell when Intuit does something wrong." Brad quickly championed Mike's plans to increase legendary Intuit responsiveness to user feedback and to shift backed up support calls to user-to-user forums, with tech support backup. This soon produced the Accountant and TurboTax Inner Circle feedback websites and eventually the new Live Community effort., for which Intuit won international awards. Along the way Brad wrote, "You're amazing Mike. Absolutely amazing!"

The new QuickBooks 2009 Release 4 fixes these QuickBooks online banking problems:

    Quick Fill. Start typing payees and accounts and QuickBooks completes them for you.

    Add New. This dropdown can add new names, accounts and classes.

    Manual Match. View and select QuickBooks register entries to match downloads
    manually. You see a register with entries not reconciled or automatically
    matched by QuickBooks.

This upgrade fixes many other errors. Click http://www.quickbooks.com/support/ (link along top navigation bar). At the same time, a Bank of America update should let users download directly. On December 18, it will be an auto-update (enable automatic updates). By then Release 5 will let you easily download, review, edit and save Multiple Bank Transactions in a batch. Some QuickBooks users also want multiple windows open at once, but that will come later.

This www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCkvOEErbj8 video shows the QuickBooks online banking problem updates. It is typical Intuit, in that it does not feature a pretty actress reading lines, but pretty Product Manager Cheung, talking about what she obviously passionately believes.

 

Email OnlineBanking_QB2009@intuit.comwith your thoughts or for online banking notices. Click on http://www.blocktax.com/Contact_us_for_QuickBooks_Accounting_Software.htm for an independent QuickBooks CPA, who knows much of what is coming next from Intuit, no matter where you have your business. Mike often helps clients do much more with QuickBooks and QuickBooks Add-ons. He also usually has long experience with new QuickBooks features before most accountants hear about them.