Scheduling & database software for your tax office.

[Jack from Ohio]

I am having to replace our server, which means new up to date server software. I am finding that the scheduling program that we have used for years will not work with the new 64 bit technology. Same applies to the database program that we keep all our customer history and information in.

What do you use in your office?

We have 2,900+ clients for 2010 and our current database has about 13,000+ entries in it.

Any suggestions about software would be helpful. Must be 64 bit compatible.

[Gail in Virginia]

http://www.phoneslips.com/home.aspx

We use Phone Slips for scheduling, as well as addresses and telephone messages. I know the latest version is 64 bit compatible, but I am not sure what the limit is on entries. It is limited in number of users as well (at least the version we use is.) It might be possible to buy additional licenses. The program itself is extremely easy to use, with almost no learning curve. And the price is reasonable, IMHO.

[Lila Godel]

I am having to replace our server, which means new up to date server software. I am finding that the scheduling program that we have used for years will not work with the new 64 bit technology. Same applies to the database program that we keep all our customer history and information in.

What do you use in your office?

We have 2,900+ clients for 2010 and our current database has about 13,000+ entries in it.

Any suggestions about software would be helpful. Must be 64 bit compatible.

We use Practice Management 2011 by Office Tools Pro. They are on the web at http://www.officetoolspro.com and http://www.facebook.com/officetoolspro. The software has data entry tabs for Contacts, Notes, To-Do's, Calls, Schedule, Projects, Time, Billing and Documents. The software installation consists of installing server software on a machine that will act as the server (ours is a computer running SBS 2011 Essentials which is only available in a 64 bit versioon) and workstation software. The server software is a SQL 2005 Express installation that hosts a SQL database for your data and sample data base for getting to know the sofware/ The workstation software is a .Net client that runs on 32 or 64 Bit XP, Vista and Windows 7.

They also have utilities for syncronising data with Outlook, QuickBooks and Lacert (we only use the Outlook one) as well as an Excel importer and a special DropFolder.net portal. With the portal which we do not use as we have a portal as part of our CPA Site Solutions web site at www.godelcpa.com (we also have www.godel.com which is not hosted by CPA Site Solutions) you can store documents in Practive Management document records in the cloud for clients to access and they can send you documents which will be stored in the client folders setup with document records in Practice Management.

There are two levels of subscription for the portal a Lite level that provides only file transfers and a regular level that provides all of the features including branding on the portal web pages. Both levels are priced based on the number of gigabytes available for storage in the package you select with a per gigabyte per month fee for overages.

If you get an Office Tools Pro merchant account (we have an Intuit one) you can send invoices to the DropFolder.net portal if you don't have the lite subscription level which allows clients to pay on-line and the payments sync back to Practive Mangement.

[tim g]

Currently, we use Office Tools. We are dropping them this year. I just received my renewal for the coming year. My renewal is 71% higher than the amount I paid to renew last year. Right now I am looking at Appointments Plus for a scheduling program. I am 99% certain that I am going to use this one. I am also looking at Time & Chaos and Timeslips.

[Maribeth]

We use Time & Chaos and absolutely love it. Setting it up on the network is easy, it does everything we need it to do. I hate that we spent so many years trying to make Outlook work for us. Highly recommend Time & Chaos.

Maribeth

[PapaJoe]

Add my vote for Time & Chaos. I have used it for years and love it.