QuickBooks is accounting software developed and marketed by Intuit. While it’s primarily geared towards small-to-medium businesses, nonprofits have also used the platform as an alternative to investing in fund accounting software.
While this may save your nonprofit organization’s money, the time and effort gone into customizing the software specifically for your nonprofit’s needs will cost you. And not only is the software not set up for you, it’s not able to give you the reporting, paper trail, and other key items your finance office needs.
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Below are just a few ways that QuickBooks won’t be able to meet your fund accounting needs:
Why QuickBooks Won’t Meet Your Fund Accounting Needs
Weak Audit Trail
Businesses like QuickBooks because it’s easy to correct transactional mistakes, leaving no record of prior data. While this is great for for-profit companies, nonprofits need a paper/audit trail of their transactions.
When using a true fund accounting software package like Blackbaud’s Financial Edge NXT, you’ll have a complete trail of your transactions, giving you security and control over your audits.
Limited Chart of Accounts
QuickBooks allows users to create basic ledger accounts, like assets, liabilities, and equity, and pair it with a ‘Class’, which can be labeled department, location or another divisional structure.
For nonprofits, however, the basic ledger accounts and ‘Class’ labeling structure makes it difficult for nonprofits to appropriately dictate their transactions. Fund accounting software can make this process simpler, as the solution is set up specifically to track the expenses and contributions of nonprofits.
Weak Budgeting & Reporting Capabilities
Budgeting is important to the operation of any organization, which means it’s necessary to use software that can efficiently create and maintain a working budget. QuickBooks does offer budgeting capabilities, however they are not strong – and a majority of QuickBooks users turn to Excel to get even more data.
Fund accounting software offers a variety of budgeting and report features. Users can create ‘What If’ scenarios, calculate forecasted financial positions, and monitor various budgets. They can also easily create charts and graphs for easy reporting.
Download The Guide
Need to do more research before deciding on a fund accounting software? Download our guide, Knowing When to Say Goodbye to QuickBooks to help you make a more informed decision.
Switch to More Powerful Fund Accounting Software
Ready to make the switch from Quickbooks to more powerful fund accounting software like Financial Edge NXT? Contact Capital Business Solutions, 2017 – 2019 Blackbaud Channel FinTech Partner of the Year, to learn how your organization can benefit these complete financial management solutions. Call Bob Schilling at (888) 249-6008 x110 or email bschilling@capitalbusiness.net to get started.
*Capital Business Solutions has been providing accounting and fundraising solutions for nonprofit and governmental organizations for over 20 years. Our Guide is meant to provide end users with points of consideration, allowing them to choose a software platform that best fits their organization’s needs.