Alternatives to Quicken for Mac

Our thanks to Dave Schlicher for presenting his views on alternatives to Quicken at our last User Group Meeting. The following is my summary of his talk – don’t hesitate to ping me if there are any errors or misunderstandings contained in the following.

Tried Three Products in Parallel

Caveat: Not an accountant – and not a tax expert. Also – does not own stock in any of the companies.

Why not Quicken ?

Quicken 2007 no longer will work under Lion – so the only alternative is Quicken Essentials – which will. BUT

Though it is easy to make the transition, it is not a good solution.

  • Intuit has not treated mac users very well
  • Quicken 1998 and 2002 have both been killed off before
  • The Quicken product on the Mac was always a poor second to windows machine
  • Quicken recommends changing format of data downloads – this ‘cannot’ be a good idea
  • What is the future for Quicken ? Unknown
  • All of this with the CEO sitting on the board of Apple
  • Investment tracking limited
  • Bill paying never imported
  • Data import only under Snow Leopard
  • If you put data into the product – will you be able to get it out ?
  • It is the ‘Roach hotel of data’. YOu can get data in – but to get it out VERY gnarly
  • CSV data files can be used – but complicated
  • Perl being used to clean up data – too hard
  • Proprietary format – but it is your finances we are talking about.
  • For as little it does and need for flexibility in moving data around – not recommended.

iBank and Moneywell

  •  are both well regarded programs
  • both handle budgeting
  • both offer iPhone apps
  • both free input and export

Trial in money dance – written in Java – so started away

iBank – igg software – 4.2.5 is latest version

  • Comprehensive number of account types
  • Auto downloads
  • Multiple currencies

Moneywell – 1.6.8

  • Overall more limited
  • V2 under dev for a year – and still not ready
  • In Moneywell, budgeting idea is integral to design

Importing data – both worked well though Moneywell a little bit better it handled reconciliation

  • IBank can’t change account type on the fly – Moneywell can

Transaction entry

  • Quicken good at entering data
  • Both iBank and Moneywell have failings

Reconciling

  • IBank not as easy

Budgeting

  • Money well makes it as easy as it possibly can be
  • But maybe so tied into budgeting that if you don’t use it, could be problematic

Support

  • Excellent for both
  • How To videos and documents are good

Conclusion

  • Both are a real change
  • Neither an exact fit – but both will work
  • Entered the trial with a bias for Moneywell
  • But with usage gravitated to iBank
  • Moneywell v 2 will be Lion only – WHEN it is available

Another review to compare the two

Moneywell Web Site

iBank Web Site