blair@pt1.Wichita.NCR.COM (Brian R. Lair) (09/11/87)
Has anyone purchased and used the Peachtree "Complete Business Accounting
System" which has been advertised as a $4800 package now selling for $199
(+$12.50 shipping)? Is it truly complete? Do they support it (e.g.
regular tax info updates)? How's the documentation?
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Brian R. Lair
NCR Corporation, E&M Wichita, Product Technology Development
<brian.lair@Wichita.NCR.COM> {ncrcae|ncrlnk|ncr-sd}!ncrwic!brian.lairagollum@ukecc.UUCP (09/12/87)
<115@pt1.Wichita.NCR.COM> blair@pt1.Wichita.NCR.COM (Brian R. Lair) writes: >Has anyone purchased and used the Peachtree "Complete Business Accounting >System" which has been advertised as a $4800 package now selling for $199 >(+$12.50 shipping)? Is it truly complete? Do they support it (e.g. >regular tax info updates)? How's the documentation? In an effort to save others the heartache I've gotten from this program, I'm posting rather than responding directly. This program, to coin a phrase, sucks dead bunnies through a straw. We've installed the whole program but only use the payroll program. We *used* to use the accounts receivables, accounts payables, and general ledger as well, but thay stank so bad we gave up and got CYMA's package instead. HOW does it stink, you may ask? Let's start with the documentation. The chapters and appendices were evidently re-chaptered and re- appendiced (ie, some chapters reduced to sections, some sections of appendices made into full appendices), and, while the table of contents is correct, NOBODY RE-EDITED THE MANUAL! You get references to chapters which no longer exist! Actual page references, too! The random-access data files are fixed, preset length. Yes, you have to estimate how many employees you'll enter through the year, how many AR transactions you'll have in a month, etc. The file sizes can be changed, but it's a pain to see "FILE ARTRN006.DBT IS FULL" and get dropped back to the main menu. The worst part: You don't tell it how many transactions you'll have, you tell it how many bytes to make the file. How many bytes are there in a transaction? Well, there's a formula in the manual, but it's not under "Setting up Accounts Receivable", it's in chapter five, under "Understanding the Enter Invoices Program." The section goes like this: AR must know how large to make your transaction file. Estimate the highest number of transactions (sales, returns, credits, and payments) you will process in any one accounting period. Make your estimate a little high so you won't run out of room in the file. Multiply that number by 90 to calculate your answer. This number must be less than or equal to 4,000,000. And this is an *easy* one. You should see the descriptions for the variable-length field files. In many many places the program prompts you through various data items, then asks "Accept Y/n". These points are points of no return. For instance, if you enter a transcation with an error in it, then accept it, you're stuck with it for the rest of the period. The only way to cancel it is to enter a reversing entry (same invoice number, opposite amount) and then reenter the correct entry. 'Course, the entry is still there, and both it and the correction will appear on all reports and invoices until you complete the period. Just today, the I had to change an employee's department code between entering payroll data and calculating the pay. It dutifully accepted the payroll information, dutifully accepted the department change, then quietly deleted the payroll information. I have right beside the keyboard a report showing the employee in his new department, making $0.00. Cute. Let me also mention the payroll report which must, and can, only be run *once*. Ask to print it again, and you'll get "No eligible Employees" or some such. How about the "pay amount" field which needs $ per hour for hourly employees, $ per year for everyone else? Does the manual mention this? Nooo. How about the module for entering hours from timecards, which goes ahead and figures the pay (based on $/hr and overtime $/hr) as well. If you then change the pay rate before running "Calculate Pay" you'll get the pay based on the old pay rate! You'll actually get something like HOURS 40.00 RATE 4.5000 PAY 170.00 (Old pay rate was 4.25) on the check. The general ledger and AR modules, at least, can *NOT* keep totals straight. I used to run the "Recover Data Files" option every week to account totals (it always found about 4-5 that were off). The general ledger kept insisting, for the last two months, that our general ledger totaled around $11 billion (only about 4 or 5 orders of magnitude off). The column of figures it professed to add had no numbers in this range. And bells? You like hearing #@$#$@ bells? You'll get'em. Just because the programmer feels like it, near as I can tell. Bells, "Hit return to continue", "Accept Y/n" till you're ready to put your fist through the screen. The error messages, on the other hand, are *always* fatal, which means you go back to the main menu immediately, like, before you get a chance to read the error message. No kidding, no "Hit return to continue" or anything. Gads, this has gotten long. But I hope I've made my point. IF YOU GET THIS PACKAGE YOU WILL REGRET IT FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE!!! And then some. Anyone who wishes (like to convince your boss not to get this thing because you'll have to run it) can write me for even more horror stories concerning this abomination. Kenneth Herron