Quicken Personal Finance Software 2007 Reviewer’s Guide
Welcome to Quicken Personal Finance Software 2007.
The perfect complement to online banking.
With more than 120 improvements to the features customers use most, Quicken 2007 provides the comprehensive tools you need to see your complete financial picture in minutes.
Redesigned Home Page
Quicken 2007 has been updated to give the product a new, dynamic look and make it easier for users to answer key financial questions right from the home page. Through a series of new visual cues, access to data is faster, important information is clearly visible and clutter on the home page has been greatly reduced.
Users will no longer have to leave the home page to answer basic questions like, “How much money will I have left this month after paying bills?” or “What bills are coming due this month?”
Not only will new users benefit from these changes, upgraders will appreciate the fact that they don’t have to relearn any of the functionality they have become accustomed to over the years.
Get Instant Answers to Key Financial Questions.
Find Out Where Your Money Is Going
The new home page not only reduces clutter, Quicken 2007 makes it even easier to manage your money and forecast your account balances at a glance. Through a series of new integrated earning and spending modules, you can easily see what’s coming in, what’s going out, and what’s left every month to spend or save.
Though bank sites are good at showcasing transactional data, account balances and showing if a check has cleared, the ability to answer these key financial questions in one place enables Quicken to offer users unique and valuable information that their bank Web site just doesn’t provide. You can easily make year-over-year spending comparisons because unlike bank sites, there is no limit to how long your data is available.
Projected Cash Flow – This new module on the home page provides a clear representation of your account activity so you aren’t left guessing where you stand financially or caught off guard by having insufficient funds to pay a bill.
On the other hand, you could also see that you have excess cash this month, view the reason that occurred, make sure that all your bills are paid, view your credit card balance and pay the excess cash to your high-interest card all from the Quicken home page!
Scheduled Bills and Income – Get organized and pay your bills on time with Quicken 2007’s increased bill pay functionality. Get immediate answers regarding what you need to pay and what has already been paid from all of your accounts.
Improved Calendar – While the new home page offers you a monthly view of your financial status, the improved Calendar provides a daily view that helps you ensure your bills get paid.
With the improved, integrated Calendar, you can see your paychecks, bills, and expenses by day and month which makes it even easier to schedule bills, get reminders, and avoid late fees.
The Calendar has been improved to offer:
· Daily balances of your available cash.
· Ability to pay bills from the calendar (available to Quicken BillPay customers).
· Direct access to the calendar from the home page.
New Scanner Integration Makes it Easier to Attach and Store
Electronic Images and Statements
Why have a separate financial paper filing system and a Quicken data file? Now you don’t need both, and finding critical checks and documents is easy because they can be attached right in the appropriate transaction or account inside Quicken.
Keeping track of these important documents, like check images, is crucial for tax purposes. The IRS suggests that you keep copies of checks (front and back) for three years for taxes and seven years for small businesses. Banks only make check images available for an average of 60 days, then charge the consumer a fee to retrieve a series of checks if they need them!
Introduced in Quicken 2006, image attachment enabled users to store electronic statements, checks, receipts, bills, warranty information and other important financial documents for as long as needed. Having this information stored logically with the transaction or account makes it easy to locate this record when preparing for taxes or in case of a dispute.
Quicken 2007 includes several enhancements to attaching electronic images and statements including:
· The ability to attach images directly from a scanner into Quicken.
· The ability to attach multiple images to a single transaction.
· The ability to attach multiple pages of a statement, bill or warranty.
· The ability to create additional transaction attachment categories to group documents.
· The ability to cut and paste images.
Easier Setup Means You’re up and Running in Minutes
In 2000, a book was published called “Organize Your Finances in a Weekend with Quicken.” In 2003, Guided Setup was introduced that shortened the setup process to 26 steps, but asked the user to fill out information regarding every single thing they wanted to do now and in the future with Quicken.
Improvements to the setup process in Quicken 2007 means that you enter just some critical information about your income, bills and accounts and in under five minutes, you are up and running in Quicken (an 864% improvement compared to that book!).
You can instantly see where your money is going, get a sense of what income and bills you have coming in and going out that month, and begin to get a handle on your finances – and you have the rest of your weekend to spend with your friends and family.
Specifically, the setup process for configuring an online account in Quicken has been improved in several ways:
Getting Started: The setup experience went from 26 confusing steps in Quicken 2006, to a streamlined 10-step, five minute process that gets users up and running as quickly as accessing an online bank site. Quicken will automatically find, set up and download all accounts held at an institution, such as checking, savings, credit card and line of credit, in one step.
Improved Help: The Help section has more options to make sure you get your important questions answered quickly and correctly.
Express Web Connect Improves One-Step Update to Enable Access to Your Complete Financial Picture in One Click
Though better than manually entering data, the customer experience of going to each financial institution Web site to download information into Quicken was difficult and time consuming. To solve this customer issue, Quicken 2007 offers Express Web Connect, an improvement that completely automates the process of updating Quicken, reduces the user effort down to a single click and enables users to make better use of their time spent with Quicken.
From within Quicken, users will now be able to enter a single PIN and password. Quicken will do the rest of the work by going to each financial institution and downloading the latest transactions and account balances. Another improvement is that during the download, you can work on other things in Quicken instead of waiting for the download to finish.
Last year, sixteen percent of the 2,700 financial institutions linked to Quicken in this way. With Quicken 2007, ninety-nine percent of the more than 4,400 financial institutions that connect to Quicken can be updated using this One-Step Update feature! That’s a 1000% improvement!
Pin Vault Password Management- Managing your financial institution passwords has also been greatly improved by giving you more control. You can change your PIN vault password directly from the Manage My Passwords screen and clearly see if the PIN number for each account has been stored.
More Than 120 Customer-Recommended Improvements
In addition to the redesigned interface, image attachment, improved setup and download, Quicken 2007 includes dozens of additional improvements to help people manage their finances.
Improved reporting – Customers told us that they wanted clearer, visual insight into their financial situation. We listened and made improvements to the features they use most, including improved reporting, printing, auto-categorization, instant insights and more.
Mini Reports- New Mini Reports are integrated into the home page to present more detailed data without having to click away to a new page. Click or fly over data on the home page to see a monthly account total and a monthly account average to help you determine when you are deviating from your normal spending patterns. These Mini Reports have been color-coded to correspond with the transaction type i.e. inflows – green, outflows - yellow.
Account Balance Graph - This new graphic report, located by clicking any Cash Flow account and selecting “Overview,” gives you a quick, visual overview of where you stand financially throughout the month. You are provided with a monthly average which allows you to determine when you deviate from your normal spending behavior and get back on budget - without the time-consuming task of creating a budget.
Additionally, a Monthly Expenses diagram lets you see where you spend your money at-a-glance. Are you spending too much, or more than your normal monthly average, eating out or on clothing? With Quicken 2007, you will know right away and can adjust your budget accordingly.
Improved Auto-Categorization/Auto Payee - In the past, users were required to manually specify the category for each transaction entry in their register. Now, transactions downloaded into Quicken will be more accurately categorized as the appropriate expense. Furthermore, the more accurate categorization will improve reporting such as on the “Spending Graph” tab.
Improved Integrated Online Backup – Quicken Backup (both online and via CD) has been redesigned to be integrated into the software. A simpler interface provides less opportunity for user error and functionality has been improved. Users on Windows XP can now backup to CD without additional software.
Users who sign up for integrated online backup ($9.99/year) will also receive a client application which enables:
· Backup of non-Quicken files to storage space
· Scheduled or automated backup
Quicken Leadership in Personal Finance
· More people have bought Quicken than any other personal finance software combined (NPD Group/NPD Techworld, July 2006)
· Quicken is the #2 selling software all-time behind TurboTax (NPD Group/NPD Techworld, July 2006)
· More than 15 million people currently use Quicken software (Intuit Brand Tracking survey, 2006)
· Quicken has 72.3% of retail unit sales and 73.1% of retail dollar sales of personal finance software (NPD Group/NPD Techworld, May 2006)
New or Improved Features in Quicken 2007
Name / Basic / Deluxe / Premier / Home & BusinessManage Cash Flow & Control Spending
NEW! In/Out/What’s Left & Instant Insights / X / X / X / X
Improved! Scheduled Bills and Income / X / X / X / X
Improved! Calendar / X / X / X / X
See Where Money is Going
NEW! Cash Flow Details / X / X / X / X
Improved! Mini-Reports / X / X / X / X
Improved! Auto Categorization/Auto Payee / X / X / X / X
Simplified Download Experience
Improved! Getting Started/Setup of Accounts/Express Web Connect / X / X / X / X
Improved! Ongoing Experience – One Step Update & Download In Background / X / X / X / X
Improved! Online Account Management and Error Messages / X / X / X / X
Improved! Security – Multi Factor Authentication Support / X / X / X / X
Improved! Support 4400+ Financial Institutions / X / X / X / X
Improved! Interface
NEW! Look & Feel / Better Organization / X / X / X / X
Improved! Image Attachment
NEW! Scanner Integration / X / X / X
Improved! Store More Images/More Categories / X / X / X
NEW! Investments Image Attachment / X / X / X
Other Notable Product Improvements
Improved! Backup – Online & CD / X / X / X / X
Improved! Printing Improvements / X / X / X / X
NEW! Migration Wizard/Discoverability / X / X / X / X
NEW! Quicken Home Inventory Manager– Support and Special Pricing! / X / X / X
Online features require Internet access and are subject to change. Services vary among participating financial institutions or other parties and may be subject to application approval, additional terms, conditions and fees.
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