Quicken Essentials for Mac Personal Finance Software

(as of 28/08/2010 03:37 - more info)

$50 $38

Listed Under: Macintosh

Quicken Essentials for Mac makes understanding your money a snapUpdated interface designed by--and for--Mac usersView your accounts all in one placeShows your current balance, including upcoming bills..read more

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Easy guided set up gets you up and running in minutes.

5 Reviews

  1. Busy Mom of 3 says:
    August 28, 2010 at 12:00 am

    This was a total waste of money! It took a lot to convince this former bookkeeper to switch to Quicken some years ago, but with so little else available for the Mac, it seemed the choice to make. But upgrading was a complete disappointment. I don’t care that it doesn’t track investments, there are ways to handle that elsewhere. I do care that it will not talk to my bank (a feature that it proudly claims is it’s finest) and when there are multiple discrepancies because the download failed, it doesn’t even do a decent reconciliation screen (claiming it’s unnecessary because it supposedly does this during download)! I’m switching to iBank and spending money I don’t have to do it!

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  2. L. Waddell says:
    August 27, 2010 at 12:00 am

    I am using Quicken a little differently. I am treasurer for two organizations and needed something that would give me a running report of the transactions and current total. I do not use it to connect to the bank. I used Quicken on my husband’s PC, but recently bought a Mac and wanted to have it on my computer. After a frustrating evening, I have it set up. I’m sure it was frustrating since I am using it a little differently. Now, it is doing what I need it to do, so I am happy.

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  3. HC says:
    August 26, 2010 at 12:00 am

    I think that I am a reasonably intelligent person and can figure out most of my computer problems. They do not give proper instructions for converting Quicken for PC files to Mac or offer actual customer service for the product to figure this out, so I cannot use it.

    The instructions for file conversion tell me what to do with a CD, but I do not have a CD because I downloaded it. Customer service is difficult to find, perhaps because it does not actually exist. For service, they direct you to a site where other Quicken users are supposed to help you, which is not what I call cusomer service but rather avoiding service to customers. I finally found a “customer service phone number, and that makes you press a lot of buttons to find out that no one will talk to you and you have to go to a website to ask that someone call you. I go to that website and asked for customer support. I got an immediate email telling me that a representative was supposed to call within one hour. I waited at home for four hours and no one called. He called sometime after four hours when I was not home and I could not even understand his mumbling on the answering machine. Maybe he was mumbling because he was ashamed to be calling more than four hours later to answer a simple question that was supposed to be answered within one hour. Two days went by an no one from Intuit tried to resolve my problem. I chose to no longer play the “hide and seek” game that they call “customer service” and decided to declare the product a failure. My order said “Your satisfaction is always guaranteed with Quicken. If you’re not satisfied, return the product within 60 days with dated receipt for a full refund of the purchase price.” I was not in the least bit satisfied, so I got a refund of my $50. I will use it to buy software that is supported by the people who make it.

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  4. Waiki Oakley says:
    August 26, 2010 at 12:00 am

    Despite the complaints about all the features this produce doesn’t have, I thought it would still satisfy my simpler needs. I bought it and set it up. I didn’t like where it stored my data so I looked at how to tell it to store it somewhere else. The preferences menu item was no help, I have never seen a program that has so few preferences that can be set by the user (about three things can be set). There is no Save or Save As menu item, there is no way to say where you want it to save the file. I tried moving the file to where I wanted it, and then double clicking it to bring up the software. After that the software would use that location. Weird, I thought, but acceptable.

    After six hours of setting up all of my many categories, inputting a months worth of credit card and debit card transactions (I didn’t like the way it did this automatically so I did it by hand), and reconciling them I went to take a look at the monthly report. It ends up that it doesn’t tell you how much money you have in each category. If gives you the sum of all the deposits into the category, which you have to write down, then you have to scroll down to the ‘expenses’ where it gives you the sum of all of the withdrawals from that category, which you write down, then you get out your calculator and for each category compute the net amount in that category. I couldn’t believe it! I went to the Help menu and clicked on Quicken Help, it sent me to a web page warning that the page doesn’t exist. I went to the help forum and found that others were incredibly irate about the same problem. The only work around (to go through the ‘cloud reporting’ option) doesn’t list more than half of the categories I use.

    I decided to return this product and get the PC version. I contacted Quicken and asked if the files I had created could be read by the PC version, they said there was no way they could be read. I couldn’t believe this, I went back to the menus to look for an Export command, nope. Then I was faced once again with the fact that there is no Save or Save As command to try to put it into another format (e.g. tab delineated text). Maybe I have lived a charmed life, but this is the worse piece of software I have ever purchased.

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  5. Atl Chris says:
    August 24, 2010 at 12:00 am

    I wrote to Quicken to express my disappointment/frustration over the many many abandoned functions in this release. It does not deserve to be called an upgrade.

    Here is what they said in response to my complaint:

    “I would like to inform you that, Quicken Essential for Mac is designed for the customers who want to experience the new features…”

    And I say, WHAT new features?!

    “You may not find few basic features in this version such as printing checks, paying bills etc. We have designed this program keeping the new users in mind.”

    Seriously? Do you expect to sound credible when features that have been in many previous versions of Quicken for Mac, like printing checks and paying bills, are now GONE? I was a new user awhile back, and it wasn’t too hard for me. I seriously doubt you’re “keeping the new users in mind.” Give me a break.

    “We will enhance the features of this program as per the feedback received from the customers. Eventually, we will design a product with improved features including online banking.”

    What gives? You charge $50 for software that has fewer features than any previous version, even though previous versions cost about the same. I don’t think you were trying to keep new users in mind; I think you were hoping to make money from unwitting Mac users by offering an “upgrade” which isn’t.

    “If you are not using Quicken 2007, I would suggest to please purchase the same this version for Mac have the features not present QEM.”

    Yeah, I’ve been using Q’07 since ’07. I’m still astonished that Intuit would pretend QEM is a wonderful new thing. Their release of this software is an insult to Mac users: they have abandoned Mac users but don’t have the integrity to admit it.

    And as a sidenote, it just rankles me that Intuit’s customer service person doesn’t bother to proofread for correct English.

    OK, I’m done venting – and I’m going to be looking into Intuit’s competitors.

    Reply

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