Web Features & E-Commerce

In recent years, many accounting software products have added web features and e-commerce capabilities to their products. As the Internet continues to change the way business does business, these features will become increasingly more important. A summary of the web features and e-commerce capabilities for selected accounting software products is listed below:

	Produces a Ready-to-Publish Web Catalog	Retrieves Orders From the Web	Prints Reports to HTML Format	Supports Remote Data Entry Via the Web	Supports Ability to View Reports Across the Web
For the low-end market
BusinessWorks for Windows 12.0	No	No	No	No	No
M.Y.O.B. Premier 1.0	No	No	No	No	No
One Write Plus	No	No	No	No	No
Peachtree 2000 5.0	No	No	No	No	No
Peachtree for Windows 7.0	Yes	Yes	No	No	No
Peachtree Complete for Windows 7.0	Yes	Yes	No	No	No
QuickBooks 2000	No	No	No	No	No
QuickBooks Pro 2000	No	No	No	No	No
For the middle market
ACCPAC for Windows Series 4.0 *	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Great Plains Dynamics 5.5	No	No	Yes	No	Yes
MAS 90 for Windows 3.X *	No	Yes	Yes	No	Yes
Navision Financials	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Platinum for Windows 4.6	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
SBT Professional Series 5.0	No	Yes	Yes	No	No
iScala 2.1	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Solomon IV for Windows 4.0x *	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes
Traverse 8.3	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Visual AccountMate 4.0	No	Yes	No	No	No
For the beginning ERP market
Acuity Applications 4.0 *	No	No	No	Yes	Yes
Great Plains eEnterprise 5.5	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Platinum ERA 4.2	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
SAP Accelerated Financials R/3	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
SBT Executive Series 3.10	No	No	No	No	No
Solomon IV for BackOffice 4.0x *	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes

A Brief Discussion of Web Features and E-Commerce Capabilities The Internet is changing the way businesses do business, and that means business managers must rethink what they expect from their accounting software. The Internet has transformed the retail channel—from an elaborate distribution system with wholesalers, distributors and a vast array of retailers to a simplified system in which a growing number of sales are made directly to the consumer. For manufacturers of both consumer and industry products, that change translates into generally lower overhead—and new demands on accounting systems. Recognizing this trend, many accounting software vendors have added features designed to accommodate the Internet. The new functions include the ability to: Publish Web catalogs directly from, and make links to, the software's inventory module. This means customers can see, among other things, real-time information on prices and quantities on hand. Retrieve orders directly from the Web site and import them automatically into the sales order module. Print all reports to a Web page format. Allow users to access reports and accounting data across the Internet using a password. Let remote users securely enter accounting data and transactions via the Web. Track an order automatically via links to tracking pages of Federal Express or United Parcel Service. Allow users to e-mail reports to users or groups of users. Configure a system to automatically send e-mail reports and messages when triggered by predefined events. Four accounting software vendors at the forefront of Internet applications are Great Plains, SBT, Sage and ACCPAC International. All four provide Web sites where prospects can test the Internet features they're interested in. At the Great Plains site, users can log on and operate Great Plains eEnterprise across the Internet. SBT's site provides links to more than 200 companies that use the SBT WebTrader module to sell goods and services across the Internet. So, whatever your immediate Internet plans, be sure to assess an accounting product's Web-readiness. As Internet importance grows, Web- enabled features will become more critical to a business.

- END -