Quicken Essentials for Mac Personal Finance Software

Quicken Essentials for Mac Personal Finance Software

February 19th, 2010

Intuit

Quicken Essentials for Mac Personal Finance Software

Customer Rating: Rating 1.5 out of 5

(252 Reviews)

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Product information Brand: Intuit
Publisher: Intuit
Category: Software
Release Date: February 13, 2010
Format: Cd-rom
Model: 409954

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Features

Quicken Essentials for Mac makes understanding your money a snap
Updated interface designed by--and for--Mac users
View your accounts all in one place
Shows your current balance, including upcoming bills and paychecks
Automatically categorizes transactions so you can see where your money's going

Editorial Reviews

Product Description: Product InformationEasy guided set up gets you up and running in minutes. Quicken Essentials for Mac lets you view your accounts all in one place. It shows your current balance including upcoming bills and paychecks automatically categorizes transactions so you can see where your money's going and helps you avoid those pesky late fees.Product FeaturesQuicken 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 and paychecksAutomatically categorizes transactions so you can see where your money's going

Amazon.com Product Description: Quicken Essentials for Mac lets you view your accounts all in one place. It shows your current balance, including upcoming bills and paychecks, automatically categorizes transactions so you can see where your money's going, and helps you avoid those pesky late fees.

Redesigned with you in mind. Click to enlarge.

View a snapshot of your most important info. Click to enlarge.

See all your accounts in one place.Click to enlarge.

See where your money's going. Click to enlarge.

Personal finances made easy. Built Mac smart.

Improved--Redesigned with you in mind
Quicken Essentials for Mac personal finance software makes understanding your money a snap. Our interface has been completely reimagined, resulting in an intuitive, elegant application designed by - and for - Mac users.

View a snapshot of your most important info
Our easy to understand Overview gives you a snapshot of all money coming in and going out, including upcoming bills and paychecks. You can also customize budgets and goals for yourself, to help you save even more.

See all your accounts in one place
View your entire financial picture in one place with Quicken Essentials for Mac. See exactly where you stand with all your accounts, such as your bank, credit cards, loans, and more!

See where your money's going
Quicken Essentials for Mac automatically categorizes your transactions to show you exactly what you've been spending money on.

New--Avoid late fees and overdrafts
Keep track of upcoming bills, paychecks, and your current balance so you can avoid those pesky late fees.

Transferring your data is easier than ever
Quicken Essentials for Mac easily and seamlessly converts your data from all supported Quicken Mac and Windows versions - in three easy steps!

Improved--Connect to more banks than ever
Quicken Essentials for Mac now downloads transactions from over 12,000 financial institutions, making it faster and easier than ever to see your whole financial picture.

100% Satisfaction Guarantee
If you're not 100% satisfied, return Quicken Essentials for Mac personal finance software with your dated receipt within 60 days of purchase for a refund of the purchase price (Return shipping and handling charges not included).

Quicken data files that can be converted from Windows to Mac
The following components of your Quicken for Windows data file can be converted to Quicken for Mac:

Account types that exist in both Quicken for Windows and Quicken for Mac.
Banking transactions.
Most investment transactions. For information, see Converting investment data.
Categories, classes, and securities contained within the exported transactions.

Using a Prior Version of Quicken Mac?

We're very excited about the all-new Quicken Essentials for Mac. Not only does it solve the core Quicken jobs better, it also provides the ease of use and elegant user interface Mac customers have come to expect from their applications.

Quicken Mac 2007 and earlier users should note that this is a brand new product, so some of the features you've grown used to may not be included. Because we want to make sure we're providing you with the solution that best meets your needs, we've answered a few questions that can help you determine whether or not Quicken Essentials for Mac is right for you.

1. Can I track my investments?
Yes, Quicken Essentials for Mac allows you to track the overall value of your investment accounts and the value of your specific holdings. It will not, however, track investment buys and sells, nor will it provide some advanced investment performance reports. If you need more more advanced investment features, try Quicken Mac 2007.

2. Can I export my data to TurboTax?
Quicken Essentials for Mac does not support that capability. If you'd like that functionality, we recommend trying Quicken Mac 2007.

3. Can I pay my bills within Quicken?
While you cannot pay bills within the product itself ("direct bill pay"), you can track your bills and make sure you have enough cash to pay them when they're due. A few alternatives available include using Quicken Mac 2007 or using the bill pay functionality on Quicken Bill Pay.

4. Can I transfer my data from an older version of Quicken Mac?
Yes, you can transfer data from Quicken Mac 2005, 2006 and 2007.

5. Can I convert my Quicken Windows data to Quicken Essentials for Mac?
Yes, it converts Quicken Windows 2007, 2008 and 2009 data.

Customer Reviews

Don't even waste your time

by Ralph Brent Stanley 2010-02-24, 403 people found this review helpful

I bought this software Feb 18, almost as soon as it hit the stores. Believe me, it was the biggest disappointment ever. As a Quicken user of 12 years, this software is not recognizable. It's nothing but a budget tracker, with none of the advanced features of Quicken for Windows. Actually, this software is like Quicken for Windows, minus 90% of the functionality. Quicken Essentials is really just that, the bare bones basics. You cannot even set up your paycheck, cannot use online billpay, cannot use with TurboTax, and you cannot even download or manually enter individual stock transactions. And most shocking of all, you can't even back up your data!!!! Am I angry? You bet I am. Instead of Quicken Essentials, it should be called Quicken Kindergarten. The following is quoted directly from their setup guide. I wish they put this stuff on the box.

"As much as we improved the experience of using Quicken when we rebuilt it from the ground up, there are some features you may have been used to using in Quicken for Mac (or Quicken for Windows) that we didn't include in this version of Quicken Essentials.

Investments
Quicken Essentials lets you to track the overall value of your investment accounts and the value of specific holdings, but the software does not track individual buys and sells, nor will it provide some advanced investment performance reports.

Exporting to TurboTax
Quicken Essentials does not currently support the ability to export your data to TurboTax.

Direct bill pay
You can track your bills in Quicken Essentials, but the program doesn't have the direct bill pay capabilities that allow you to pay your bills directly from the program.

Other advanced features
Quicken Essentials does not include many of the advanced features in other versions of Quicken, including Business features, Rental Property, lifetime planner, cash flow forecast, spending plan, debt reduction plan, emergency tax records, tax planner, and home inventory manager."

If Quicken for Windows is worth a retail price of $60 to $70, then this new version of Quicken for the Mac is worth at most 5 bucks. Seriously, it does nothing more than downloads transactions and helps you track your spending or maintain a budget. I feel like a total fool for purchasing this product and will be returning it to Intuit. And to think I waited almost 3 years for this product. I was really expecting to be impressed. After Intuit's horrible experience with TurboTax last year, I really can't believe they have the temerity to unleash this worthless product on the market. I expect people at Intuit to get fired over this disaster, and deservedly so. This product looks like it was designed by an 8th grader in order to help a 3rd grader do his arithmetic. And did I mention the graphics? Oh, so elementary. That little pink pig next to my savings account makes me want to scream !!!!!!

Optimistic, understanding, and horridly disappointed

by Jonathan Bowers 2010-02-24, 223 people found this review helpful

I've been a quicken user for 8 years now, almost always on a mac. In my opinion Quicken was by far the best option for personal money management. In fact it would take a lot to make a loyal user of their products ever consider switching. This program, Quicken Essentials for Mac has made it blatantly obvious that I need to look elsewhere from this point forward for my financial software needs.

I won't nit pick at the software for the specific features that are missing(many of what I'd consider to be basic requirements for even calling it Personal Finance software) but instead I'll simply say that this software provides so little, and is so far off the mark from doing half of what prior versions of Quicken did that I'm not really sure what the purpose of having it is. The user interface upgrades are so lackluster in comparison to the degradation of usefulness that you don't even notice them.

to those consumers considering the purchase I'd like to point you to either Quicken 2007(if you need check writing, better online transaction downloading, bill pay, investment account updating and tracking) or [...] if you like the budgetary and overview side of things(Mint was purchased by quicken and the Mint team ultimately developed Quicken Essentials). Unfortunately if you buy this you'll be getting very disabled versions of both Quicken & Mint and will be left frustrated, constrained & forced to acknowledge the waste of money.

Worthless--non essential for the Mac. Cannot print checks any longer!

by jsschi 2010-02-23, 178 people found this review helpful

If there was a way to give this product 0-stars that would be my rating. Good thing that they have a 60-day money back policy as I am sending this back today.

I did see, before I bought this, that you can no longer track investment accounts (other than a balance) and I was fine with that as well as some of the additional items listed that were no longer included. However, they should put in big bold letters on the box and on Amazon's product listing that, "This program no longer allows users to print checks." What were they thinking? I, like many, do not write a lot of checks but for 5 or 10 each month that I do write--I used Quicken and printed the check in the program (using the overpriced Intuit checks--which I just happened to re-order 3 months ago) .

There are so many more things missing from this program that were in older versions (and are not spelled out in detail) it would be silly to list them. However, needless to say, if you made use of even one of these features then you will be asking for trouble in getting this program. For example, you can no longer keep track of loans or mortgages and show the actual principal and interest due. All you can do is show a "liability" account and the balance remaining.

What a complete and absolute waste this program is. It is little more than a conduit to download your various bank and credit card accounts in one place without going to the various account websites.

Quicken 1995 - in 2010! Line up - buy your copy now!

by Gadget Guy 2010-02-26, 94 people found this review helpful

Dear loyal customer: Here's the New version Quicken for the Mac that you've been waiting OVER three years for! More good news - we'll gladly charge you more than we do for our highly functional, feature-complete, Windows version (Quicken Deluxe 2010 for Windows sells for MORE than twenty-five dollars less on Amazon right now). You're patience and devotion to our product is about to be greatly rewarded. We know Quicken 2007 for the Mac is a dog. It's slow and buggy and poorly designed, but hey, what else were you going to use on your Mac? We're sorry we stopped fixing bugs or enhancing Quicken 2007 YEARS ago - but we still recommend it over Quicken Essentials for Mac, on our website, if you need to:

1) Pay your bills online
2) Track investment purchases and sales
3) Print checks
4) Export to TurboTax

These are silly things anyway - who really wants to pay their bills using Quicken - right? And after you've spent the entire year entering all of your financial information into Quicken - why not do it all over again in order to use one of our other products - like TurboTax? It's your time, not ours.

Look, we've been trying to figure out this whole "Quicken on the Mac" thing for a while. We know we promised you a new Quicken for Mac years ago - but, we kinda screwed up and had to scrap that project. Then, we were completely caught off guard by the fact the Mac actually became popular. So we figured we could just release a bare minimum product - you know, check the box and buy some time to add in what we should have delivered years ago. We figure, in the meantime, some of you will actually pay for this useless product AND, we can say we've addressed the needs of the Mac market.

We own the financial software market, so you're going to just have to accept what we give you and pay top dollar for it. Sorry people that's just reality. Grin and bear it - please stop complaining and just give us your money.

Very Disappointed

by Jeffrey Fields 2010-02-24, 78 people found this review helpful

I have used Quicken for over 15 years and as long as I used a Windows version I was very pleased and upgraded many times. I converted to Mac about 4 years ago and after trying Quicken I decided to keep a Windows machine solely to run Quicken. After a while I installed Fusion so I could run Windows Quicken on my Mac and then a couple of years ago I forced myself to use the Quicken 2006 I have on my Mac. I have never been comfortable with Quicken 2006 and looked forward to the day when Intuit would issue a "real" Quicken for the Mac. I was very excited to learn about Quicken Essentials for the Mac. I received the order yesterday and struggled last night and most of today until I finally realized that could not imagine why I would to continue this frustration. I have tried Shareware and Freeware personal financial manager programs that are many times better than this program. As much as I don't like Quicken 2006, it is heads and shoulders above Quicken Essentials for the Mac. I cannot describe how disappointed with this program and one Star is a generous rating.

In the words of Intuit's CEO Aaron Patzer: "Holy crap!"

by George Beahm 2010-02-25, 69 people found this review helpful

When Intuit's CEO Aaron Patzer joined the company, he remarked, "Holy crap, we haven't put one of these out in three years."

Amazingly, he added: " It's called 'Mac Essentials' because it's got the essential features used by 80 percent of the users we've surveyed and talked to."

Patzer's notion is that something is better than nothing, and that next year he will issue a more complete version, bridging the gap between 80 to 100 percent, to make it fully functional. No, Mr. Patzer, sometimes nothing is better than something, especially when it's software like "Quicken Essentials" that was pulled out of the oven half-baked, served up on a silver tray, and dished out to Mac users who are going to find out that it's just cardboard cuisine.

Mr. Patzer, as a longtime Quicken user since its inception, I've got to say: I've used financial software packages for a long time, from various companies. I know them well. And this latest 'Mac Essential' is no software financial package worth our time or money; it's hobbled beyond human imagination, robbed of one of its most essential -- yes, essential! -- feature: to pay bills online or pay bills by printed check, neither of which is supported by this new, "improved" software.

Let me repeat myself for emphasis: YOU CANNOT PAY YOUR BILLS WITH THIS SOFTWARE. YOU CAN'T PAY ONLINE AND YOU CAN'T PRINT OUT CHECKS.

For $60 prepub and $70 at full retail, this product is the worst piece of Mac software for the financial market ever coded. Others have, rightly, railed against all of its other deficiencies, but the lack of a financial package that won't allow bill payment is such a colossal error that it'd be like engineering a car and deciding there's no need to put an ENGINE in it because you should just park it and enjoy the view. (This software allows you to VIEW your current financial picture. You just can't use it for much of anything else. Looks pretty, but that's about it.)

The inability to export data to TurboTax -- another essential feature that's present in the current version -- is also missing.

This software just ain't ready for prime, and don't let Mr. Patzer convince you otherwise.

I'm sending this back to Intuit for a full refund, with a letter addressed to Mr. Patzer explaining to him that in the software business, the presumption is (a) when you offer a so-called improved version that's a giant leap backward, don't charge $70. As is, this software pretty much offers nothing but a quick picture on your finances--it can't DO anything with that data, however. Furthermore, on that basis, it'd be worth, maybe, $10 to me; and (b) I had to check my birth certificate, which clearly shows I was not born yesterday.

I'm sticking to my current version, which has all the features this version has omitted.

Mr. Patzer should fall on his sword for this one. When he said "Holy crap" upon finding out that the Mac version of Intuit had been ignored for three years, he was right to be surprised. Ironically, we, too, have been surprised: Who'd have thunk that after three years of gestation, this "new, improved" version is the best they could come up with?

Unfortunately, he seems to think we, as long-time customers that have supported his company with our dollars and entrusted his flagship financial product, Quicken, with our fortunes (large and small), will be happy with this misbegotten, rushed-to-press, hobbled, inadequate, unimaginative, and largely dysfunctional/nonfunctional software, for which we should be happy to pay $70.

Bottom line: I, and a legion of Mac computer users, can only quote his immortal, telling words, which should be emblazoned on every piece of "Quicken Essentials for Mac": "HOLY CRAP!"

In my considered, informed opinion, this product is wet, moist, and odoriferous. It's a piece of -- should I even have to say it? -- crap.

Brutal software -- I really wanted to like it

by JJ Rock 2010-02-28, 42 people found this review helpful

I read many opinions on Quicken Essentials for the Mac and was ready to accept the limitations. I really don't need the check writing, bill pay (do it via my bank), or even detailed investment tracking (TurboTax imports from my brokerage). So I figured I would be getting a nice Mac implementation instead of running Quicken for Windows.

Well, I was wrong. This software is just that bad.

Intuit made importing from Quicken for Windows much more complicated than they need to. You have to install and run an export utility on your Windows machine. Note if you run VMWare on the Mac to do this, you will have problems with Share Folders. After you do the export, you copy the file to the Mac, and then run the import. The import will kick out some errors (especially if you use investment accounts) and place the file on your desktop. You get to figure out what the messages mean, Intuit offers little help.

So now you have things imported -- it must get better now; right? Nope. Wells Fargo currently does not work, it's not in the bank list and will not update on line. My 401K refused to update it's account balances, even when using web connect. No errors from Quicken, but it looked like it tried to do something. The import also created a bunch of new schedules and showed I had hundreds of past due transactions. All were wrong and I manually deleted them.

Entering new transactions requires clicking "new" and waiting a second or two for a new register line to appear. If you click "cancel" line new line remains. The process is slow and clunky (even on a new 27" iMac). My check register defaulted to not showing the check number, I had to hunt to add it in the transaction display.

The "preferences" consist of three things, you cannot control much of how Quicken Essentials looks or operates. Account information is pretty minimal, nothing like the info that Quicken for Windows can store.

Account balances are not listed next to the accounts in the left panel like Quicken for Windows does. If you want a quick overview, you need to click a different view.

I design and build software for a living. Quicken Essentials is of early beta quality at best. There are some decent ideas, but it needs more time to be fully developed. Charging $60 - $70 for it is robbery.

One final note. It has been reported in the Quicken Essentials forum that any online banking info is pushed up to the Intuit servers and stored there for the online account syncs. I am not comfortable with that and Intuit should be made sure that users know that. Intuit does encrypt the data, but I am not comfortable having key financial information living on Intuit servers.

Thankfully, Intuit has a 60 day money back guarantee. I will be asking for that tomorrow.

A Disaster

by Jeffrey A. Burger 2010-02-25, 54 people found this review helpful

Three and a half years after the last Quicken Mac release (and many more years after problems with Quicken Mac became apparent) comes this disaster. It offers no BillPay, poor acount reconciliation, no export to Turbotax, no investment transaction tracking. And not only doesn't it allow you to track investment transactions; you can't even see your investment balances over time (not to mention your overall net worth over time)--just the total numbers as of today. You also can't manually add investments if the institution doesn't offer downloading (and some big ones such as Mass Mutual do not and don't plan to soon, despite all of Intuit's talk about thousands of institutions). And here's an indication of how brilliantly this program was designed: You can't even see today's account balances at a glance on an opening screen--you have to click through to another screen for that. I could go on (and on and on). Oh yeah: And if you don't like it, too bad--while data imports well, it apparently can't be exported. So this is like the Roach Motel--you can check in but you can't check out.

Suffice it to say that this program would be a huge disappointment even if it were priced at half what it is and even if it had come out right after Quicken Mac 2007. The fact that it's being priced above $60 and coming out 3-1/2 years later (and many more years after problems with Quicken Mac became apparent) is ridiculous.

Going back to Amazon for refund.

by J. Krol 2010-02-23, 43 people found this review helpful

I have been using Quicken for Windows for 12 years.My latest version is 2010 which I have been using on my iMac via Bootcamp. I wanted to get a native Mac application so I ordered this program. After 2 days its going back for a refund. Too many features missing: investments, detailed mortgage information, print checks, and most important to me is the ability to save attachments (copy of bills, statements, etc.). If you are used to the windows version, I would not recommend this product.
I just ordered VMware Fusion from Amazon so I can continue to use Windows based Quicken.

Would give zero stars if possible

by Walter A. Foery 2010-02-23, 50 people found this review helpful

I have just been in a chat session with Intuit. The agent confirms that, no, you can NOT write checks with Quicken Essential for Mac 2010. Say WHAT?? How is it possible that they deleted that functionality? This is amazingly brainless and will force me to abandon Quicken and seek another product - after over 15 years! Boy, Intuit blew it here!