Intuit Master Builder

Rusty Nails

I think we have about 30k in it, but you can spend less.

joecobb71

I was going to buy Quickbooks Pro 2005 for $89.00 on EBAY. What I really need is the payroll software to print checks. Do you think Pro 2005 is worth it?

slickshift

I have Quickbooks Pro '04
It's little over kill for just printing checks, but yeah at $89 it's worth it
I paid $200 in '04 I'm sure, probably more
You'll use some of the other stuff once you figure it out-or better yet have someone who knows it show you
I'm sure you'll want to invoice etc. with it
It's a good program

ProWallGuy

Be careful with that. Check to make sure it isn't a teacher/student version, or just an upgrade package. If its a full version, $89 is a steal.

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So_Cal_Plumber

We have been using Master Builder since 1999. We have had our ups and downs but the over all software has worked for us. Since they have released the 2003 Version a lot of the bugs that we where having had have been worked out, but like with any software there are still some features that do not work properly or the way we want it to work. Our company does about 20Mil in Business a year and Master Builder was the first software we started out with. I have worked with serveral other softwares with my pervious company that I would never go back to but the did have reports that I wish I could generate with Master Builder. The report writer in the system does have it's limitations but I was able to link Microsoft Access to develop more custom reports. I am currently running about 100 users with this software. We have 3 locations and the are connected through a T1. I was hoping to see if anyone could tell me if they have different locations and how they connect and if they experience any problems with their remote locations. Thank you for this site, I was beginning to think that the only way to talk to anyone about this program was to call a "Pro Advisor" which doesn't help when they are facing the same issues.

BigTony

I work for a small commercial general contractor and have been searching for a good construction accounting/estimating/project management program for several months now.

Our accountant told us we have outgrown our QuickBooks Premier Contractor Edition and need to find something else. He recommended QuickBooks Enterprise Edition which is, for the most part, the same as QuickBooks Premier. It doesn’t offer anything other than the ability to handle a larger data file and can crunch the data twice as fast as regular QuickBooks.

QBE was a viable solution in that our data would transfer without a hitch and there would be a flat learning curve since we already use QuickBooks. But, we still need to add functionality in the form of third party plug-ins to get all the features we are looking for. By the time we added up all the third party software required we were nearly at the MasterBuilder level. Now we were worrying about having a patchwork program in that some plug-ins may not play nice with others and the respective vendors will all be pointing fingers at each other when we call for support.

We started looking into “higher-end” accounting systems and found MasterBuilder. We had the rep come in and show us how it worked and we were fairly impressed but immediately realized there was going to be a steep learning curve. Why else would they want to sell you $2,500 - $5,000 worth of training?

We are also looking into Timberline which seems to be a richer program but at a much higher price. We figured MasterBuilder would cost us somewhere in the neighborhood of $12,000 to fully implement and Timberline came in at a whopping $30,000, not including the server we would have to purchase.

Needless to say this is a very big decision for us and this site has been a big help since I stumbled across it. Although, I am more confused now than ever…lol

Thank all of you for your time and your postings!

Tony

Cole

Think of it as an investment.

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BigTony

Yeah, a major investment.

We just got off the phone with a WinEst rep. who was going over their software and the integration with QuickBooks and MasterBuilder.

I don't understand why, if you are paying $7,000 for software as is the case with MB, you would need estimating software too...

Sarah9910

Big Tony. why can't you use MB's estimating module, why do you need Win Est also? Just curious

Paul Sturge

Hi all, as I am new to this forum I will introduce myself. I work for a Construction Company in Houston, TX as IT manager. My background is exclusively in IT starting way back when I did mainly hardware support though software and network support to now, where I manage the companies network. I have no construction experience at all but trying to learn fast so to better support my users.

As an IT manager of a construction company, I have seen different issues and priorities that pertain to the construction industry in general. One of these is the old chestnut of accounting software/PM software, estimating software etc. This brings me to my point (at last). We currently use Master Builder with no additional modules. We have been entertaining the idea of changing our software and/or adding modules to the existing setup. I have had demos from both Master builder and Timberline to see how they differ. While Timberline looked good, there were sufficient concerns for us to look back towards Master Builder and see if we can improve in that direction. The major concerns were cost and implementation. It was obvious that it would be very disruptive to fundamentally change the software we use, not only to our accounting department but also to the PMs and their assistants. We still feel that Master Builder, in its current form, does not do all we need. We are looking at the add on modules to perhaps streamline how we work, but one of my concerns is the seeming lack of flexibility in the report writing. I am not a Crystal Reports expert, nor any kind of report writing expert but I am looking at maybe trying to develop some custom reports for our organization. I did a search online and discovered a product called ReportBuddy. It promises to make report writing easy and I take that with a pinch of salt. I was wondering if anyone out there had any experience with this product and could share their thoughts. Or, maybe there is a better product out there? Out-sourcing this kind of thing is very expensive and though there are ‘bundles’ of reports out there they do not really fit what we need. I would rather try to learn to develop my own.

Well, I guess that’s about it. I apologize for the rambling post!

Thanks in advance for any information you are able to share.

Paul

denick

We are a small masonry & sitework contractor. We have been using MB for three years. My wife runs the office. She has no training on computers or accounting schooling. With talking to our accountant, phone support from MB, trial and error. She does all our accounting, payroll (for up to 7 people), jobcosting, equipment costing, and daily job history (using the module for that). She has put alot of time into it, BUT as soon she has the payroll data and receipts from a job she can hand me a report on the status of the job. Hours worked, equipment hours, materials used, % profit and more. It can be compared to the budget to get estimated vs actual costs. That is a sobering experience!

We don't use the estimating module but do input our estimate into the budget.

This makes it worth it.(as soon she has the payroll data and receipts from a job she can hand me a report on the status of the job. Hours worked, equipment hours, materials used, % profit and more. It can be compared to the budget to get estimated vs actual costs.)

We have only started to take advantage of many of the features like change orders, RFI's

It seems with help like Sarah offers many people can benifit from MB.


Nick

SteelHorse

Is anyone using the newest version of MB? We have been on MB since the early 80s (dos)... we were also beta testers of MB6 & MB7 (I don't recommend that to anyone) and simply got tired of changing and paying for upgrades and the associated training... but there must be some worthwhile improvements.

dnick... you should spend a little time and get the estimating going... it is one of the better modules. Takes time to build, but the ability to export to budget and proposal is priceless when time is tight.

Paul Sturge

[QUOTE=SteelHorse]Is anyone using the newest version of MB? We have been on MB since the early 80s (dos)... we were also beta testers of MB6 & MB7 (I don't recommend that to anyone) and simply got tired of changing and paying for upgrades and the associated training... but there must be some worthwhile improvements.

I implemented v11 not too long ago. The biggest improvemtnt with that version was concurrent licensing. We have 23 seats and 37 PCs. I have it on all PCs and people can go in and out as they need to. As long as a license is availible (served from the admin module on my 2nd server) there are no problems. Of course, the accounting department is encouraged to keep MB open to make sure they always have access. This was a big improvment on the 1 seat 1 computer deal from the previous versions. I came into MB at version 9 so I dont know a lot about the older versions but it seems that the interface has not changed much over time and there are things I would like to see happen. Perhaps a move to SQL, or certainly a revapm of the DB structure would be nice. It is slow for us at times, some reports taking way too long to run though MB tech support are working on this with us. As I have said in a previous post, we have looked at Timberline but have decided that we should investigate MB further first...

Paul

Sarah9910

Wow...a beta tester from way back. congratulations on sticking thru all that. I go back quite aways with MB, back when it was owned by Omware, back then the beta testing was rough for those that committed to doing that. Now that Intuit owns the product, it is much more clean when it goes out the door, they can afford to test in house much more in depth than Omware could. It has gone from non-concurrent licensing (everybody could use it no matter how many licenses) to concurrent licensing (one licence per pc/user)and now to whatever they are now (I don't know). You have to admit that with Intuit behind the product, they are going to keep it updated well and won't let it go out the door untested. Just like Maxwell with American Contractor and Timberline, they are all competitors and HAVE to be quite close in what they do or they can't compete. I still say, whatever product you use, if you are trained well and experiment (backup backup backup) with it (you are in control of the software, it's not in control of you) you will do well. You get out of it what you put in to it. If the dollars you put into it don't pay off within a couple years, you need to rethink what you are doing. Are you saving on workers comp costs? Are you saving by getting jobs done quicker and correcting costs overruns because you are seeing the profitability reports before the job is complete? If so, as AMEX would say "it's priceless". If not...it's just like any other tool that isn't maximized.

OK...I'm off my soap box now...

Paul Sturge

Sarah,

The licensing is concurrent now. That is, as many people can access as you have seats for. As I said in my last post, I think this was the best improvment over the last version. I hated having to un-install a license and re-install on another PC everytime I needed to change who could use it! I m just starting to learn how to write reports. It seems pretty coplex and I am thinking about taking the Master Builder online classes they advertise. Would you recommend them? Also, do you know of any report writing software or good websites I could check out?

Thanks in advance.

Paul

Sarah9910

Paul...about a year ago you were looking into a different report writing software for Master Builder, did you find it?

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rbsremodeling

Check Improvebuild remodelers business solution. A good overall program that may work for alot of builder/remodelers get a demo and talk to the software tech support


http://www.improvebuild.com/

Click on sales and check out the demos

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