Reckon Future Development

Melinda Jane Koth
Melinda Jane Koth Member Posts: 51 ✭✭
edited February 2022 in Accounts Hosted
Dear Reckon,

I want to here what your future development plan is for Reckon Hosted. The Reckon Hosted program is so so so far behind the other accounting products. I have a significant number of my clients on the product and I have started making enquiries about shifting my clients off Reckon Hosted to either Myob or Xero. The only reason we went with Reckon in the early years was that your Reporting functionality is really good....

For my clients to stay on Reckon Hosted we need to know immediately what is in your product development pipeline. What we are actively seeking to know is the following:

1. When will Bank Data feeds be cleaned up to be like Xero or Myob, and be easy to use
2. When will more add on's be implemented to enable the likes of Shoeboxed, Receipt Bank, Dropbox, etc etc.
3. When will OCR technology be implemented to enable suppliers to email their invoices directly to Reckon, which will scan the invoices and then enable the invoices to be OCR'ed into Reckon.

If these can't be or wont be implemented before the EOFY we will be moving our clients.....

We await your answer

Comments

  • Shannon Sciuto
    Shannon Sciuto Member Posts: 98
    edited February 2018
    Agreed.  I'd like to add: 


    4.   When will Reckon Hosted allow users to have an app to quickly create invoices, pull up customer balances and process bank feeds on the go from mobile/tablet devices
  • cosmic
    cosmic Reckon Developer Partner Posts: 1,072 ✭✭✭
    edited September 2018
    We have it , and its free , and its already running, you may also talk to Jason Hollis, RECKON API .

    Cosmic Accounting Group

    Accountants and Tax Agents 22397009

  • Larissa_7048652
    Larissa_7048652 Member Posts: 36 ✭✭
    edited October 2019

    Yes!

    And also

    5.  I know this is a simple point but can the function of Emailing Remittances be fixed so that it doesn't default to some rubbish remittance form and that we can email more than 6 remittances at a time and not freeze up the program.

    Cheers.

  • Melinda Jane Koth
    Melinda Jane Koth Member Posts: 51 ✭✭
    edited February 2017
    What do you mean we have it and it already running????
  • cosmic
    cosmic Reckon Developer Partner Posts: 1,072 ✭✭✭
    edited February 2017
    i just posted new thread on our Cosmic Mobile Invoicing.
    We have released Mobile Invoicing for Reckon Accounts Hosted.
    It will work on Android devices at this moment.
    if you are further interested you can down load from Google store :Cosmic invoice solution. I can give you login info for testing.
    just send me an email:[email protected]

    Cosmic Accounting Group

    Accountants and Tax Agents 22397009

  • Jeffrey Fazal_7315662
    Jeffrey Fazal_7315662 Member Posts: 9
    edited February 2017
    We haven't been with Reckon for long, have they developed the desktop range after splitting with Intuit?
  • Jeffrey Fazal_7315662
    Jeffrey Fazal_7315662 Member Posts: 9
    edited February 2017
    I'll be interested in hearing an official reply from Reckon also. There has been a lot of feedback and ideas on this forum and they've been sent along to the team, but we have no idea if they are going to implement them or not. 
  • Melanie Gray
    Melanie Gray Member Posts: 2
    edited February 2017
    Hi All

    Following this thread.

    For the last 3-4 years I feel like Reckon are behind, before that, I felt they were always up-to-date with everything. I have just moved one of my companies to Zero to test it out. I did call Reckon and let them know my thoughts, and that I used to be a loyal user but I am currently disappointed with their slow movements in technology. 

    From what I understand and can figure out, Reckon Hosted will become obsolete down the track, all of their efforts are being put into Reckon One (the competing products to Zero/MYOB). But I would be happily proven incorrect. Just my thoughts.

    Hence, the reason i think im going to have to move all my company files over :( 

  • Melinda Jane Koth
    Melinda Jane Koth Member Posts: 51 ✭✭
    edited February 2017
    Ok if that is where they are going, why don't they just say to us that is where they are going the stuff Reckon Hosted we are not going to do anymore development and by the way we will offer you a migration path to change your hosted files to Reckon One (which I don't like using anyway). Instead they are happy to loose customers hand over fist to the likes of Xero and Myob...

  • Jason Hollis
    Jason Hollis Alumni Posts: 516 Reckon Staff
    edited September 2020
    Hi Melinda,


    Thank you for raising your concerns. Your passion should be commended and thank you for remaining respectful throughout. 

    If I may I would like to address your original post point by point.

    1. When will Bank Data feeds be cleaned up to be like Xero or Myob
    The truth is... from an internal product perspective... never. We have not re-written Reckon Accounts from the ground up a la MYOB. Nor is it a multi-tier architectured web application like Reckon One or Xero. We are working with the Intuit code base and the bank data function that comes with that code. This years release will see further tweaks as did last years release, however the workflow as such cannot be changed.

    So that said... we do have a solution that will allow us to bypass the inherent code. So bad news first... this will not be available by EOFY. There are a lot of moving pieces as Reckon has multiple products and of course bank data touches many of them. The good news... we haven't been idle on the subject. Some things just take time.

    2. When will more add on's be implemented to enable the likes of Shoeboxed, Receipt Bank, Dropbox, etc etc.
    Unfortunately both the above mentioned add-ons have been approached more than once. It is up to them to connect to us, and the best thing our users can do is send them requests.

    We do have excellent partners in this space already. 3 have committed to Hosted and we are monitoring their progress with anticipation. Also it is important to note that v2.1 of the Hosted API has literally only just finished final testing - many partners were waiting for this new version as it added many new features. We simply need to wait for them to add us into their schedule now it is complete. 

    Dropbox and the like is an interesting one. We will have an integration to online storage by years end. We are just working through how this will work with Hosted (Reckon One is easy as it has a unique URL for each transaction) and I hope to give more news soon. 

    3. When will OCR technology be implemented to enable suppliers to email their invoices directly to Reckon, which will scan the invoices and then enable the invoices to be OCR'ed into Reckon.
    So we already offer this on Reckon Accounts Desktop with the 3 applications I mentioned above. Visit the Reckon Add-on Marketplace for more info. We can't wait for them to finish their Hosted integrations. Again, there is no harm sending them an email to voice your thoughts.

    4. From Sharon re Mobile Invoicing: 
    Cosmic's invoice app does this.. and it's free. Again the way Hosted was written you wouldn't serve it up on a tablet, so we love that Cosmic saw the market gap and came up with a solution.

    5. From Larissa - remittance default issue.
    Start a new thread on this Larissa as the team will need to troubleshoot. Emails should not be freezing unless you have corrupted 'send email' data which we can fix. Customised default remittance is a known issue and it's sitting in the product backlog. Let me see if it can make this years release however we are doing final QA right now. Leave that one with me.

    Finally, I am the new Head of Product Strategy at Reckon for all Business products, so as of last Monday the buck stops with me. So please keep the feedback coming, and I promise to provide feedback to you. 



    Kind regards,
    Jason Hollis
  • Melinda Jane Koth
    Melinda Jane Koth Member Posts: 51 ✭✭
    edited February 2017
    Jason 

    Firstly let me say welcome on board and thank you for the first detailed response that we have had from Reckon in a long long time. Its unfortunate though that they have basically waited until the literal horse has bolted to appoint someone into this position. I don't envy you at all with the enormous amount of work that you will have to do to win back loyal accountants, bookkeepers, bas agents and clients.

    In response to each of my issues, what you have advised is good, its better than what we have had, unfortunately, as you state, "things take time". It also doesn't help Reckon ended up with basically a Legacy system that is not adaptable to the ever changing and fast paced technological changes. But its time that is precious to both your clients, Bookkeepers, Bas Agents and Accountants. And we don't have the time to wait, as we have been asking for a considerable amount of time for change.

    In the current add-on market place again its a fast paced ever moving world. Everyday I hear about other add-on's being used by other Bookkeepers & Bas Agents. I have adapted quite a lot of these into my practice, depending on the clients software and needs, and its enabling me to move into more of an advisory role rather than Bookkeeping. But having said that with my Reckon Clients I am still stuck in the dark ages of manual data entry.

    Its interesting I  implemented an OCR system for one of my clients the other day that is cutting our data entry down from 3 days to 20 minutes each week. In discussions with this Add-on provider I discussed as to whether they were looking at Reckon Hosted given that further API development had just taken place, and their comment was "Reckon Hosted" is not worth looking at as Reckon isn't big enough in the market place.?? This comment was also confirmed with another OCR provider, who said the same thing.

    Perhaps as a suggestion you could put out a "Pipeline development time line" on this forum, so users know where they are at with the software and whether it is worth staying on.... Also I would be interested to know if Reckon has a Working Group of Bas Agents, & Accountants who advise on what it is that we expect to see in your Product.

    Again thank you for your response and we wish you well in your position going forward.

    Kind Regards

    Melinda
    The Bookkeeping Company




  • Jason Hollis
    Jason Hollis Alumni Posts: 516 Reckon Staff
    edited February 2017
    Hi Melinda,

    Firstly thank you. It will be challenging, but challenges present opportunities. 

    There is a lot in there to respond to so please contact me for a chat and I can dispel some concerns and add comment to others. 

    As for Reckon not being big enough... I think there is enough data to suggest otherwise. It must be remembered that accounting software add-ons are generally in a growth phase, especially in the cloud, so they need to target the largest accounting vendors first as they know they will only get a small % of total users for that type of product, let alone fighting for market share among the 10 other apps in that particular accounting add-on eco-system. It's tuff, and they need to be strategic. We get that.

    At the end of the day it's up to the add-ons if they wish to offer their services to our customers. We are more than happy to work with them, however if their competitors see the value in being a Reckon partner then that's also a good outcome to ensure our customers receive the same benefits. At the moment we are sitting at around 650 developer partners, so there must be value there somewhere. ** Our goal is to give more developer partners exposure this year via our marketplace. This is one of my priorities. 

    So some good news to end on. We have a new tool that tracks feedback and feature requests where users can vote and comment. We are in phase one of testing internally. It will then be rolled out to our accredited partners, then professional partners, and finally end users. This will address many things as you can imagine. 

    As for user groups, we are in fact about to kick off a new focus group structure for feedback from our partners (professional and accredited) as well as cloud advisors. It would be great to have you involved. When we speak I will provide you with more details. 



    Kind regards,
    Jason
  • Melinda Jane Koth
    Melinda Jane Koth Member Posts: 51 ✭✭
    edited February 2017
    Thank you Jason for your response. Its good to know that there is finally some positives to come out of your appointment and we hope again that the communication keeps flowing. I will contact you hopefully early next week, I would like to be involved in a focus group about Reckon's future. Once again thank you for your candid and honest advice on the future developments within Reckon.
  • Shannon Sciuto
    Shannon Sciuto Member Posts: 98
    edited February 2017
    Hi Jason, 

    I note you've said 650 developer partners but when I do a search in the add-on marketplace for Reckon Accounts Hosted apps I see only 4 apps from 2 developers. 

    In discussions with major app developers they've stated that the API for Reckon Hosted is so vastly different from those other software programs that it's not worth their time to do the work. 

    I was once your biggest supporter.  I am a partner in the big 4 programs and a 3 other smaller ones and I will always recommend the best program for the business based on functionality and value for money.  We have one client on Reckon One which has been quite buggy and painful.  I have 4 clients left on Reckon Accounts - 2 of which will be moving to cloud programs this year. One is looking for better bank feeds and integration with ServiceM8 and the other needs to be able to invoice and process bank feeds on the go.  Unfortunately, the benefits of Reckon Accounts are quickly being outweighed by the benefits of other programs. 

    Unfortunately, I can see that its not an easy fix to transition Reckon Accounts to a new platform and it will be years before Reckon One is able to match the functions built into Reckon Accounts. 

    I'd love to see a Roadmap of how Reckon is planning to overcome these challenges over the coming months/years. I need to be able to tell my clients if it's worth sticking around because it's going to get better or if they're going to be left behind if they stick with Reckon. 

    Fingers Crossed !


  • Jason Hollis
    Jason Hollis Alumni Posts: 516 Reckon Staff
    edited February 2017
    Hi Shannon,

    Thanks for helping to make my first week in the role a baptism by fire. But honestly, its great to see Reckon users taking the effort to post. That's half the battle won right there. 

    As I mentioned my priority is to give more exposure to our developer partners this year. In previous years the Developer Partner program has been a paid program and hence why there are limited listings, as marketing was in the premium tier.

    In 2016 we officially offered the SDK / API for free. That was for Desktop, Hosted and Reckon One (which was always free). However, we wanted to give our partners who had paid in the past at least a year on the 'new' site as a way of saying thank you. We have added more during the year, however when we launch v2 of the site later this year we will add as many of the 650 who want to be listed (not all do) as we will have category / industry filtering etc...

    As for the Hosted API being too hard. Well.. it is the same SDK as desktop, simply wrapped in a RESTful API. It's not hard.. it's used by Intuit globally.. by thousands of developers. Is it different to a RESTful / JSON API as used by Reckon One. Definitely. The API team are more than happy to talk to any developer on this to set the record straight. They can email us here.


    Have a great weekend, and thanks again,
    Jason
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