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I compared QuickBooks Self-Employed vs spreadsheet tracking for 3 months
I spent January through March running both a QuickBooks Self-Employed account and my old spreadsheet system side by side. I figured the spreadsheet was fine since I've been doing it for 4 years but wanted to see what I was missing. The big difference came when I compared my total write offs. QuickBooks caught $340 in mileage deductions I missed in my spreadsheet because I forgot to log a couple gigs. Plus it auto-categorized a bunch of expenses from my business card. The spreadsheet took me about 2 hours every Sunday night while QuickBooks needed maybe 15 minutes a week. Now I'm stuck wondering if the $15 monthly fee is worth saving those 2 hours. Has anyone else switched from manual tracking and regretted the cost?
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karenc202mo ago
That $1.09 an hour really puts it in perspective, doesn't it? Guess my spreadsheet skills are paying me less than what I'd make flipping burgers, which is humbling. I tried the QuickBooks free trial myself and ended up sticking with it mainly because I kept forgetting to log things like my Starbucks runs for client meetings. My brain just isn't wired for remembering every receipt, so that $15 is basically me paying someone to remember stuff for me. Still, it stings a little every month when that charge hits.
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lucashenderson2mo ago
165 hours over 12 months just to save $15 a month? That math works out to like $1.09 an hour. You're basically paying yourself minimum wage to data entry.
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