Reach Accounting

Reach Accounting is an online accounting software for small businesses with better user-access roles. However, the system comes with several minor and major issues as covered in the review as well as omissions of basic functions you would expect from online accounting applications.


Getting Started
First time signup process takes you through four simple steps, from setting your company name to agreeing to terms and conditions. If you are familiar with Windows8, ReachAccounting dashboard would be a deja vu.  Really simple to grasp all features available in the system, such as Service invoices, expenses, payroll and reports, but really not meant for easy navigation from the dashboard features list. You need to do “Search …” for items of interest.
In Reach Accounting, there is also document attachment feature, however we were unable to upload anything. You can also give it a try and join the club.
Contacts
Adding contacts is not as straightforward as it might seem in Reach Accounting. To find the list of customers, suppliers, etc, you would need to do “Search…” operation. Even after we found the list of customers, we could not add new ones as we used to do in all accounting applications.
Apart from it, there was no way to bulk upload our customers and suppliers CSV files nor a place to add customer balances in Reach Accounting, which inhibits migrating from other systems, regardless where and how you maintained your books previously.
Invoicing
Reach Accounting has a nice services invoicing form. You can select one of “cash sales” or sales on account options. Also you can toggle between tax-inclusive and tax-exclusive amounts. Also you can email invoices to customers, and send sms notice for an invoice. If you need to customize your invoice, no big deal, as there is a simple invoice designer (HTML and CSS).
In all accounting applications we have covered so far, there were a lot of BUTs, and Reach Accounting was no exception. When we issued cash sales of $990 ($90 GST) we were supposed to register $990 cash receipt not $900 as stated under “Record Payments Received”. Journal entry for which was supposed to be Cash (Debit) $990, GST Liability (Credit) $90 and Sales/Income (Credit) $900. In addition, there is no way to handle customer overpayment/deposits.
We also wondered if Reach Accounting had automated transaction option, which it did, however to our surprise we were not “authorized” to create any repeating transaction, even though we were an admin.
Expenses
Expense has an identical add/edit form as Sales Invoice, which is fine, however we faced an issue when assigning an expense account and adding a supplier in expense form.
Each time we tried to select an expense account, there were no options to choose from, but only “Account()”, which is a bug. As a result, we could not record any expense in Reach Accounting.
Reports
Even though Reach Accounting offers vital financial reports, none of them can be drilled down into. Such non-transparent representation is the one of the major turn-offs of accounting applications.