Moving away from FMS

[seanmh]

Due to the sudden death of our Bursar, a new appointment has been made the persons involved (including myself and our accountant) are quite unfamiliar with FMS and having used it for the last week or so have come to learn just how awkward it is to do things on.

As this is the end of the financial year our accountant has suggested dumping FMS once the year end is done and moving over to Sage. Some schools he supports use Sage and he has said that it is alot more simple to use and understand.

We are a foundation school and whilst we process our own orders/invoices etc payroll is done externally with us only having to import a file via automatic reconsilliation etc.

Has anyone moved away from FMS to another accounting system e.g. Sage?

If so what problems/limitation/gotchas are there? also what possitive aspects are there of doing this?

Thanks

[mjs_mjs]

My mum uses Sage for my dads business and for her dayjob. It's nice to install and update, support is good and tbh it looks nice (FMS is stuck in win 95 looks). It's simple to use and flexible. It doesn't do other things like asset register that FMS can do but it's very nice at doing accounts. I can ask me mother for more info/screen prints but she isn't employed in a school!

[SpuffMonkey]

I wish I could get our lot to dump FMS - hideous software. Do bear in mind though - theres a bit more to implementing a new accounting package than just installing it - will your accountant be doing all of that for you?

[matt40k]

Would it matter about the lack of Personnel integration?

[Sarconia]

Have you considered using Quick Books as well? I think it's cheaper than Sage...

[AIT]

+ 1 for sage.

[AngryTechnician]

Have you considered using Quick Books as well? I think it's cheaper than Sage...

It is, but I wouldn't recommend it. Last year a small business using QuickBooks that I do some IT support for ran into a bug with their annual tax return that Intuit support spent days trying to fix, then eventually said "We give up," and hung them out to dry. They had to file on paper that year instead.

[Sarconia]

Cor, scrap that then... That is extremely poor customer service. I only suggested it because I used to use it occasionally on one of my previous jobs and never had any issues.

[Cools]

Think Before you leave FMS you will have a lot of setting up on your new package.
and FMS was Built for schools in mind, sage is mainly Corp/SME business based package, have a look at FPS from RM if you want to move at least you will not need to spend hours setting it up. see if your LEA has a lic for you if so get them to send you a disk out.


We are moving to FMS as its easier and we can do asset tracking / managing

[synaesthesia]

I can't say anything about FMS or Sage (Sage is nice and easy to use from a business POV but in a school, I don't know) but I will warn against Quickbooks - buggy software and a diabolical support system. Their solution for fixing a large bug stopping you from printing reports is to buy a patch/newer version. And to find that out involves spending £1 a minute to their knowledgeless helpline.
Funnily enough that exact site is moving to Sage

[PhilNeal]

Also don't forget the electronic ordering which can save you more than you pay for the software!

[PhilNeal]

"so have come to learn just how awkward it is to do things on."

My guess is that you haven't had training and haven't discovered short cuts. FMS is hugely popular in 1000's of schools, even when people move away from SIMS they stick with FMS. I know it looks dated!

[mjs_mjs]

As payroll is done externally, there would be no need for personnel to be linked with FMS. You could still manage your personnel from within sims.net surely.

Yes FMS is set up for school/educational use but a good book keeper/accountant/bursar/someone with the sage for dummies book should have no trouble doing that within sage either. It'll be allot more flexible than FMS. The software is only as good as the person sitting in front of it.