Quicken Update Highlights Web
Like rival Money, Intuit's Quicken 2003 emphasizes links to online resources over minor desktop revamp.Mike Hogan, special to PCWorld.com
Intuit is unveiling an update to its Quicken personal finance manager that plunks a new interface onto the already full-featured money manager, so it resembles archrival Microsoft Money even more than previous versions.
Quicken 2003 is scheduled to be available August 21 in several configurations. Prices start at $30 for the Basic edition (comparable to Microsoft Money 2003 Standard edition, priced at $35, with a $10 mail-in rebate). Quicken 2003 Deluxe is priced at $60; Quicken 2003 Premiere, $80; and Quicken Premiere Home & Business, $90. For all but the basic package, customers who upgrade from earlier editions of Quicken can get a $20 mail-in rebate.
Microsoft updated Money to its current edition earlier in August. Its high-end product, Microsoft Money 2003 Deluxe, is priced at $65 (with a $20 mail-in rebate). Also available is the $85 Microsoft Money 2002 Deluxe & Business (with $20 mail-in rebate). Microsoft Money 2003 Suite: Finance, Tax & Legal, is scheduled for release in October priced at $95 (also with $20 mail-in rebate).
Each edition of the Quicken family offers successively more functions. Quicken 2003 Basic provides checkbook-balancing, bill-paying, and tools to track spending. More finance management tools are added in Deluxe, such as tax-preparation and savings tools, as well as investment monitoring. The Premiere edition adds more portfolio management tools and retirement planning, and the combination program (Home & Business) includes Quicken 2003 Premiere plus invoice management and business tax tools.
Online Focus
With the release of the Quicken 2003 update, the programs are becoming indistinguishable, particularly at the high end. Each has cosmetic differences, but each also has every tool, wizard, and report a money manager could need.
The significant change this season is the apparent sacrifice of Quicken's straightforward interface to a goal that's long been a Money objective: making the customer an aggressive consumer of online financial services. Both programs are now heavily laden with ads, alerts, and advice links that whisk you away to pages where the services of the publishers and their partners are conspicuously handy. You can experience these so-called benefits using last year's software. The new versions offer no significant new features, although some old ones have been slightly tweaked and/or relocated.
Already an effective desktop gateway for now-and-future Microsoft.Net services, Money 2003 got just a nip and a tuck. One noteworthy new feature is Tax Estimator 2003, which compares last year's and this year's tax line items side-by-side, and estimates this year's obligation or refund. That information helps Capital Gains Estimator show you how your tax obligation changes for different stock sales.
But Microsoft reserves most of its innovation for the MSN.com Web site, which can only be unlocked if you sign up for a.Net Passport password. Through MSN Money, customers can get access to the Online Investing Research Center, which provides financial news feeds and various financial analysis tools and monitoring services, such as a customizable portfolio manager.
Desktop Changes
Some 16 million Quicken Premiere users will find more noticeable appearance changes: Intuit says it has made the interface more "task-oriented." But the changes may be disconcerting to current users. Quicken windows that used to brim with data and were easy to jump between are now dominated by active links to other parts of the program, similar to Money's design. The QuickTab Bar for navigating those windows is gone. Instead, you click a link for a task--say, investing--and Quicken assembles the tools and data it thinks you need.
Why the change? Intuit says it wants to make it easier for users to take action. It's probably no coincidence that, at least as far as investing goes, many new menu items take you to the new Quicken Brokerage section of the Quicken.com Web site, where customers can immediately begin filling in a buy or sell order.
A mid-priced competitor, Quicken Brokerage uploads your financial data from any version of Quicken, but only accepts tax-related data from Quicken 2003.
Current users of Quicken or Money may already be satisfied. Both applications are full-featured, and of course the easiest program to use is the one you already know. You can still have access to the Web services through the older versions of the programs.
Users who expect to purchase a lot of online services might like Money better. It is more tightly linked to its partner Web site, and MSN.com's service offerings are broader than Quicken.com's. Bundled with Money are one year of free online bill-paying service through MSN and one-time free online tax preparation and filing.