Financial software has key advantages over bank Web sites
By Matt Krantz
USA Today
Personal finance software programs are the computer industry's version of veggies: Everyone knows they're good for you, but it's just hard to get anyone excited about them.
After all, if you're like most people and track your bank accounts and investments casually, you don't really need fancy software to do it. You can simply bop onto the Web sites run by your bank and brokerage to check balances and stock holdings.
And if you're a financial control freak who tracks every penny, you probably already use such software and are in no rush to spend another $40 or more for the latest version.
That leaves the leading makers of personal finance software, Intuit and Microsoft, in the difficult position of attempting to win over consumers who think they don't need personal finance software or think what they already have is good enough as they release Quicken 2005 Premier and Money 2005 Premium, now hitting shelves.
To help you figure out whether you're better off with personal finance software or just using a financial Web site, USA Today takes a look at some of the most common things people do to manage their money.
Monitoring your finances overall: Software vs. Web sites
• The edge: Personal finance software.
If there's one thing personal finance software excels at, it's pulling together all your financial information in a single place. Both Money 2005 and Quicken 2005 can show you, on one screen, how much money you have, how much you owe, and when all your bills are due. Both Quicken and Money do a better job at this than the alternative: surfing all of your bank and brokerage sites individually.
Storing financial information
• The edge: Personal finance software.
Ever wonder how much you spent on your cousin's wedding gift three years ago? Want to look up how much your rent was six years ago? Because Quicken and Money store all of your financial information on the hard drive on your computer, you get a long-term record that you can copy and make back-ups of.
That's a vast improvement from what some banks' Web sites offer: six months of past transactions at best.
Keeping tabs on your balances
• The edge: Banks' Web sites.
No matter how easy Quicken and Money get, if all you want to do is see your current bank balance, it's hard to compete with the bank's own Web site or just getting a receipt from the ATM. Neither requires any software, just a user name and password.
Create a budget
• The edge: Personal finance software.
Everyone talks about putting together a budget to track spending, but few actually do it, because it can take so much time. Because personal finance software already has a record of all your financial information, you can easily put together a budget, literally by clicking a few onscreen buttons.
Depending on how nitty-gritty you want to get with your budget, Money 2005 adds both an "essential" and "advanced" budget.
Long-term planning
• The edge: Personal finance software.
If you're looking for some guidance about whether you're saving enough money, both Money and Quicken do a fine job. Both will help you estimate what your net worth will be in the future and make suggestions on how to improve your financial picture.
Don't expect to find anything like this from your bank's Web site.
