Which Version of QuickBooks do I need?

Payroll deductions change every year or at least the Federal Income tax tables do. If you have not updated your payroll tables in a while your federal income withholding has been incorrect for 2007.

Is there any way of updating the payroll tables & formulas in OneWrite?

A good third party payroll company is paycycle. I've heard horror stories about ADP and Paychex. Both of which are very expensive. Bank of America also offers low cost payroll for their banking customers. I have read that it is Paycycle hiding in the background. If payroll is the only reason for switching then I would find a payroll solution instead of a new program. Why fix what ain't broke.

Since you brought up Peachtree, I will try and give you a comparison of the

You might look at Peachtree again. It has a lot of the features that OneWrite has. You can also do your payroll manually if you don't want to purchase the payroll service. If you only have a few employees or your payroll is basic then the manual route works fine and is quick to set up.

I would not bother doing a data transfer to your chosen program. Most conversion utilities cause more work than it is worth. I would start a new company using the 12/31/07 trial balance from OW and go from there. If you can dump the vendor/customer info into excel you can easily setup an import of this information into Peachtree and, I believe, Quickbooks.

I would stear clear of the QB Starter edition. It is too basic a program for most people's businesses. If you want QB then get Pro.

If you want Peachtree either Pro or Complete will suit your needs. BTW, Staples and Office max run a rebate program several times a year that enables you to get Pro for free.

You can do a Sales receipt for a customer. In QB Pro & Peachtree you can also memorize it to reuse it each week. You can also set up a detailed journal entry that you memorize so that you have better control over the accounting.

With QB you have to set up Items that point to the G/L accounts for all income related activity. For expenses you specify the account on the form. In Peachtree you specify the G/L account on the screen for both income and expenses giving you greater control over the accounting. Using Items in Peachtree is typically only used for Inventory purposes.

QB will "remember" the last account used for a vendor. You can not specify a default G/L account for a vendor. You can do this in Peachtree in the vendor and customer profiles.

Also, the starter program will not allow you to enter a bill to be paid later. If you need to use A/P then you need at least the Pro version of QB. Even the Items used to map income to the G/L are limited to simple setups. No inventory. No way to memorize transactions that I can see.

Most people like the QB payroll once they have it set up. It does require that you know how your payroll should be set up. It also does a lot of account mapping in the background which may or may not be to your liking. I prefer knowing exactly what accounts are being used and I want full control over the mapping but that's just the way I was taught bookkeeping.

Peachtree also has a payroll program that integrates nicely with the program. I find it easier to setup than QB. It also now has the ability to print plain paper payroll tax forms.

Hope this gets you thinking about the programs. Download trial versions of both programs so that you can get a feel for how things work. Or research payroll options.

The entry level version of QuickBooks is given away for free, no charge, zip, Nada. The old adage you get what your pay for could not be more true when it comes to this version. Big Al will say no more on this topic.