If you're keeping business books using Excel and Word, you'll be happy to learn there's a better way. Microsoft has announced Microsoft Office Small Business Accounting (Office SBA for short), aimed at making life easier for spreadsheet bookkeepers.
Although it's still in beta, I had a chance to put the new software through its paces. I found that Office SBA plugs a yawning gap in Microsoft's product line that Intuit's QuickBooks has very successfully exploited. Office SBA is aimed at businesses that have outgrown Excel for spreadsheet-style books but aren't quite ready to move up to Microsoft's more capable Small Business Manager Accounting ($995 for a single user).
Office SBA permits up to five concurrent users, and it can import QuickBooks data. Microsoft has already targeted small-business users with Microsoft Office Small Business Edition 2003 and Microsoft Office Outlook 2003 with Business Contact Manager.
This same small-business market now served by Intuit's QuickBooks and by Peachtree and Simply Accounting, both from Best Software. However, Office SBA offers a user interface with the familiar look and feel of Microsoft Office 2003, along with a high degree of integration with that suite.
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