FreshBooks Reviews

FreshBooks has helped us simplify and streamline our financial operations while maintaining security and organization.

Here's the skinny on FreshBooks (the good, the bad, and the ugly):

The Good:
You can't beat the visual dashboard for tracking outstanding and past payments for clients. It's a great billing system for small businesses and especially consultants or freelancers. The recurring billing/invoicing system is FAB!

Like many platforms these days, Freshbooks showcases a library of "add-ons" to help enhance your experience. Some of the best ones (in my book, as a tech consultant and marketer) are Hubspot, Shopify, Mailchimp, Bidsketch, BaseCamp, and Podio.

There's a decent time tracking feature, along with the ability to track expenses. You can create/assign staff to project billing. Of course, you can issue "estimates" to prospects for future projects. As you send invoices through the Freshbooks system, it will log "sent" emails for you. And the system is designed to handle manual invoices for snail mail as well.

Each client/business that you bill receives their own "login" to your dashboard to view their invoice(s). This is a nice touch, as clients may often "misplace" that original email with your invoice in it...

It integrates very nicely with Stripe and PayPal (although I hear that may be changing - what? I know) plus Freshbooks has its own payment feature. I never have issues with payments, they always come through the system promptly (for online playing, 24-48 hours, the norm).

The Bad:
I'm not a fan of the reporting feature, while it's functional, it doesn't allow enough flexibility that a diverse consultant such as myself would like (need) to have. There are several reporting functions for each core feature (Accounting, Clients, Invoicing, and Time Tracking). But no option for custom reporting, which I often need as my diverse array of clientele has different process, set-ups, etc. At the very least, I would like to be able to customize the built-in reports on some level. I've not found an add-on that would assist me with this pain point.

The Ugly:
Finally, sadly, the worst thing I have to say about FreshBooks is that the Android app is greatly lacking. As the years (and technology) progress, that could eventually become a deal breaker. All the features in the world won't do a consultant much good if all of those same features can't be accessed via mobile device. We're ALL mobile these days, doncha know.

However, if you split your time between desktop/Mac and mobile, then Freshbooks is well worth a look!

I think there are less expensive services but none do what I need as well as Freshbooks.

FreshBooks is overall a good software, at least if your needs are not too complex. I keep however facing issues with a few features, such a bank reconciliation that never are accurate or complete. Customer service takes a bit too long to respond, although will in the end listen. Seems however that said issues are not to be fixed very soon...

My overall experience on this tool was very satisfied

Freshbook was fast and quick

It was rated well, so I expected better performance. Reconciling the small transactions I get from health insurance companies is very time consuming and it seems like there should be a better way to add those payments without having to manually enter each one when I have to reconcile.
Invoices default to "accrual" accounting which is a pain if you use cash-based accounting (which I do).
Overall, I have not been able to have accurate business numbers (profit/loss) for months because trying to figure out how to add payroll info has been so challenging.

FreshBooks was founded by someone that wanted to make a great product for small businesses to do invoicing and time tracking, that focus is obviously gone and the focus revolves around their payment processing.

FreshBooks is exceptional in its simplicity of use, making it a great choice for any business's accounting needs. In the beginning, it helped us save time by allowing us to automate a few procedures. Create polished invoices that will impress your customers in no time at all.

Easy-to-use: Freshbooks A lot of functions are available and you can get started in a short period of time. Clients will love this for making payments. Freshbooks' user-friendliness and the fact that all of my clients are saved there are two things I really like. All of my client data has been held there for more than a decade.

Freshbooks does manage the following VERY well: Time tracking against projects and clients; invoice creation based on tracked time; and one-off invoices or flat rate pricing. I also like the clean and easy to navigate interface.Generating and reading historical reports is quick and easy to determine things like, how quickly specific clients are paying (and who is historically slower at paying), income by client and income by project/work type.The phone app is functional for my needs, although it's a little clunky and not nearly as full featured as the desktop software. It's not bad, but not great. I have successfully tracked time on the app, then issued an invoice from my phone to my client's email inbox.Overall, Freshbook fulfills my needs as a consultant.

Able to run and invoice quickly. Add the strong integration that it has with Freshdesk for ticketing and my time tracking - it has allowed me to better streamline my operations.

We've used Freshbooks for quite sometime now in our business. When searching for billing software, I needed something smoothe, mobile and also that allowed for customer portals that could be branded to our company. This was a big deal for us, so we absolutely wanted to make sure it was a feature in whatever software it was and Freshbooks did just that.

Freshbooks is super easy to use and handles everything from the customer accounts, to the invoicing to recurring charges and credits. At the end of the year, all the clients get a statement of their services they have paid for, and they never have to contact us about anything. They can review their bills at any time, and also accept estimates that are put together. It also is fabulous for integrations, and we currently use Google Apps, Gusto HQ and a few others to make it that much more effective.

Before the drastic change to the new format, it was excellent. Made my job so much easier, and me so much more effective. It was really a great product. Now, since the new format has been forced on me, it has been nothing but frustrating to use. They didn't just change it a little, they completely revamped everything and made it far inferior to what it once was. For me anyways, it is no longer "user friendly". It is no longer an effective tool. The only reason we haven't switched to someone else is because of the 10 years of history we have saved in the program. We would lose all of that if we switched, so unfortunately we are stuck with having to use this horrible new format.

Overall I cant fault the product and would definitely recommend it to any business owner. The only thing I wish was possible, is to pay in my local currency for budgeting purposes.

I have found the platform to be very user-friendly and efficient. It has made my job of managing expenses, invoicing clients, and tracking time much easier and more streamlined. I particularly appreciate the ability to create and customize invoices quickly and easily, which has helped me to get paid more promptly and accurately.One of the things that I find particularly useful is the ability to access Freshbooks from anywhere, as it is cloud-based and accessible on multiple devices. This has made it easy for me to work remotely and stay up-to-date on my accounting tasks while on the go.Overall, my experience with Freshbooks has been very positive, and I would recommend it to other people who need to manage finances for their companies. While there are some areas where more customization options or integrations could be beneficial, the platform is generally reliable and efficient. I appreciate the value that Freshbooks provides, and it has become an essential tool for me in my job.

FreshBooks helps me do the essential tasks of invoices and expenses while also helping me get a big picture view of my business's financial health.

This is a review of Freshbooks Classic. They have just come out with a new version that I am not using due to a lack of addins at this early stage.

I use Freshbooks to invoice my customers for the time and materials I spend on their products. I have recurring invoices that automatically bill my customers on the first of the month for their monthly recurring services and any labor I may have spent on their project for for support.

Freshbooks definitely makes the invoicing process simple and easy. I don't have to worry about manually creating invoices each month. A big time saver. It also provides several different ways for the customer to pay their invoice including credit card and PayPal (PayPal is not an option in the new version of Freshbooks).

But Freshbooks doesn't make the time tracking simple. Since most of my charges are based off time spent working on customer products, I need a powerful Timer tool. Freshbooks does not supply that tool. They have a very rudimentary tool that is browser based. You click start, select your Project and Task, then press stop when completed. Life isn't that simple.

I may be working for one client when another calls on the phone. I would have to stop the existing timer, select a new project/task, start the timer again, then after stopping it, go through the whole process again to go back my original task. Awful.

Instead I had to purchase a desktop based tool called Chronomate that is so much more powerful. It even knows when I've stepped away from desk and forgot to stop the timer. It also uploads to Freshbooks so I don't have to manage anything. Bliss. Of course the developer isn't maintaining it anymore so it doesn't work with the new version of Freshbooks. Crud.

Because of the lack of a decent time tracking tool I won't be updating to the new version of Freshbooks anytime soon.

The most significant thing with this product is efficient. I adore everything about FreshBooks. It is a great application for specialists and little organizations. I have been utilizing it for as long as couple of years and rate it the best programming in the market. At whatever point I had issues, the help group helped me to determine them rapidly with successful arrangements.

The last year has been horrible, absolutely horrible. This is a dishonest company in my opinion, but the biggest thing was last night after a week or more of begging to have access to my data after the subscription ended Zac, a support specialist decides at 7pm without me asking to access my data, download it to his computer and emailed all the documents to me over an insecure interface. I called and talked with customer service and was promised a call from management before the end of the day to discuss and that never happened. I told the woman I spoke with today that I didn't trust someone would call me back and she promised and of course, no one did. Then when I call back at EOD my phone number is blocked and all I get is an email saying essentially it was a mistake and we all make them and it's not their normal way of handling this, basically, an oops sorry. They clearly have no care for client data security and their security practices seem to be so cavalier from this experience they should never handle anyone's data. Their customer service didn't hesitate to flat out lie to me or management turned them into liars whichever it is. Please don't support this company.