DIY Payroll Subscription Cancellation

[steve perney]

I am hoping someone here can help with this issue. I tried calling the DIY
payroll technical support folks and they basically did not have a clue!
(after reading this ng for the past year, I am sure this is no surprise to
anyone)

I am a CPA who will be preparing W-2's shortly for my clients. I have a
current subscription to the DIY Payroll and will be using QB2003. I use the
disk delivery option. The DIY payroll folks have been very cooperative over
the course of 2003 in providing me with service keys for all the clients for
whom I run the payrolls. As I get to year end however, a problem has
arisen. Many of my clients do their own payrolls and then give me the data
file to reconcile and print W-2's. Most of these people downloaded the
"free" payroll update when they did their installation and have not yet made
a decision regarding actually "paying" for the right to do payroll (whole
'nother topic!). This "free" update expires immediately, so they cannot get
any additional updates. Unfortunately, it also put a service key in the
payroll services. I called DIY to get my own service key for these clients
so that I can install the disk delivery update on MY system (all perfectly
legal in my license). Unfortunately, when I "edit" the payroll service and
type in the new service key, I get a message that says the existing payroll
service must be cancelled. It already shows as expired in the payroll
service window. Does anyone know how to "cancel" or delete the existing
service? I have already tried to simply "add" the new service and get the
same message about cancelling the existing service. Any thoughts would be
greatly appreciated.

signed
Confused in Cleveland

 

[Allan Martin]

I am hoping someone here can help with this issue. I tried calling the DIY
payroll technical support folks and they basically did not have a clue!
(after reading this ng for the past year, I am sure this is no surprise to
anyone)

I am a CPA who will be preparing W-2's shortly for my clients. I have a
current subscription to the DIY Payroll and will be using QB2003. I use the
disk delivery option. The DIY payroll folks have been very cooperative over
the course of 2003 in providing me with service keys for all the clients for
whom I run the payrolls. As I get to year end however, a problem has
arisen. Many of my clients do their own payrolls and then give me the data
file to reconcile and print W-2's. Most of these people downloaded the
"free" payroll update when they did their installation and have not yet made
a decision regarding actually "paying" for the right to do payroll (whole
'nother topic!).

There is no decision to be made. If they do not subscribe to the DIY service
or purchase an upgrade then the payroll functionality stops on Feb 15, 2004.
It is highly unlikely that once a client processes their payroll using
software that they will want to go back to doing it manually.

I am not 100% certain on this issue but I do believe what you are attempting
to do with the clients that process their own payroll constitutes a license
violation. Intuit has anti-piracy features built in to their software that
will not allow the use of a single payroll service subscription on more than
one instance of a licensed QB installation.

It is to bad that Mike Block does not post here any more I'm sure that he
would have the answer. However he was chased away by the likes of Tim, who I
am 100% certain will join this thread and cut and paste his boring diatribe
concerning payroll tax tables.









This "free" update expires immediately, so they cannot get

 

[Guest]

It is to bad that Mike Block does not post here any more I'm sure that he
would have the answer. However he was chased away by the likes of Tim, who I
am 100% certain will join this thread and cut and paste his boring diatribe
concerning payroll tax tables.

Oh, give us a break, will you?

Why didn't the tech support have an answer? Is it maybe because they
are incompetent?

And as another vocal critic of Mr Bock's inane, mindless, superficial,
manipulative, self-serving boardroom-worship drivel that he was
flooding this ng with, I say good riddance! If I was anyone at Intuit
I'd tell him to stop his uninhibited idolatry because he is not good
for the company's image.

To his credit, he did help a lot of posters with FAQ type questions
and if his site is still up it has a lot of relevant links and
information. The rest of his high corporate drama was annoying and
worthless.

==

 

[Allan Martin]

Oh, give us a break, will you?

Why didn't the tech support have an answer? Is it maybe because they
are incompetent?

It may be that they assumed that the caller was trying use a tax table
subscription purchased for one QB license
on files created with software purchased under a different license.
Sometimes its safer to play dumb.

And as another vocal critic of Mr Bock's inane, mindless, superficial,
manipulative, self-serving boardroom-worship drivel that he was
flooding this ng with, I say good riddance! If I was anyone at Intuit
I'd tell him to stop his uninhibited idolatry because he is not good
for the company's image.

To his credit, he did help a lot of posters with FAQ type questions
and if his site is still up it has a lot of relevant links and
information. The rest of his high corporate drama was annoying and
worthless.

Personally I got a real kick out of it. It was nice to see someone that
really took pride in what they sold and suported.

 

[Guest]

Personally I got a real kick out of it. It was nice to see someone that
really took pride in what they sold and suported.

It can be funny for a bit but, after a while, regurgitating discarded
marketing meeting notes to impress QB users with his assumed Intuit's
Divinity Of Purpose got to be annoying as hell.

I'd love to see a real QB current or ex employee here to give us some
insight of why the un-thinkers at QB completely disregard any notion
of producing a decent, efficient, usable and fairly priced software
tool for small business owners.

==

 

[Allan Martin]

It can be funny for a bit but, after a while, regurgitating discarded
marketing meeting notes to impress QB users with his assumed Intuit's
Divinity Of Purpose got to be annoying as hell.

I'd love to see a real QB current or ex employee here to give us some
insight of why the un-thinkers at QB completely disregard any notion
of producing a decent, efficient, usable and fairly priced software
tool for small business owners.

They are to busy producing one of the best small business products on the
market today.

 

[steve perney]

There is no decision to be made. If they do not subscribe to the DIY service
or purchase an upgrade then the payroll functionality stops on Feb 15, 2004.
It is highly unlikely that once a client processes their payroll using
software that they will want to go back to doing it manually.

I am not 100% certain on this issue but I do believe what you are attempting
to do with the clients that process their own payroll constitutes a license
violation. Intuit has anti-piracy features built in to their software that
will not allow the use of a single payroll service subscription on more than
one instance of a licensed QB installation.

From my conversations with the DIY payroll people, I believe that I am
within my license agreement so long as I process the W-2's from my office
and do not install the tax tables on my client's machines. I am not
concerned with payroll functionality beyond February 15, 2004 at the client
location, I am concerned with printing W-2's in my office where the printer
has already been properly aligned to quickly produce W-2's. When I called
to get the service keys under my "active" subscription, I fully explained
what I was going to do for my clients, and they had no problem with
providing service keys. So I again go back to my original question
regarding how to "cancel" an expired subscription in a data file? Can
anyone help? I remember Mike Block from many posts in the past but do not
have a link to his website. If you feel this would be useful could someone
repost the link?

 

[steve perney]

Oh, give us a break, will you?

Why didn't the tech support have an answer? Is it maybe because they
are incompetent?

When I spoke with the DIY tech support people, they tried to help but
insisted that I should be able to simply type in the new service key and it
would work. I then got the usual response that this was beyond their level
of expertise but I could call another number to speak with the QB tech
support people. I was informed that unless I had purchased a "service
plan", I would have to PAY for that call. I chose not to call.

 

[Allan Martin]

From my conversations with the DIY payroll people, I believe that I am
within my license agreement so long as I process the W-2's from my office
and do not install the tax tables on my client's machines. I am not
concerned with payroll functionality beyond February 15, 2004 at the client
location, I am concerned with printing W-2's in my office where the printer
has already been properly aligned to quickly produce W-2's. When I called
to get the service keys under my "active" subscription, I fully explained
what I was going to do for my clients, and they had no problem with
providing service keys. So I again go back to my original question
regarding how to "cancel" an expired subscription in a data file? Can
anyone help? I remember Mike Block from many posts in the past but do not
have a link to his website. If you feel this would be useful could someone
repost the link?

This issue is covered in Intuits knowledge base on their web site. Why
wouldn't you be concerned with the fact that your clients' payroll will stop
functioning on 2/15/2003? At the very least they should be made aware of
this fact. There is very little if any special aligning required for
printing W-2s.

 

[Jeff]

Steve.
Go to www.bloctax.com
Jeff

From my conversations with the DIY payroll people, I believe that I am
within my license agreement so long as I process the W-2's from my office
and do not install the tax tables on my client's machines. I am not
concerned with payroll functionality beyond February 15, 2004 at the client
location, I am concerned with printing W-2's in my office where the printer
has already been properly aligned to quickly produce W-2's. When I called
to get the service keys under my "active" subscription, I fully explained
what I was going to do for my clients, and they had no problem with
providing service keys. So I again go back to my original question
regarding how to "cancel" an expired subscription in a data file? Can
anyone help? I remember Mike Block from many posts in the past but do not
have a link to his website. If you feel this would be useful could someone
repost the link?

 

[Jeff]

Steve,
Sorry 'bout the 1st post - the right address is www.blocktax.com
Jeff

 

[steve perney]

This issue is covered in Intuits knowledge base on their web site. Why
wouldn't you be concerned with the fact that your clients' payroll will stop
functioning on 2/15/2003? At the very least they should be made aware of
this fact. There is very little if any special aligning required for
printing W-2s.

I did not mean to give the impression that I am unconcerned about my clients
Payroll Tax Tables after 2/15/2004. However this post was not intended to
start a discussion about the payroll tax update policy and sunset rules of
Intuit. I and my clients are all having the discussion regarding whether it
makes more sense for them to pay $169 for the DIY payroll update to their
QB2003 or to purchase QB2004 Basic at a lower price after rebate and get the
"free" one time payroll tax table. Each client has to make this decision
based on their own facts and circumstances.

With respect to the alignment of W-2's, that is only one part of the issue.
Mostly, the client sends me their qbb file via email and then I can have an
associate in my office do the W-2 work. If I had to physically travel to
each client's office during January and print W-2's from their system, I
would have time to do very little else during that month. I did not have
this issue in the past, as I and 95% of my clients were all using QB99. My
tax subscription for QB99 allowed me to work with as many client data files
as necessary without getting separate service keys. It is only since the
"forced" upgrade to QB2003 that this problem has surfaced.

Thanks for the tip on the QB knowledge base. I previously did a search on
the key work "cancel payroll" and came up with nothing useful. Can you
offer more information regarding where I should look on the QB website?

 

[Tim Kroesen]

You are a speculative idiot Allan; what will it take to chase you away
from posting on threads in which you add nothing but spank?

Truth be told you have no notion whatsoever why Block doesn't post here
anymore; perhaps his handlers at Intuit barred him because of all the
negativity he attracted to the product with his unwavering shilling?
Perhaps *he* has a business to run unlike you apparently? In nearly
Three Years here I never managed to chase him off; that is a fact beyond
repute.

See; no diatribe whatsoever about Intuit ripping-off yet another
customer; because the customer *already knows* exactly how he's about to
be ripped-off. Why not try and peddle him some of your brand of pay-fer
'support' too...?

Tim K

 

[Tim Kroesen]

....you really mean they are too busy manipulating every dime possible
out of the customer; fairly or not...

Tim K

 

[Tim Kroesen]

Steve; how do you feel about recommending this product to your
customers???

Remember; this program now amounts to an 'accounting s/w service' that
your customer must pay into ad infinitum. A 'service' that is pleased
to offer *your replacement* en program might I add...

That's the way my Ohio CPA sees the situation BTW...

Tim K

 

[steve perney]

Steve; how do you feel about recommending this product to your
customers???

Remember; this program now amounts to an 'accounting s/w service' that
your customer must pay into ad infinitum. A 'service' that is pleased
to offer *your replacement* en program might I add...

That's the way my Ohio CPA sees the situation BTW...

Tim K

Tim:
I am still recommending QB to my clients. As I mentioned in a related
reply, most of my clients stayed with QB99 for four years until "forced" to
upgrade because of the sunset policy. (if we could have continued to get
payroll updates for QB99, I would have lived without the patches and
technical support. QB99 was a terrific basic bookkeeping software package)
My initial plan was to allow them to stay with QB2003 for four years (and
some may still choose this route) however it may be more cost effective to
buy the new version of QB Basic each year. I am still evaluating that
alternative.

Unfortunately, most of my clients do not have a great deal of accounting
knowledge nor do they want to invest much of their time in learning new
software. The big advantage that QB has over some of the other products I
have worked with (MYOB, Peachtree, Creative Solutions, MAS90, to name a few)
is that it is relatively easy for the non accountant to use and very easy
for the outside accountant (CPA) to fix the clients mistakes. Peachtree has
improved tremendously over the last few releases but is also more costly
than QB and I believe Peachtree also charges for a payroll subscription. I
know Mike Block is gone from this ng, but he did always have a valid point
in that QB will continue to dominate the small business accounting software
market until another competitor can match the price to value that QB
provides. I certaintly hope that competitor comes along soon, but until
they do, I will continue to recommend QB to clients.

Steve

 

[Guest]

They are to busy producing one of the best small business products on the
market today.

He he... It can't even sort! Are you purposefully ignorant now or do
you want to just start an argument?

==

 

[Allan Martin]

I used "expired subscription"

I did not mean to give the impression that I am unconcerned about my clients
Payroll Tax Tables after 2/15/2004. However this post was not intended to
start a discussion about the payroll tax update policy and sunset rules of
Intuit. I and my clients are all having the discussion regarding whether it
makes more sense for them to pay $169 for the DIY payroll update to their
QB2003 or to purchase QB2004 Basic at a lower price after rebate and get the
"free" one time payroll tax table. Each client has to make this decision
based on their own facts and circumstances.

With respect to the alignment of W-2's, that is only one part of the issue.
Mostly, the client sends me their qbb file via email and then I can have an
associate in my office do the W-2 work. If I had to physically travel to
each client's office during January and print W-2's from their system, I
would have time to do very little else during that month. I did not have
this issue in the past, as I and 95% of my clients were all using QB99. My
tax subscription for QB99 allowed me to work with as many client data files
as necessary without getting separate service keys. It is only since the
"forced" upgrade to QB2003 that this problem has surfaced.

Thanks for the tip on the QB knowledge base. I previously did a search on
the key work "cancel payroll" and came up with nothing useful. Can you
offer more information regarding where I should look on the QB website?

 

[Allan Martin]

Tim, my man. I knew you would pop in on this one. I read your book.

 

[Tim Kroesen]

....and you brought your box of Crayons...<g>

Tim K