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2013 Review of InsynQ

Brian Tankersley

Jul. 29, 2013

Best Firm Fit: Organizations who use professional tax and accounting applications from multiple providers. InsynQ has a particularly strong reputation for successfully dealing with the challenges of hosting Lacerte Tax and ProSeries Tax Professional, which challenge many providers. Also, as the only provider in this review which offer hosting of Canadian tax and accounting applications on servers based in Canada, firms with operations in both the US and Canada may be particularly interested in this company’s offerings.

Strengths:

  • Has one of the most automated company and user setup tools of those companies which commercially host applications and servers for accounting professionals and their firms. InsynQ is one of the more established hosting companies serving the accounting and bookkeeping sector.
  • Provides hosting services for QuickBooks, Sage 50, Sage 100 ERP, numerous QuickBooks extensions, Microsoft Office, Microsoft Project, and Microsoft Exchange. InsynQ also hosts contact management/CRM applications such as Sage ACT!, Goldmine, Results CRM, and Microsoft Dynamics CRM.
  • One of two companies in this review (along with Cloud9 Real Time) which offer separate hosting services for Canadian accountants and clients, and the only one who offers an optional, separate Canadian server farm location.
  • Supports the broadest range of tax software, including US income tax offerings from Intuit, CCH, Drake, and Thomson Reuters, Canadian income tax applications, and sales tax calculation and filing applications from CCH and Avalara.
  • Excellent library of self-help documents and white papers explaining common terms and issues surrounding hosted desktops.

Potential Limitations:

  • Some of the older virtual desktops are hosted on Windows Server 2003, which is nearing its end of life.
  • The Company’s primary US data centers are in the Northwest US, and while this may be attractive to firms in that region, it may represent a drawback to firms in the Southeast.

Overview:

InsynQ is one of the largest and best established hosting companies focused on the accounting industry. The company has offered commercial hosting services for over 15 years, and was one of the first online software hosting companies. The Company’s offerings are segmented into three tiers, accounting application hosting, business application hosting, and custom server hosting.

  • Accounting Application Hosting provides remote data storage and access for any of the last three versions of QuickBooks Pro, Premier, or Enterprise Solutions, Sage 50 (US Edition) and Sage 50 (Canada Edition). The company supports many common QuickBooks add-on applications such as SmartVault, Bill.com, SpringAhead, Method Integration, ACCTivate!, Qvinci, and Transaction Pro Importer.
  • Business Solution Hosting provides access to commonly used productivity and management tools, including Microsoft Office, Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft Project, as well as contact management and CRM applications such as Microsoft Dynamics CRM, Sage ACT!, Goldmine, and Results CRM.
  • Custom Server Hosting provides the ability to host almost any application on a custom server maintained by InsynQ, and details are available upon request. Many common applications used by accounting professionals are supported only in a “Custom Server” configuration, including Adobe Acrobat Standard/Pro, Sage 100 ERP, industry specific versions of QuickBooks Enterprise, Sage Master Builder and Office Tools Pro, as well as professional tax and accounting suites from Thomson Reuters, CCH/Wolters Kluwer, Intuit, Drake, and others. The company also hosts instances of Microsoft SQL server for custom in-house applications.

InsynQ is able to provide multi-tiered access controls to data so that accounting professionals can have access to some data stored by clients (and vice-versa, if desired). Access to client data can also be limited so that users do not automatically have access to all files and data.

The company supports hosting clients and also provides end user support to PC and Mac users from its headquarters in Gig Harbor, Washington. The support center is HDI certified, and many of the company’s support personnel have individual HDI certifications as well.

InsynQ’s US Hosting facilities are all located in the Northwest US (Canadian facilities are in Southwestern Canada) at public, Tier III data centers run by reputable providers. Custom tools like IQ DataLocker are available to help firms move large amounts of data to and from the hosting environment.

Support is available from 6:00 AM to 6:00 PM PT, Monday through Friday. Support is delivered in a variety of methods, including e-mail, chat, remote support connection, and telephone. Emergency support is available after hours and on holidays 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, every day of the year. Documentation to help end users and their IT support professionals connect computers, tablets, printers, and scanners to the securely hosted applications and data are available from the Company’s support website.

Summary and Pricing:
Pricing varies by implementation and is listed on the company’s website.