QuickBooks Synchronization vs. Integration

QuickBooks Synchronization vs. Integration

Having seen the success of DentaLab for QuickBooks, a number of other vendors began to advertise that their laboratory case management software integrated with QuickBooks or was compatible with QuickBooks.  So when reviewing the alternatives, a number of labs have asked us this question:

Is integration with QuickBooks the same as synchronization?

The answer emphatically is:  No

Synchronization has many advantages over integration, as it provides for transferring information both in and out of QuickBooks, for keeping the links for the various tables and the transaction records coordinated and accurate at all times. 

QuickBooks originally provided for integration through the creation of IIF files at intervals to bring information created in other systems into QuickBooks.  In our legacy systems, this was the only choice and required very careful, often manual, coordination between the two systems and remembering to integrate at the correct times.  Intuit has not dropped the use of IIF files, but discourages it.

Some say they are compatible with QuickBooks because the ask you to take advantage of the easy export of customers, employees, and items from QuickBooks into a variety of formats.  This is also quite different than synchronization.    

Synchronization was offered by Intuit to selected developers and provides many benefits, including these:

• Synchronization means that separate systems now work hand-in-hand as though they were one. It is a step above integration and compatibility via export/import steps.
• The standards, methods and look and feel are coordinated so that once one learns one system, it is easy to continue on with the other.
• Data is typically entered only once, eliminating the time and errors involved in multiple entries for the same data.
• Updates are immediate, as there is no need for exporting from one and then importing into the other at specific intervals.
• Data is not lost or mismatched due to forgetting to export and import or to enter at more than one point.
• Synchronization brings together the benefits of mass-marketed software funded by millions of users with the benefits of expertise involved in a smaller but more specific industry.
• Synchronized software results in a richer, more comprehensive, more complete set of features at an affordable cost.

DentaLab for QuickBooks was developed in conjunction with the Intuit Developers Network and  is the only dental laboratory case management system that is truly synchronized with QuickBooks.  

If you have further questions…

You can contact the support team at Mainstreet Systems at:

Voice :  215-256-4535
Fax:        215-256-1594
Email:    support@mainstreet-systems.com
Skype:  mainstreet-systems
Web:     http://www.mainstreet-systems.com or www.mainstreetsystems.net