Handpicked Software

If you’re a consultant or Web designer–or attorney, freelance writer, or wedding planner–iWork is the perfect program for managing your business. Why spend a bundle on QuickBooks or another finance program that forces you to think like an accountant? iWork is specifically designed to work the way you work: managing clients, projects, estimates, events, retainers, invoices, and payments. Why use a program that looks like it’s been grafted onto the Mac, with a dumbed down interface (hey, we know what checks look like; do we really need to fill out virtual ones to manage our finances)? iWork is designed for OS X, with a polished interface, brushed metal appearance, and drawers. And it integrates seamlessly with your other OS X applications, like Address Book, iCal, and Mail.

iWork is intuitive and easy to use. It adds an iWork Clients group to your Address Book. Drag and drop clients into this special group and they automatically appear in the client list in the main iWork window (you can also add clients from within iWork). Select a client and create a project. You can list all projects for all clients in the projects list, or just projects for the selected client. Add Job Events to a project as you work on the project. There are several types of Job Events: Timed, Flat Rate, Quantity, Payment, or Group (group events let you hide sub-events to avoid clutter in your invoices). Job Events can be taxable (you can specify the rate) or non-taxable, and you can add a markup.

Once you’ve created a new project for a client, it’s easy to manage project information and events. A Project Info drawer lets you manage estimates, payments and retainers, and add project notes. You can add To Do items and sync them with iCal. You can also add project files to a File Cabinet tab in the Project Info drawer. When you open an associated file, iWork can automatically time your work, adding it either to an existing event or creating a new event. You can also time events by starting a Timer from the toolbar, or from an iWork status menu you can easily add to your Menu Bar. iWork can round up your time to a value you set and even alert you if your mouse has been inactive for a period of time, just in case you forgot to turn off the timer.

When you’ve completed a project, create an invoice with the supplied invoice template, edit it to create your own custom invoice, or use one of several additional templates available for download from the IGG Software website. You can print the completed invoice or email it as a text message or PDF attachment. iWork can also save a copy of the completed invoice in case you need to print it again.

You can also create reports with iWork. iWork can print a full text report (the template can also be edited to provide just the information you’re looking for), a pie chart of Job Events, or a graph showing your Earnings Per Project Through Time. These reports aren’t the most useful, and this is iWork’s one weakness. It would be more useful if the graphical charts were more flexible (showing income per month, for example).

If you collaborate with others on your projects, you can share information over a network. Install iWork Server on one computer, and users with the iWork Client can access the same data. iWork Server is $74.99 and includes two iWork Clients.

Bottom Line: iWork makes managing your business a breeze, so you can focus on making money instead of wondering if you’ve been paid. And it saves you money at the same time. It’s uncluttered and easy to use (so you can be more efficient), while offering the most important features at a bargain price.
From: IGG Software
Price: $29.99; $39.99 for Business Package (with iBank)