Money Plus Deluxe | Money Plus Deluxe - Good but needs a serious upgrade

Money Plus Deluxe | Product activation problems

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Money Plus Deluxe

	Money Plus Deluxe Windows \| Microsoft Software, 2007 average customer review:based on 72 reviews view larger image
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Money Plus Deluxe - Good but needs a serious upgrade

I use both Microsoft Money Plus Deluxe and Quicken 2008 Premier. While Microsoft Money has an easier to use interface, it lacks a considerable number of items found in Quicken that I wish they would incorporate. First, by right-clicking on a payee in Quicken, you can get a full report of transactions to that payee, while in Money you are given a very limited report. Also I entered depreciation for my car and Quicken correctly did not add that to my Income & Expenses Report, while Money did. I also notice that Quicken has more tools, like a loan calculator, that Money does not have (Money did have in earlier versions, but it appears it was removed). You can enter home inventory in both programs, but in Money the only way I found you could access it is by finding how to modify your home page to include home inventory, while in Quicken home inventory is simply under a pull-down menu. I'm not clear why Microsoft seems to hide this feature. If your financial needs are simple, then the interface of Microsoft Money is probably the best thing to get. However, for more complicated financial situations, I found Quicken to be much more encompassing. Microsoft needs to do a serious upgrade to Money and it can start by simply looking at its main competitor.

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Product activation problems

I was a pretty happy Money 2004 user and decided to upgrade to Money Plus Deluxe for my new Vista Ultimate (32-bit) PC and have had trouble since. I have had to contact customer service via e-mail twice regarding product activation issues. Phone support has banker's hours and is also toll call, so I avoided this option.

The first issue occurred when I tried to enter the product activation key. There are a number of boxes where you enter the code. The problem was that I could not enter the last digit in each box. The solution was to enter the activation key in Notepad, including the dashes, then copy and paste it into the first box in Money. Come on Microsoft, there is no excuse for this, it is running on your operating system and entering text in a box is very basic stuff. (yes, I did update to Money SP1 and it still wouldn't work)

The second issue also had to do with product activation. The EULA states that you can install Money on two separate computers, or two times on the same computer. I finally got it installed and activated on my laptop, but when I attempted to install this on my desktop PC, I got the following error: "this key has already been installed on the maximum number of computers". Microsoft support wants me to supply my Hardware Fingerprint code to them, and they said they will generate a new key. I am still in the process of this, but I am assuming they will allow me to activate this. Even so, this has been a major hassle. I just want it to work, there has to be a better way.

So now I need to contact Microsoft every time I upgrade hardware or buy a new PC so that I can access my financial information? I don't appreciate being treated like a criminal after paying them. I will be looking for a replacement to this. I am done with Money.

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