Mac retirement planner

Andersod

Quicken is really missing a large segment of users who use Quicken on their iMac or Macbook by not having the same features as the pc version...after promises for several years Quicken mac still lags behind. Biggest question from a business stand point is why, I would think they would want the additional sales..

jfclague

That is why I run Parallels on my Mac, it is the only Windows program that I use with Parallels.

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jacobs

Andersod said:

Biggest question from a business stand point is why, I would think they would want the additional sales..

The first issue is that there are many hundreds of feature requests for Quicken Mac, and the development team can only complete a few of them every month or two. Creating a Lifetime Planner and Tax Planner would both be large projects. They are always evaluating where to deploy their limited resources to have the best and largest impact on the Quicken Mac user community. There are doubtless many people who would like to see these features added — but there are also many users awaiting many other features.

Second, you suggest that these two features would increase sales and revenue. I'd guess that not many people would choose Quicken just because of the presence or absence of these features. That's not to say that it wouldn't make the product better, only that I don't think it would drive sales. 

Chris_QPW

jacobs said:

Andersod said:

Biggest question from a business stand point is why, I would think they would want the additional sales..

Second, you suggest that these two features would increase sales and revenue. I'd guess that not many people would choose Quicken just because of the presence or absence of these features. That's not to say that it wouldn't make the product better, only that I don't think it would drive sales. 

Interesting fact, neither the Tax Planner nor the Lifetime Planner (retirement) are even mentioned on the comparison sheet for the Quicken Windows editions.

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jacobs

DocGer said:
Just more excuses.  Please stop.  

So because they haven't implemented a feature you want, it's "just more excuses"? No, it's just reality. They have more feature requests than they can implement. While they are making progress on adding features, it will take years to add all the features users want. And across the user community, we all rank different things at the top of our wishlist, so they have to pick the ones they think are more pressing/impactful/helpful than others.

What's the alternative? They could hire more programmers to be able to make faster progress, but they'd have to raise the price to pay for the additional staff. And raising the price would likely end up chasing some customers away, so they wouldn't even get added revenue to pay for more staff. 

There's an existing Idea thread for adding a Lifetime Planner to Quicken Mac. It's got a significant number of votes, but anyone who wants this feature who hasn't voted for it yet, add your vote. More votes can, over time, push some feature requests higher on the developers' roadmap. 

Chris_QPW

@DocGer why should you be able to complain about a feature that hasn't been implemented yet, and @jacobs shouldn't explain why it hasn't been implemented?

It goes both ways.  Most likely everyone on this thread knows but just wants to complain.

• Complain about the fact that it hasn't been implemented.
• Complain if it is explained why it hasn't been implemented.
• Complain if no one responds to their complaint.

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jacobs

DocGer said:

So lets just say, these "major" additions of Tax Planner and Lifetime Planner, and including Savings Goals... are sorely needed. And making excuses for the lack thereof does nothing to placate Quicken Mac users.

I'm not making excuses, and I'm not trying to placate anyone. I understand why users are frustrated that their desired features haven't been implemented yet. I also understand that we all think different things are "sorely needed." I think these would all be good features, but they probably wouldn't be on my Top 10 list. That doesn't mean one of us is right and one is wrong, just that Quicken is a program with many facets and uses, and what each of us thinks would be most useful or important varies considerably.

DocGer said:

And if Quicken Inc needs to outsource more programmers or hire freelancers to get the job done...so be it.  

Whether they hire more programmers internally, hire outsourced programmers, or hire freelance programers, all entail more costs. We don't have access to their financials, but it's logical to assume that they'd need more revenue to support more costs. More revenue can come from enlarging the user base and/or raising prices. I've said I don't think the addition of any particular feature would significantly drive new sales, so a larger staff would likely need to be funded by higher prices. They're in a competitive product category, and it seems likely that higher prices would drive some people away, resulting in little or no net gain in revenue, and potentially a downward spiral of an ever-smaller user base.

I would think they have some product managers who would love to hire additional staff to be able to move more quickly with product development. They've actually done so in recent years, but it's been to build a new product (Simplifi) to tap into a different part of the market. I also think they have MBAs who study what price they think the market would bear when making their pricing decisions. If they thought they could tack on another $5 or $10 per year to fund more programming and testing/QC staff, without losing significant sales, I think they'd do it.

DocGer said:

The annual subscription price already gets raised each and every year.  

Not true. There have not been five price increases over the past five years. (But they have pretty much eliminated discount pricing, except for new users. ) When Quicken switched to subscription pricing in fall 2017, Deluxe was $49.99. From that time through early 2022, the price had increased only $2.00, from $49.99 to $51.99. Then there was a significant jump this year to the current $59.88 price. 

Even with the jump in price this year, the cumulative increase over five years is slightly less than the consumer price index has increased over the same time:

I'm not saying Quicken is a bargain , just that the price has pretty much kept up with the rate of inflation. 

Chris_QPW

jacobs said:

I'm not saying Quicken is a bargain , just that the price has pretty much kept up with the rate of inflation. 

"Old timers" got use to when Quicken's price didn't keep up with inflation. 
One can understand that when costs to deliver the products were decreasing, but that is certainly not the case these days for Quicken.

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jacobs

DocGer said:

I'm done here with this thread.  Otherwise, I'll get banned for life... I'll keep my point of view on these Quicken matters regarding lack of features to myself now.  I'm just beating my head against the wall. I'll get more aggravated... and Quicken will ignore this and do nothing...as always. 

Let me say first that there's no reason to get so upset or frustrated by a conversation on this forum. It's a user community forum. We help each other, we complain to each other, we learn from each other, we share ideas and frustrations, we discuss and debate. 

And occasionally, albeit rarely, we get a chance to influence the company and/or the product. But for the most part, what we say here isn't read by Quicken management, except perhaps in summary/aggregate. Expecting otherwise is pretty much a guarantee of frustration.   

That said, I'll reply to a few of your points…

DocGer said:

You keep doing what you do, defending Quicken management...

I haven't been defending Quicken management. (I've got my share of beefs with Quicken management! ) I've been explaining the reality of the situation. You're saying you want what you want, and anything that doesn't deliver what you want is an excuse.

DocGer said:

Features that are supposedly voted on and are in the top 10 SHOULD have a huge priority and should be implemented.  ASAP.  

After all, that's what Quicken users request and want.  If Quicken doesn't want to follow those highly voted recommendations, then get rid of the voting process altogether.  

Once they knock off the top 10, then the next top 10 should be tackled and implemented.  

I agree that highly-voted topics should get priority. There's evidence over the past 8 years that the developers have indeed listened to the user community on many things. But not everything, because it's not as simple as implementing features in vote order. Certain things need to be tackled together, or in a sequence of development, and those things often aren't evident to users looking for a specific feature.

I'll give an example unrelated to this topic. I think one of the most fundamental flaws in Quicken Mac is that it can't generate a useful budget-versus-actual report for a user-specified timeframe. It's pretty inexplicable to have a budget module and not be able to get such a straightforward report. People have voted for it in large numbers. So why isn't it done? I believe, from a discussion with the former product manager, that the answer is that the 12-month budget code is complex and fragile, and making any significant changes to it will require re-writing the entire budget code. And there are a bunch of other user requests to enhance the budget, including monthly rollovers and an "everything else" budget line. A budget-versus-actual report might not be impossible to build with the current code, but if they have on their roadmap to rewrite the entire budget code, then they don't want to spend time adding a new report feature which will have to be re-created when they rebuild the budget section of the program. So the budget-versus-actual report is put on hold and folded into the larger budget rewrite project. But for users just wanting a simple report to make their budget useful, it's frustrating that this seemingly easy feature request hasn't been implemented.

And there are many other factors involved in what gets tackled when. There are underlying technology changes to keep up with Apple's macOS changes, evolving banking protocols, switching bill payment providers when the old one decides to drop support for Quicken, maintaining compatibility with other Quicken products (Windows, Simplifi, mobile/web) for areas where those different products must communicate or use the same protocols — projects which can consume a ton of programming time with few or no visible new features for users. It's often frustrating as a user not to see tangible new features, but the unheralded benefit to all that behind-the-scenes work is that the program keeps working, and has a path forward. 

You might brand all this as simply "excuses," but I see it as acknowledging the reality of maintaining and continuing to enhance Quicken for many years to come.

DocGer said:

As to "cost of living" increases, the issue is that the value hasn't increased commiserate with the product development.

"Cost of living" increases simply maintain the status quo; they don't increase value. When you buy a tomato, it isn't better than it used to be even though it costs more. When you rent a car or buy a plane ticket, you're getting essentially the same product as you did years ago, but it costs more. In the case of a software company like Quicken, I'd assume that they've faced the same need to increase their employees' wages as most companies have; payroll is certainly their largest expense, and the most significant driver of the cost of the product. 

DocGer said:

There's very little value in Quicken nowadays.

Well, that's up to each of us to perceive. I find Quicken still has lots of value to me, which is why I continue to use it after three decades. I don't want to try to track everything in a spreadsheet, and I don't want to use an ad-supported product like the one you mentioned. You obviously feel differently. If you decide it doesn't provide enough value to be worth the ~$5/month it costs, then it's probably time to move on. No one will tell you you're wrong. We all use Quicken differently, and derive different value from it; what's valuable to me may be useless to you, and visa versa. 

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