Hey FreshBookers,
Just a little reminder that the FreshBooks office will be closed Tuesday, December 25th and Wednesday, December 26th for Christmas and Boxing Day. If you need assistance, visit our forum and you may find the answers you’re looking for. If not, email and phone support will be back up and running on Thursday morning wearing new sweaters, socks and maybe a paper cut or two.
Happy Holidays!
Wednesday marked one of our proudest releases in recent memory: version 4.2 (codename “Thriller”). No big new features have been added, and no major changes have been made; this release was about tackling a list of many little things to make our users happy, and we’re hoping it shows. Here’s a photo of our release cake (now a tradition thanks to Daniel) — the code name for this release was… well… you can read it for yourself:
Before we get into the bright spots of the release, we need to acknowledge one trouble spot. Right at the end of the day, after the new release had been running without a hiccup for about 14 hours, a small tweak affected people’s ability to log in for about 45 minutes. Anyone who was inside FreshBooks at the time would have been unaffected, but anyone who was trying to log in was prevented from accessing their account. If you were adversely affected by this (we were able to reply to everyone who contacted us about the issue within an hour or so), please contact us and we will look into how we can make it up to you.
Now, on to the good stuff! Here are just a few of the improvements we’ve made with our latest version of FreshBooks.
One of the most common complaints about FreshBooks was that every user required a username and password. Well, no more! Now when you enter a new client, FreshBooks hides these fields from sight, and automatically generates a unique username and password on the fly. Of course, you can change them if you like; it’s still just a click away to view these fields.
We’ve done the same for the second client address as well; if you don’t need it, you won’t see it. All in all, it reduces the number of fields on the page by one-third, and puts the focus where it belongs. It’s a fantastic change, and we’ve received some great feedback so far.
For a long time, a big pain point for our users were invoice and estimate numbers. Not only could you not only edit them manually, but they couldn’t contain letters either - particularly rough for people trying to coordinate FreshBooks with different accounting software.
Now when you create/edit invoices and estimates, you’ll see a new “number” field on the top right. Yes, it’s true - you can now edit invoice numbers, and use letters too!
Another update is inline creation of new tasks and invoice items, and inline editing of taxes. Now when you’re in the middle of something and realize you need to add one of these things, you’re given the opportunity to do it right where you are! No more leaving what you’re already doing.
Just some of the little things we’re doing based entirely on the feedback of our users. We hope you like it.
If you’ve taken a look at our developer documentation in the last couple days, you’ll notice we’ve added the first incarnation of the most-requested feature — API access to your timesheets! We’ve also added support for estimates, and editable invoice/estimate numbers.
So remember all those little toys, widgets and integrations you keep asking for — like, say, a time tracking widget or QuickBooks Integration? — they are now possible! We’re toying around with a bunch of ideas ideas in-house, so you might see something from us down the road. For now, count on the community to come through like they always have.
That’s pretty much it. We tried to get it here in time for the holidays — we hope you enjoy it; please let us know.
With yesterday’s new version of FreshBooks, the Amazon Payments service is now available to FreshBooks users. This has been in the works for a while now, so we’re really interested in hearing about some of the first user experiences with Amazon Payments. Consider what follows a quick-start guide, and an invitation to try out the service.
There are a few things about Amazon Payments that might seem a little strange, so I’m going to try my best to explain all of the “gotchas.” If anything is unclear or you have additional questions, you can either post to this thread, or email our support team or myself directly.
First off, note there are two kinds of accounts: Business Accounts and Personal Accounts. If you’d like to receive payments for FreshBooks invoices, you’ll need a business account. You can sign up over at Amazon’s site.
Business accounts are (for now) U.S.-only. I’m sure Amazon is working on adding support for other currencies; we’ll keep everyone posted as they are added, but for now, Amazon requires business account holders to have both a valid U.S. mailing address and a valid U.S. bank account. You’re asked for both when you create your business account, and if you choose not to provide this information, you won’t be able to receive any payments to your business account.
The reason for this is a little strange: unlike services like PayPal, Amazon does not deduct transaction fees from FreshBooks payments. Rather, Amazon first attempts to withdraw the transaction fee from your Amazon balance, and if this fails, so does the transaction. To remedy this, you must submit and verify your bank information, and then transfer enough funds from your bank account into your Amazon account to cover your first transaction fee. This is a bit cumbersome, but for the time being there is no workaround.
Head to Amazon’s site to find out more about the transaction fees.
Personal accounts can be created by anyone worldwide, provided they have a valid credit card. If they’ve ever purchased from Amazon.com, chances are they already have one, too. Note there are slightly higher transaction fees for International Credit Card payments — again, the fee structure is worth a look. Personal accounts have limited privileges in comparison to business accounts, but if you provide a valid U.S. address and valid U.S. bank account in your personal account, your transaction limits are increased.
To enable Amazon Payments in FreshBooks, head to your “settings” area and choose “enable online payments.” Here you’ll see the option to enable Amazon Payments toward the bottom; this will redirect you to their site to enter your account information. At this point, you can sign into a business account you’ve already created, or create one on the spot. Amazon will ask you if you wish to authorize FreshBooks to make payments to your Amazon Payments account. Once you have confirmed, you will be redirected back to your FreshBooks account.
Now, when you create invoices or recurring profiles, or back to edit existing ones, you will be able to select Amazon Payments as a payment option.
I hope this long-winded post has cleared up some questions you may have about Amazon Payments. Again, if you have any additional questions, please post them here, email our support team, head to our support forum or email me directly.
Tomorrow morning (Wednesday, December 19, 2007), we are releasing FreshBooks Version 4.2.
Please expect a short period of downtime between 7:00 AM and 8:30 AM EDT (NOTE: this is 4:00am in LA, 7:00am in NYC, 12:00pm in London, 7:00pm in Hong Kong, and 11:00pm in Melbourne).
We sent a detailed email out about this and other FreshBooks news this morning. If you didn’t receive it, you can go here to view it online.
Version 4.2 includes a number of usability improvements, integrations with Amazon Payments and a major API update. It has some other goodies that I am sure you will like.
What is FreshBooks?
“Will handle your billings and collections with aplomb.”
“A better solution for any host who just wants a simple, effective billing tool.”
“Customers come first… positively refreshing.”
“FreshBooks strikes me as a bit more intelligent and more mature.”
“Refreshingly straightforward… definitely try this product.”
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