Intuit has done a lot of tinkering under the hood with QuickBooks Online Plus ($39.95 per month). The cloud-based accounting application has incorporated dozens of finance-reporting and billing changes over the last year, as well adding as Starbucks Mode, a welcome new privacy setting that hides sensitive information from those who might glance at your device's screen when you're working in public. QuickBooks Online Plus is our Editors' Choice for cloud-based accounting services. Xero, its closest competitor, has recently added hundreds of small improvements, but it still has some catching up to do.

QuickBooks Online Plus is just one tier in the QuickBooks Online family, a family that includes Self-Employed ($9.99 per month), Simple Start ($12.95 per month), and Essentials ($26.95 per month. All of them let you connect with your bank accounts online and download transactions, track income and expenses, provide bank level security and continuous backups, run reports, and make at least some of your financial data available on mobile devices. QuickBooks Online Plus, of course, does more.

Building a Foundation

If you've been entering and saving data in another accounting solution that can export to .CSV or Excel formats, you can import customer and vendor files, products and services, and your Chart of Accounts into QuickBooks Online Plus. Importing data from one accounting application to another—or even from Excel itself—can be a challenging process that may require the help of a financial advisor. It can be done, but make sure you're very clear on the required steps before forging ahead.

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The days of lengthy, multi-question setup wizards that desktop software used to employ are long gone. So, whether you import existing data or start from scratch with QuickBooks Online Plus, you'll have some preparation work to do before you start working with your finances. QuickBooks Online Plus, like its competitors, offers some introductory suggestions, but then it's off to the Settings screens.

You can just jump in and start producing transactions, but you'll have to enter customer information and item records, and so on as you go along. You may also find that a feature you need hasn't been activated. The best course is to click on the gear icon next to your company's name and select Company Settings. QuickBooks Online Plus then displays a series of sectional tabs on the left (Company, Sales, Expenses, Payments, and Advanced) that is similar to the Preferences screens in desktop QuickBooks.

You'll be able to turn features on and off (Classes, Custom Transaction Numbers, Purchase Orders, and so on) and access exceptionally flexible customization options for forms. The Advanced screen contains more nuts-and-bolts accounting options, like your fiscal year, your designated shipping account, and your ability to "close" the books.

Every cloud-based accounting solution offers these under-the-hood options; some are part of a dedicated Settings section and others appear elsewhere on the site. Each also chooses to have a different set of features turned on or off when you begin. You can change these default settings, and should do so in your first hours with the application. QuickBooks Online Plus's set of Company Setting options, along with other preparatory tools accessible from the same screen (product and service lists, user permission management) are conceived and presented in a more understandable, flexible, thorough fashion than most competitors' settings, though Xero is equally comprehensive.