Intuit Not Out to Change Mint Says Founder

Quicken had customer service? I, too, was one of its first customers — one of those Old Fogeys You Think Don’t Understand Technology, I just preferred to do my finances offline. I backed up what I thought was all my data to an online service, then had a hard drive crash. Went to download my data to my new drive and guess what — NO Quicken data! Why? Because the default saving place was in “Program Files” rather than in document files! When I called customer “service”, they blamed me for being dumb enough to have allowed the default location they programmed in. I was on tax extension at the time and sat for three weeks reconstructing 18 months of finances. Then I was with Mint. Until now. Old dogs do learn new tricks. Condescending is a kind word.

I am glad to hear Intuit expects Mint to infuse and freshen up Quicken. I just joined the Quicken family after using MS Money for decades on my desktop (which has now ceased). I have to say Quicken has been a big dissapointment on presentation and graphic options, compared with Money. It works and feels like those early software programs that used to run on DOS! Amazing in this day and age of iphones, XP, and so forth..

I am not that old but I had used Quicken and I had liked it. I started using aggregator services from few banks but they could not deliver the end user experience. The moment I saw mint I became fan of it. I hope Mint continue to increase end user experience and intuit can use mint technology and team to revamp its QuickBooks online products.

Keep it Mint..

Unbelieveable! I want to express my disappointment also… not by Intuit’s or Mint’s software offerings, but by the harsh commentary regarding these software pioneers. It just goes to show no good deed goes unpunished.

I have been a Quicken, Quickbooks Desktop and Quickbooks Online user for decades. Quicken software revolutionized personal finance accounting. Perhaps many of you armchair critics are too young to remember that there were no economical personal software solutions on the market before Quicken. Not only were the software offerings expensive back then ($1000’s), you essentially needed to have an accounting degree to understand double entry accounting.

Thank heaven for Intuit and its line-up of economical accounting solutions. QBOE is a life saver to those of us who have business operations at home and overseas. We now have instant 24/7 access to our financial records in 4 countries at the click of a mouse. The cost of the most expensive Intuit offering is equivalent to about 2 days of a bookeepers salary… think about it… a few hundred bucks gets you the accounting tools to manage your finances… and you have the audacity to complain because it isn’t free?

For all you grumblers out there…there is no free lunch! You have been riding on the coat tails of Mint’s advertisers. So what if they eventually charge for MINT. It will be worth it. No one is forcing you to use either Quicken or Mint. If you don’t like it go find or create something better; or just go back to your basement apartment in your mother’s house and keep your receipts in a shoebox.

MINT… what a delight… a great company looking toward the future Saas market. With Intuit’s resources and MINTs vision and technology this is going to be a great M&A. Kudos to both companies and may they find the prosperity they truly deserve and have already earned.

Scott,
There are many Mint or Quicken Online users who are also Paytrust users. Many of us feel abandoned with the complete lack of support since Intuit acquired Paytrust. Actually, this week was the first time that there has even been an update to the site look in over 2 years (but no functionality updates have been done since the acquisition). Intuit has completely ignored the product, especially the SmartBalance feature.

I am still a paytrust.com customer (for over 9 years now) and have accounts with Quicken Online and Mint. I hope that you’ll allow better integration between these platforms, because there is so much potential. However, I’m jaded like many other people because of past experiences.

Why should we trust that you won’t let Mint.com wither on the vine like you did to Paytrust?

What are your intentions with Paytrust, Quicken Online, and Mint after the acquisition is complete? Will Quicken Online and Mint be consolidated into one service? Will there be any integration between Paytrust and Quicken Online or Mint?

I used to use Turbo Tax. Used it fo over 15 years. Then one year I found an error in the program. It failed to bring up the correct forms. No problem. Went to online tech help, who was unaware of the problem , but did give me a work around that worked. Two years later I uncovered another program error, only sad to say I discovered the error when I got a note from the IRS that I underpaid my taxes.

The problem occurred because the program had a logic problem. I pay my taxes quarterly. The previous year I used all of my refund to pay part of my quarterly taxes for the first quarter.

The following year when I got the screen to enter my quarterly taxes paid all fields were blank. For the first quarter payment I entered the sum of the previous year’s refund plus the additional amount that I paid for the first quarter. Unfortunately unknown to me the program was already accounting for the previous year’s refund. Thus, I unknowingly double counted that amount. There was no warning or any other indication that the program was already including that amount. Therefore, the program calculated wrong amount for the tax liability for the year. I ended up paying the tax and the penalty. I submitted the penalty to Turbo Tax for a refund based on their guarantee and was denied. I was then informed to read their guarantee and note that it guarantees to pay any penalties due to CALCULATION errors. It says nothing about logic errors. I told Intuit that I didn’t by the program to do arithmetic, I bought it for the Tax logic. An Excel spreadsheet can do the arithmetic. They still refused to refund the penalty.

I have been a happy Tax Cut user ever since. I also tell everyone I know who uses Turbo Tax about my experience. I was in the process if signing up for Mint.com when I found out that Intuit was buying it. Now I have second thoughts. I have decided to wait a year or two and then revisit to see if this site to see if it is still worthwhile.

I’m not going to flame and badmouth, despite my serious reservations about the acquisition–I have concerns I want addressed though, before I sign up.

I came here to sign up with Mint but noticed the blog link about the Intuit acquisition…needless to say, that gave me pause. I see a SERIOUS conflict-of-interest here and am still undecided at this point. I want to know:

1. Will Mint’s feature-set continue to be worked on and expanded without any meddling or veto by Quicken (this question is for Scott)?

2. Will all the current and pre-acquisition planned features for Mint remain intact and un-crippled as a result of this acquisition?

3. Will the promised European banking support for Mint (not Quicken products, Mint itself) be delivered upon?

I’m hoping the answer to all three will be a resounding ‘yes’.

I joined Mint precisely because it was NOT run by Intuit. Quicken, Quickbooks, Lacerte, ALL Intuit programs I deal with as an IT admin, are bloated, difficult to manage, closed-down proprietary pieces of junk. For example, just try to get QuickBooks data in and out via ODBC. Furthermore, Intuit’s idea of support is a joke. Their support site is FULL of 404 errors, their forums are full of unanswered problems to basic questions. Their upgrade policies are laughable at best. In short, a terrible company and a terrible thing to happen to Mint. I cried inside just a little when I heard of this sale. Needless to say I will be closing my account ASAP.

I want to believe you, but looking at your company, I know I can’t. I recently went to file a tax return with TurboTax.com. I just wanted to do the free e-file as I was a student for most of the year and didn’t have much to worry about. However, I had gotten a job abroad toward the end of the year and thus needed to file the one page foreign tax exclusion. When I answered ‘Yes’ to TurboTax’s question about having foreign income, I was told I’d have to pay $30 (for a basic membership) to get access to the one form. ‘Bleh’, I thought, and upgraded. After quite a while filling out deductions and the like, I went to submit. Bam, another fee. This time, I was told I had to pay an additional $40 to include my state tax return in the e-filing.

That’s what I’m talking about. Blatant bait and switch. Nowhere was I told before I started that it was going to cost me an additional 40 bucks to submit my state return, even though it was giving me an estimated amount for it the whole time (i.e. assuming I would–because why on earth would anyone e-file the fed and snail mail the state?). So, I had to pay $70 to submit the equivalent of 3 one page forms. Had I not been abroad and pressed for time, I would have told your company to go you know what.

Needless to say, I will never use another of your products. And the second I see Mint starting in any way to employ your miserable business practices, add me to the rolls of lost customers.

I ran to Mint to get away from Quicken only to come full circle. Nonetheless, I’m willing to give Intuit the benefit of the doubt. Mint still lacks crucial features, features and resources of which Quicken has access too. List of Banks/Credit Unions, OFX/QIF uploads, and cash accounts. Add these and you’ll have a customer for life. I’m giving Scott a chance in hopes that Intuit won’t punish the innovation of Mint, but help it to flourish.

I am skeptical of the Intuit buyout but I wish the best for Aaron and this group. They took a risk, and succeeded. I have only been a Mint.com user for about 11.5 months, *our 1 yr anniversery is coming up on Nov. 18th* but I will likely use this service until I die or they start charging money.

However, I have to say I have never saved money with their “Ways to Save” but have done so with the budgeting tool.

Best of luck guys.

Hopefully, we’ll get a Canadian version of Mint soon !