ParishSOFT

Benefits:

I like that ParishSoft is specifically designed for Religious Education programming. I love the fact that the program continues to grow. Users are asked for feedback and evaluations. The company is responsive to needs and provides gracious, capable customer service.

Drawbacks:

I have no complaints. I am a very satisfied costumer!

In sum:

We are running efficiently and effectively. I have used ParishSoft for 10 years and have enjoyed growing with their help!

Benefits:

Parish Soft Family Suite is easy to use for posting contributions and running contributions reports.

Drawbacks:

Reports for family and labels are not as easy to use

In sum:

Overall great

Benefits:

The record keeping sofware is good. The ability to retrieve our information is also good.

Drawbacks:

We are currently trying to do bulk e-mails and have not been able to make it work. The IT Support Staff is working on the issue for us but still no luck.

In sum:

We have been fairly satisfied with the program overall, but it has been frustrating that our e-mail function is not allowing us to send out any e-mails.

Benefits:

ParishSoft is extremely user-friendly. The ease at which you can obtain a quick report as well as a detailed report was a welcome change after using our antiquated database. The IQ (Intelligent Query) module makes it extremely easy to customize a report (birthday report for a specific month for example) for downloading to excel.

Drawbacks:

On the family information screen I had to get a bit creative as you are not able to customize what appears on that screen. For example, I wanted to note our school families, winter residents and volunteers but there was not an option to do so. By using the map code box, I manually type in school family, et al. Having an option to customize would be beneficial.

Benefits:

They were able to transfer the information we had in the other product to this new one without me having to enter everyone individually.

Drawbacks:

Change is hard. The offering part - again because we had such a simple system with easy checks

In sum:

The parishioners information part is good. The offering part is not good - only because before we had a SUPER SIMPLE system with lots of checks and balances and this one added at least an hour with no real checks. I worry because unfortunately I am a human and I make mistakes.

Benefits:

The accuracy of keeping all the data I need to access is great. Most of the features I use are fairly easy to learn. There are so many features of this program that it will literally do whatever command you need as it stores so much data that you will never lose anything important. Switching over from our old parish data system was not simple. It took a while to learn the features in order to feel comfortable using it.

Drawbacks:

I feel there cannot possible be any features missing from this software. We are a small church and do not use hardly any of the brilliant features that this program has to offer. However, the features I use I had to learn little at a time. It was difficult for me as I am not very computer savvy. Some things still are difficult for me to figure out such as reports with specific data. But as I learn the system, I learn to access the reports. At times I call on the support team who are brilliant and very quick to answer my request.

In sum:

I feel the program overall is excellent. It has features that can includes any possible scenario that even huge businesses or organizations can use with great results. The program is far-reaching in the aspects of data keeping, storing, importing, exporting, assembling in various modes, statistical records--- this program does it all. I am sure it has features that I have not even begun to explore or will ever use. But there are organizations that can use all it has to offer. This is a very good program for all types of business.

Benefits:

It is very user friendly. As someone who works with the database on a daily basis, the ease with which I can extract and isolate specific groups and information and the amount of time involved in the process makes a big difference to my day. Plus, should I get stuck on a particular process, Customer Support is very knowledgeable as well as very accessible, which is one of the factors we have stuck with Parish Soft for the last 6 years or so!

Drawbacks:

I don't like how there is no flexibility in Lookups, Celebrants. I wish I did not have to go out of inputting Sacraments so I can enter the name of a Celebrant who is not yet on the system and then have to go back to finish entering that Sacrament information. I wish there was an option of entering a Celebrant's name that is not yet on the system and it would just capture that information unto the list for future use.

In sum:

I have had a very positive experience with Parish Soft overall. Customer Support has been superb, the software itself has been easy to work with. I am not at all computer savvy, but I have come to love working with ParishSoft. I started with learning to enter people's basic information, to entering and tracking donations, mailing out end of year donation statements, to managing class enrollment, tuition payments and tracking attendance in Religious Ed, entering and printing Sacrament certificates and now I am learning to build my own queries! Of course I get to call Customer Support every couple of tasks that I get stuck on and they have been very friendly and knowledgeable. They also are very patient and do not get exasperated when it take me awhile to understand the process (if they do, they do not show it, haha!, and I appreciate that!)

Benefits:

Now that I know how to use the software, I love it and use it daily and with ease. It is easy to use Family Suite for your daily needs, and then, it can do whatever you want it to do with a little help from QuickReports or with the help of Tech support. Also, the Offering program is easy to use and even fairly easy to instruct others on how to use it. This program can do so much more than what we use on a daily basis, it would be nice to have a refresher course on how to use more. It would help to have a course on IQ alone.

Drawbacks:

IQ is difficult as there are too many options.

In sum:

I am very pleased with ParishSOFT. It gets the job done!

Benefits:

The support is always there when you need it.

Drawbacks:

The cost because you have to pay for almost every feature you want to add on, like to get the IQ feature will cost extra, etc.

In sum:

I like that whenever I get stuck in a task, support is justa call or an email away.

Benefits:

I use Parish Soft Family Suite on a daily basis. It is easy to use. I am able to organize and re-organize the info. there according to the needs of the parish. The support over the phone is excellent and I like to receive the follow-up report. Sometimes I print it out for future reference.

Drawbacks:

I wish there were more categories where I could put parishioners into groups such as: Confirmation, First Communion, Baptism and Youth Group. It would also be nice if we could add ministries.