NeatReceipts Professional Mobile Receipt and Document Scanner and Software Combination Version 3.0
by NeatReceipts
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List Price: Our Price: $179.95 You Save: $70.00 (28%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: Office Product See more product details |
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of NeatReceipts Professional Mobile Receipt and Document Scanner and Software Combination Version 3.0
Customer Review: Buyer beware; a few hiccups for the novice owner
Summary: 2 Stars
I give the product two stars after having it for only a few days. I say "beware" to the novice (like myself) for a few good reasons.
Portable scanner- it's not. There are two main reasons it's not truly portable. First, it's not self powered or contains any internal memory. It must be powered up by the supplied USB cable (which for a RH person seems awkward with the cable on top feeding paper from right to left- but we'll overlook that)thus portability is quite limited. You cannot attend a trade show and scan all those business cards they might make you think you can- unless you drag around the power supply also....
Secondly, while you might choose to lug around a laptop for powering this unit it will only actually work on a laptop (or pc) to which the full software program has been installed. Meaning you cannot tap a bit of USB from Bob at the Widget booth to scan his latest product card- unless Bob's computer has the Neat software installed. And even if you did...the scan will remain on Bob's computer after you scan it, not on yours!
For me this is somewhat counter productive as I'd hoped to scan receipts at my shop and work on filing them later at home. No can do! I'd need the software in BOTH computers then after scanning them at the shop I'd have to thumb drive them or such to take them home with me, then import them to file them. And later delete all the uselessenss on the shop pc. Far easier to haul all the paperwork home (again?) and do it there.
The software did not load as planned when installed. To their credit Neat was good with phone tech and prompt. They got me up and running after moving files around in the C-drive that were incorrectly loaded. (2yr old XP with modest specs) After working the software for a few hours and trying to figure out how to make a file system I began to scan about 40 receipts to take it for a test drive. Scans look clear but many were loaded into Documents and not receipts given they were full page. Neat did a reasonable job of reading true thermal paper 2" wide receipts but can't understand "tips" to get the proper total. Full page receipts were often (well over 50%) not to the proper amounts so each one needed to be edited before I filed it.
For me the jury is still out. So far I don't see any time really saved over my old school receipt filing. With the transfer of paper, the scanning, the moving of files in the software, then having to review and edit way many of them before done it's as much work (or more) than I had previously. Just different work.
I'll look for other uses but I'm thinking like other add-ons this one's another "cool idea" that's not ready for prime time.
Customer Review: Traveling with the NeatWorks Scanner
Summary: 4 Stars
I have had this for a couple months now. I travel sometimes for work and this sucker does a great job handling the receipts. When I get back to my hotel or whenever I get a chance to scan the receipts, it scans them into a folder. I can add comments, so that I remember why the company has to bill it back. For me, I need to add contract numbers, who was in attendance (for meals), etc. I can add all of these things and even have it kick out a nice little expense report.
So far I have been happy with it, except for a few glitches with the software, and some lack of functionality.
...it has been fantastic for the following reasons:
1. It puts everything into a folder that I can name and add a date to. I do my expenses by the week, so I have weekly folders.
2. It will generate a nice little pdf with a cover page, a line by line listing of receipts, the comments about the receipts, and the actual receipts. I will have upwards of 30 receipts and still be under 1 meg.
3. They let you know that IRS accepts scanned receipts as originals. This means that every receipt that I need to keep until tax time can be scanned in and placed in a receipt folder for taxes for that year. Then when tax time comes, I can just generate one big pdf file for the whole year.
4. Everything stores in a database. There is some limited searching that you can do, but my main happiness is that I haven't lost a receipt, yet.
5. This thing comes with a mounting bracket so that you can hang it upright. It's a fantastic idea. I scan my receipts straight into the trash. Once they are scanned, they drop into the garbage.
...it has had some issues.
1. In the version 3.0 that I purchased, it would just not print out all of the comments if you had too many receipts. This was frustrating for the first month and a half. Then, since I had complained about it, they sent me a free license for the next version, NeatWorks 4.0.
2. They only let you use their scanner. This is frustrating because I come home, dock the laptop, but can't use my home scanner that's attached to the docking station. I have to drag out the specific scanner and use that. Apparently, Mac users can use alternative scanners. They need that with PC users. Currently, their software is crippled.
If you're a traveler who needs to generate copies of receipts, then this is a great deal. If you have a workspace and already have a scanner, then this may be for you. Once they un-cripple their software and allow any scanner to work with it, this will be a much better deal.
Customer Review: I love neat receipts
Summary: 5 Stars
This thing is amazing. In an attempt to become organized I have been trying out new software and methods lately. After some research I decided to give this little gizmo a try. I figured if I hated it I could always return it. No such chance! I'm in love with this thing.
Anyway here it goes.... This thing slices, it dices, it does it all. It's so easy to learn that anyone can get the hang of it.
It has three sections. One for receipts, one for 'documents' and one for business cards. Each section lets me create folders. I created folders like 'Ty's Tax Write-offs' and 'Electronics' and 'Home Improvement' in the receipts section.
I click on a 'Folder' and place the receipt in the scanner and hit scan. It pulls the receipt through. It recognizes over 1500 major retailers like Best Buy, Target, etc. If it doesn't recognize it, you type in the business name. Here's a cool feature; the next time you scan a receipt from that company the thing recognizes the receipt and names it by the correct business.
It picks out the tax, the total amount on the receipt and then reads all the remaining text and it indexes it.
This means that if I bought my ipod and scanned it I can type in 'ipod' or 'apple' and it finds the correct receipt. It's awesome. I have started scanning in all of our receipts past and present. Before we visited our accountant I scanned in all of our tax write-offs and ran a report on numbers.
You can click on a particular receipt and it brings up a copy of it. You can print it, pdf it, etc.
You can search by category, business name, amounts, anything.
The documents section is handy too. I'm scanning in all our loan documents, home documents, legal documents, extended warranty information, etc.
The program is amazing and in my opinion that is really what you're paying for is the program. The scanner is pretty great too though. It pulls through receipts of any size and shape with little problem.
Essentially what you're getting is an amazing high tech filing cabinet for $200.
To those that gave it low ratings... it's technology. No it's not perfect, but it's pretty darned nice for the price. I scanned in probably 60 receipts in the first hour and I was just learning how to use it. I would have spent that much time just filing them in a filing cabinet. I had few problems and overall it recognized probably 85% of the vendors and prices correctly.
Customer Review: It keeps getting better ....
Summary: 5 Stars
I have been using the Neat Receipts product since its first release and with each subsequent release I can only say it just keeps getting better. The new scanner hardware is a great improvement on the earlier model and the changes to the database engine has made the day to day performance of the application rock solid. Though the OCR accuracy is not 100% it comes damn close considering the variety of receipt layouts and quality that I feed it. It does a superb job of recognizing and tagging the main data elements in a receipt and ignoring the individual line item amounts and sub-totals. It also does a great job of recognizing the form of payment and allowing the user to tie the receipt to a cash account or a particular credit card.
The software does have occasional difficulty with graphic logos on the receipts but the underlying intelligence will pick up the vendor name if it is somewhere else on the receipt. If there is no alternative to the graphic the field is left blank and highlighted. Since the image of the receipt is right next to the data it is a simple matter of reviewing and updating this field. The Neat Receipts software remembers vendors once they have been entered, so this edit is often as simple as entering the first few characters of the name and Neat Receipts will fill in the rest.
I use the product almost entirely for managing paper receipts for tax purposes. My accountant loves the fact that I no longer hand him a box of loose receipts. I now provide him with a printout of the receipts fully categorized. This alone has been worth the cost of the product many times over.
In addition to receipt scanning the application does a great job of scanning and managing business cards. In this area it is definately on par with other dedicated products that exist and is better than most.
Though document management is available as a feature of the product it is not the primary focus. The dpi quality of the scanner is sufficient to keep usable images of scanned documents and the software does a good job of categorizing and managing them. The dpi is also not so high that it creates a burden on processing overhead and storage that would come with a higher dpi.
I would highly recommend this product. There is nothing else out there that comes close to the features and sophistication of the Neat Receipts application.
Customer Review: NeatReceipts works great for me
Summary: 4 Stars
I have been using this product since version 1.5 and was eagerly awaiting Version 3.0 so I could run it on my new Vista notebook. Program runs much cleaner for me under Vista (new install not upgrade) than it did on XP, although it ran fine there. Overall I am very pleased and couldn't live without my NeatReceipts. I travel extensively as a Board member and investor in companies and collect lots of receipts all the way. I should note that I am a board member of Neatreceipts but I am also a pretty experienced user of many business productivity gadgets and software. The program IS a little slow to load as noted here but I do have a database with more than a thousand receipt images . I have also found that my Vista notebook power settings have a pretty big impact. I timed my most recent expense report preparation from a 4 day multi city trip. It took 3 mintues for the program to load, 17 minutes to scan in 21 receipts, 5 minutes to edit data that the scan missed and 5 minutes to generate a PDF report that I emailed. I've been using the software and hardware for about three years so I know the little quirks that others have found annoying. You get used to it much like my Windows Mobile phone. I also usually do my scanning in front of watching a sporting event on TV on the weekend so I am multitasking anyway. The OCR is actually quite good and is improved in 3.0, dates which were a bit of a problem in earlier version read in almost perfectly, amounts are pretty good but do need to be checked for extra digits, 8s vs 0s (depending upon font), Vendor names get better and better as you "train" your system to recognize the stores/restaurants you frequent. End of the year I can run great reports (the upside of the large database installation that is bedeviling some of the reviewers here) for reimbursement and tax purposes. I don't bother trying to directly export to Quicken or Quikbooks. Business card scanning has worked well for me when needed and I use the Scan to PDF to email signed documents all the time. Scanner is very portable and I've completed expense reports on Amtrak or waiting in the airport lounge and immediately emailed them off.