Disgraceful decision Wave, very disappointed in your attitude in alienating everyone except USA. Most business owners understand that you don't progress by removing value from your product. Struggling to decide if it's simply arrogant or just stupid. Either way, just another poor management decision.
This is terrible! As a one-person company, this feature helped me so much - and I can't believe that they've alienated everyone outside the USA and Canada by this decision. Does anyone have suggestions for an alternative platform to use?
Yeah guess we'll move to a different accounting system then. Way to alienate your user base. H&R are incredibly short sighted. Guess they only bought Wave to remove the competition, rather than maintain a stellar product. God bless the USA.
The only reason I use Wave, will have to find a new solution I had a feeling that the HR Block merge would mess this software up. Anyone have suggestions for an invoicing/accounting software for an individual freelancer? Based in Aus.
Thank you to everyone who has shared their reactions, thoughts, and questions in response to the news that Wave will cease providing automated bank imports outside the US and Canada after the end of 2019.
We understand that some customers are angry or disappointed, and to those we can offer only a sincere apology. However, we have also recognized a desire from many customers to better understand Wave’s decision, and I’d like to attempt to satisfy that.
First, a little context: Wave is a Canadian business; the vast majority of our customers, and virtually all our income, comes from Canada and the USA. Our parent company, H&R Block, is a US business, that also has virtually all its activities and revenue in North America.
Despite our focus on North American markets, Wave has always been happy to welcome users from around the world to take advantage of Wave’s free invoicing and bookkeeping software. We will continue to welcome all entrepreneurs world-wide to use Wave accounting and invoicing software, free of charge.
So why the change around automated bank imports?
Connecting to banks and other financial institutions to import data is a specialist activity. There are a small number of vendors who work in this area, and power bank imports for nearly all accounting and financial software products.
In our core markets in Canada and the USA, we offer additional, paid services that generate Wave’s revenue: Payroll services, and our own Payments platform*. These services - as well as others to be launched - involve a lot of interaction with customers’ banks, and this has led us to start working with a new bank integration partner that gives us more flexibility to connect the different parts of our system, and deliver new and valuable features to US and Canadian customers. This integration partner, however, does not work with banks and financial institutions in other geographies, so we cannot use the same service on a global basis.
At the same time that our connected bank services in North America are becoming more powerful and integrated, our old bank imports platform that provides bank transaction import in the rest of the world - powered by our original bank integration partner - is scheduled for deprecation and would require a major investment to update in line with our current software tools and standards.
Ultimately, Wave’s decision to cease providing automated bank connections outside its core markets is one of prioritization and business value. The integration partner that powers our bank connections in the US and Canada does not integrate banks in other countries; our old bank integrations platform would require significant effort to rebuild for our free markets; and that investment of time and money would be at the expense of other projects that help us grow and add value to our business at home. While Wave remains committed to helping entrepreneurs world-wide through providing free financial software, we cannot justify prioritizing features for our free markets above extending and strengthening the business through adding more value for customers in North America who - ultimately - pay to keep Wave in business.
Everyone here at Wave understands the frustration and disappointment that this decision causes for many business owners who have been accustomed to having bank data import automatically. We understand that some of you will feel the need to move to another accounting system; we respect this, and appreciate having been able to be part of your success to this point.
If, instead, you are looking for ways to adapt to this change while staying with Wave, I encourage you to experiment with exporting bank transactions from your online bank and uploading directly to Wave through our free Wave Connect integration for Google Sheets, or Wave’s in-built CSV upload feature. A couple of commenters have mentioned TillerHQ, which could also - in conjunction with Wave Connect - be a great way to maintain a streamlined process for getting data into Wave.
Thanks for reading, Paul
* Wave generates revenue in Canada and the US through operating its own payment processing platform. In all other markets, as a convenience for users of our Invoicing solution, we provide a free integration to Stripe.
Hi Everyone, Rudolf here from TSBA (South Africa)! We are The Small Business Accountant and have a workaround for the bank automation feature that will not be working from 1 Jan 2020. Please contact me if you need some advice. I for one will be staying on Wave and will keep clients automated. This solution works on multiple accounts per client and we are testing bond accounts, savings products and personal retirement products as well. Currently we can confirm ABSA, Investec and FNB does work. we are making sure other banks also give us smooth sailing. Please reach out to me to chat if you want.
@PaulC Thanks for clearing things up - "Our parent company, H&R Block, is a US business, that also has virtually all its activities and revenue in North America."
I thought H&R Block was an international company. Usually international companies look to expand their markets, not shrink them. Obviously H&R Block wants to recover their investment and shave expenses by dropping the rest of the planet - a big F* YOU to everyone outside North America. Message received.
Once a name or reputation is blown, it takes a very long time to recover. Companies have gone bankrupt in the long term over decisions like this. H&R Block has forgotten about goodwill. You have also forgotten that small fish can become big fish and expand to spend money in the future.
As a result of your decision, I will personally NEVER support H&R Block or any of its subsidiaries in any way, at any time EVER. Not now and not in the future, even if the company expands its market abroad to Europe, Australasia, Southern Africa and/or South America. I am a man of my word. Goodwill? Zero!
Good luck for the future - in the long run, you may find that you need it.
Good to hear from @PaulC to at least put some details around their decision.
Seems to make very clear that this decision isn't going to be reviewed, so that's that.
I will stay with Wave as I just find the overall functionality more suited to me than alternatives, plus I don't want to go through learning the tricks and tips for another system!
@Arushi said:
This is terrible! As a one-person company, this feature helped me so much - and I can't believe that they've alienated everyone outside the USA and Canada by this decision. Does anyone have suggestions for an alternative platform to use?
Wave was great, and this is an awful disappointment that you are ruining it. This is a huge step backwards to your clients, but clearly you have a lot of money to make elsewhere so...screw us. Thanks.
A couple of years ago I found myself having to move from Freshbooks due to their extortionate and sudden price increase. Was very happy with Wave until about 5 minutes ago... I'll keep coming back to this page to see if anyone can recommend a decent alternative platform.
Well, seems like WAVE under H&R Block has comprehensively stuffed this up big time. For everyone in Australia/NZ who is looking for an alternative to Xero etc. (like me), check out ROUNDED. I'll happily throw $20 bucks their way every month. Read this: https://rounded.com.au/blog/our-commitment-to-bank-data-and-belief-in-open-banking/
Am not going to use it anymore if this feature comes to end in middle of the year.
Any alternative software, which can directly track data from my Bank AC?
So why did you do a major system change before the bank transaction change? I now can't seem to split my transactions between my personal and two business accounts. If you had waited until all of us had left (all of us who won't be using WAVE after 31st December), and then updated this system that would have been a lot more sensible. As it is, now I don't know how to enter my business expenses so that I have an accurate record of my accounts until the end of December. Thanks! and I note you've made the old system 'read only', so you've shafted us, then you've shafted us again. I understand you don't want our business, that's fine. But at least you could have kept the old operating system in place until 31st December - so that us plebs could get all of our information onto and then off of your system with minimal fuss. You have some weird ideas.
Settings > Other > Data Export, (incase anyone else wants to know!)
We've been using this for free - so let's grow up and get real that this does leave us at the mercy of opportunistic decisions like this. I've never liked H&R Block, always instinctually stayed away from them and now they've come through to display their value system in full technicolor crappage! Now we know without a shred of doubt.
Can the Wave team please confirm that the client bank account credentials held by the third party bank processing service will be securely deleted before disconnection or should we do that ourselves somehow? Thanks.
Comments
Disgraceful decision Wave, very disappointed in your attitude in alienating everyone except USA. Most business owners understand that you don't progress by removing value from your product. Struggling to decide if it's simply arrogant or just stupid. Either way, just another poor management decision.
The END result will speak for itself ….. very disappointed about this decision
This is terrible! As a one-person company, this feature helped me so much - and I can't believe that they've alienated everyone outside the USA and Canada by this decision. Does anyone have suggestions for an alternative platform to use?
This is devastating, I rely on the connection to my bank account to record all my transactions.
Yeah guess we'll move to a different accounting system then. Way to alienate your user base. H&R are incredibly short sighted. Guess they only bought Wave to remove the competition, rather than maintain a stellar product. God bless the USA.
Has anyone tried 'Rounded".....an Aussie company by the looks?
That bank connection sync feature is the ONLY valuable feature of Wave that keeps me here. I'm finding alternative solution. Goodbye Wave.
The only reason I use Wave, will have to find a new solution
I had a feeling that the HR Block merge would mess this software up. Anyone have suggestions for an invoicing/accounting software for an individual freelancer? Based in Aus.
Hello,
Thank you to everyone who has shared their reactions, thoughts, and questions in response to the news that Wave will cease providing automated bank imports outside the US and Canada after the end of 2019.
We understand that some customers are angry or disappointed, and to those we can offer only a sincere apology. However, we have also recognized a desire from many customers to better understand Wave’s decision, and I’d like to attempt to satisfy that.
First, a little context: Wave is a Canadian business; the vast majority of our customers, and virtually all our income, comes from Canada and the USA. Our parent company, H&R Block, is a US business, that also has virtually all its activities and revenue in North America.
Despite our focus on North American markets, Wave has always been happy to welcome users from around the world to take advantage of Wave’s free invoicing and bookkeeping software. We will continue to welcome all entrepreneurs world-wide to use Wave accounting and invoicing software, free of charge.
So why the change around automated bank imports?
Connecting to banks and other financial institutions to import data is a specialist activity. There are a small number of vendors who work in this area, and power bank imports for nearly all accounting and financial software products.
In our core markets in Canada and the USA, we offer additional, paid services that generate Wave’s revenue: Payroll services, and our own Payments platform*. These services - as well as others to be launched - involve a lot of interaction with customers’ banks, and this has led us to start working with a new bank integration partner that gives us more flexibility to connect the different parts of our system, and deliver new and valuable features to US and Canadian customers. This integration partner, however, does not work with banks and financial institutions in other geographies, so we cannot use the same service on a global basis.
At the same time that our connected bank services in North America are becoming more powerful and integrated, our old bank imports platform that provides bank transaction import in the rest of the world - powered by our original bank integration partner - is scheduled for deprecation and would require a major investment to update in line with our current software tools and standards.
Ultimately, Wave’s decision to cease providing automated bank connections outside its core markets is one of prioritization and business value. The integration partner that powers our bank connections in the US and Canada does not integrate banks in other countries; our old bank integrations platform would require significant effort to rebuild for our free markets; and that investment of time and money would be at the expense of other projects that help us grow and add value to our business at home. While Wave remains committed to helping entrepreneurs world-wide through providing free financial software, we cannot justify prioritizing features for our free markets above extending and strengthening the business through adding more value for customers in North America who - ultimately - pay to keep Wave in business.
Everyone here at Wave understands the frustration and disappointment that this decision causes for many business owners who have been accustomed to having bank data import automatically. We understand that some of you will feel the need to move to another accounting system; we respect this, and appreciate having been able to be part of your success to this point.
If, instead, you are looking for ways to adapt to this change while staying with Wave, I encourage you to experiment with exporting bank transactions from your online bank and uploading directly to Wave through our free Wave Connect integration for Google Sheets, or Wave’s in-built CSV upload feature. A couple of commenters have mentioned TillerHQ, which could also - in conjunction with Wave Connect - be a great way to maintain a streamlined process for getting data into Wave.
Thanks for reading, Paul
* Wave generates revenue in Canada and the US through operating its own payment processing platform. In all other markets, as a convenience for users of our Invoicing solution, we provide a free integration to Stripe.
Hi Everyone, Rudolf here from TSBA (South Africa)! We are The Small Business Accountant and have a workaround for the bank automation feature that will not be working from 1 Jan 2020. Please contact me if you need some advice. I for one will be staying on Wave and will keep clients automated. This solution works on multiple accounts per client and we are testing bond accounts, savings products and personal retirement products as well. Currently we can confirm ABSA, Investec and FNB does work. we are making sure other banks also give us smooth sailing. Please reach out to me to chat if you want.
Since Wave is discontinuing bank connections. Does anyone knows of a similar app? I would like to move to it....
Just set up a trial on Rounded. Looks good so far and the most similar to Wave I've seen. Not free though.
@PaulC Thanks for clearing things up - "Our parent company, H&R Block, is a US business, that also has virtually all its activities and revenue in North America."
I thought H&R Block was an international company. Usually international companies look to expand their markets, not shrink them. Obviously H&R Block wants to recover their investment and shave expenses by dropping the rest of the planet - a big F* YOU to everyone outside North America. Message received.
Once a name or reputation is blown, it takes a very long time to recover. Companies have gone bankrupt in the long term over decisions like this. H&R Block has forgotten about goodwill. You have also forgotten that small fish can become big fish and expand to spend money in the future.
As a result of your decision, I will personally NEVER support H&R Block or any of its subsidiaries in any way, at any time EVER. Not now and not in the future, even if the company expands its market abroad to Europe, Australasia, Southern Africa and/or South America. I am a man of my word. Goodwill? Zero!
Good luck for the future - in the long run, you may find that you need it.
Good to hear from @PaulC to at least put some details around their decision.
Seems to make very clear that this decision isn't going to be reviewed, so that's that.
I will stay with Wave as I just find the overall functionality more suited to me than alternatives, plus I don't want to go through learning the tricks and tips for another system!
I would recommend BulletHQ.
It’s free and loaded with features
Try out BulletHQ
Wave was great, and this is an awful disappointment that you are ruining it. This is a huge step backwards to your clients, but clearly you have a lot of money to make elsewhere so...screw us. Thanks.
A couple of years ago I found myself having to move from Freshbooks due to their extortionate and sudden price increase. Was very happy with Wave until about 5 minutes ago... I'll keep coming back to this page to see if anyone can recommend a decent alternative platform.
Well, seems like WAVE under H&R Block has comprehensively stuffed this up big time. For everyone in Australia/NZ who is looking for an alternative to Xero etc. (like me), check out ROUNDED. I'll happily throw $20 bucks their way every month. Read this:
https://rounded.com.au/blog/our-commitment-to-bank-data-and-belief-in-open-banking/
Am not going to use it anymore if this feature comes to end in middle of the year.
Any alternative software, which can directly track data from my Bank AC?
Wow, way to ruin a great app and lose customers, whoever thought this one up should be fired immediately.
So why did you do a major system change before the bank transaction change? I now can't seem to split my transactions between my personal and two business accounts. If you had waited until all of us had left (all of us who won't be using WAVE after 31st December), and then updated this system that would have been a lot more sensible. As it is, now I don't know how to enter my business expenses so that I have an accurate record of my accounts until the end of December. Thanks! and I note you've made the old system 'read only', so you've shafted us, then you've shafted us again. I understand you don't want our business, that's fine. But at least you could have kept the old operating system in place until 31st December - so that us plebs could get all of our information onto and then off of your system with minimal fuss. You have some weird ideas.
OK, so am not seeing a way to export all the data in my Wave account.
Does anyone know how this can be done?
It's OK : I just found the Export Data link!!
Settings > Other > Data Export, (incase anyone else wants to know!)
We've been using this for free - so let's grow up and get real that this does leave us at the mercy of opportunistic decisions like this. I've never liked H&R Block, always instinctually stayed away from them and now they've come through to display their value system in full technicolor crappage! Now we know without a shred of doubt.
Yep, they'll be getting my money.....excellent, prompt service and a seemingly great app.
You mention UK and EU here but I thought you already stopped bank connections or are you doing this again now! Please clarify.
Anyone tried https://www.bullethq.com/ and https://rounded.com.au/ and have a comparison they can share?
EDIT: Just been looking at Bullet and found this:
https://www.bullethq.com/alternative-to-wave/
EDIT: Bugger. Not many banks offered. Looking for one to do ING.
https://i.imgur.com/hZ2KtlF.png
Can the Wave team please confirm that the client bank account credentials held by the third party bank processing service will be securely deleted before disconnection or should we do that ourselves somehow? Thanks.
Looks good but for my needs I can't justify an ongoing fee. I'm trialing "bullethq". So far, so good.
How can I retrieve the funds from my Wave account.?