I’m kind of getting to like the microsofties building the Office Accounting package. First, they seeded the market with free copies; now they are about to kick off a beta on their next version, with prizes no less.

MicroISVs are most definitely small businesses, Microsoft Office Accounting Professional 2007 is selling for $98 at Amazon (while QuickBooks Pro 2007 Small Business is selling for $199), and this might be just what you are looking for to handle your accounting.

You are handling your accounting, aren’t you?

Tax audits rank up (or more precisely, down) there with having a dentist hyped up on speed decide you really need that molar drilled in half while you’re strapped to the chair. Without Novocain. It is not something you want to have happen to you.

So here’s the pitch, directly from Redmond:

Greetings! We’re pleased to offer you an exciting opportunity to get your hands on the latest and greatest version of Office Accounting. We’re hoping that as someone involved in running a small business, you’ll want to try the latest software that makes it easier than ever to manage your company’s finances, your sales and purchases, and your employees. This is your chance to give us feedback before we release Office Accounting 2008 to the public.

We will be starting a Beta program in August and would love your participation. The Beta program will be about 6-to-8 weeks long, during which time you can provide us with important feedback to make sure that we have a great tool for you to run your business with. In addition to providing valuable feedback, you’ll also have a chance to WIN A GREAT PRIZE, such as a copy of Office Accounting 2008 Professional or an Xbox 360.

Office Accounting Professional is a fully featured accounting application which provides a single place to manage your company’s finances with the familiar look and feel of other Microsoft Office system applications. It provides the following features:
- Get started quickly with familiar Office look and feel
- Create invoices, track sales and pay vendors
- Sell online with eBay and PayPal sales tools (I added the emphasis - sounds interesting!)
- Bank online with thousands of financial institutions
- Access integrated services for payroll, credit card processing
- Rich inventory management features
- Support for multiple users
- Rich company dashboard and over 60 reports
- Multi currency support, jobs, classes, cash flow forecaster and lots more

We’ve been working very hard over the last months to make this version better than ever. All of the enhancements are in direct response to customer requests and needs. And so we want you to take a close look and make sure that we’ve gotten things right. This Beta is open to users in the United States only.

To accept this invitation and to apply to become a member of this program, follow this link:
http://connect.microsoft.com/InvitationUse.aspx?ProgramID=1502&SiteID=135&InvitationID=NOM-923W-GMBX

(If this link does not work for you, copy the full link and paste it into the Web browser address bar.)

Follow the steps shown to you to apply to become an active participant. You may be asked to take a survey, or submit other preliminary information. To report a problem or to ask a question, visit the Contact Us page (found at the bottom of every page).

Thank-you for your interest, and we look forward to hearing from you!
Sincerely,
The Office Accounting Team”

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