There's a concise advertising message with this product; do your books, and do them quickly and Intuit(ively). A somewhat "brick-through-your-window" advertising delivery, true enough, but there's an inherent appeal therein, mainly because this isn't mere marketing blather. The QuickBooks financial suites have always been respected for their relative ease of use (we say relative because when it comes to accounting, nothing is ever that simple).

And the 2003 edition doesn't buck this trend. In fact, one of the main thrusts here has been in making the program neater and more presentable, as well as fostering a more user-friendly nature. Some presentation aspects have been tweaked and overall QuickBooks 2003 feels very clean, with the easier-to-use menu systems being most welcome.

There's also a useful tutor mode which takes your hand and leads you gently through the basic aspects of using QuickBooks. The online help has been bolstered and a new "Ask Jeeves" type of question and answer format has been tacked on.

For example, you can type in "How do I delete an invoice?" and the program will search and come back with relevant responses. This works quite well and is really handy for QuickBooks novices who will probably be intimidated by the prospect of manually sifting through the Help text.

Aside from all this, what actual functionality has been added to QuickBooks 2003? The biggest introduction is the addition of a "Create a Budget" option which allows you to plan out your projected spending over future months, though you can only knock up a basic spreadsheet with the Regular edition reviewed here. Even so, this will still prove useful to some.

Myriad little tweaks have also been implemented, such as full integration with Microsoft Word and Excel. More data backup options have been provided (including automatic backups), along with form customisation (adding logos for example) and printing options.

Finally, improvements have been made to the VAT tracking system, so that QuickBooks 2003 will automatically mark up items included in the current VAT return and keep tabs on its status. There's no single jaw-dropping, must-have feature here, apart from the new budget facility, though this is limited with the Regular edition.

Even so, this is still an excellent package for the small business user and the enhancements are all well worthwhile, especially for novices to the PC accounting game. It's a fairly priced package and existing QuickBooks owners can get a twenty quid rebate, which should mean they can effectively pick the program up for around the hundred pound mark.

This is a worthwhile new edition of the top-rated, small business user's accounts package. The added user-friendly aspects will help the fiscally challenged out there. Those who own bigger businesses, however, will probably want to look at the Pro version, which boasts more advanced features, including stock control, job costing and so forth.