Freelancers, contractors, and sole proprietors need to keep their books, but most bookkeeping software is built for accountants. Kashoo Classic had the core features, but its interface had stopped keeping up with the people it was built for.
The average small business owner spends an estimated 6.8 hours a week on finances. Many of them use tools that were built for larger businesses, which leaves them with features they don’t need and workflows that slow them down.
Before I joined, the team was already collecting feedback from existing users through Intercom conversations, surveys, and cancellation forms. I used that feedback to understand where Kashoo Classic was failing.
Four themes came out of it:
Users said the reports were limited and that they couldn’t drill into specific charges.
Users wanted to see their numbers as they changed, not after the fact.
The interface didn’t distinguish income from expenses, and it was hard to find key actions.
Routine actions like a quick payment took too many clicks.
“We switched to quickbooks. We needed much more in the way of reports and accessing information, this note applies to both of our accounts. The inability to see specific charges by account within a project when clicking on that charge was very frustrating.
The report options were silly, and lacked some basic reports needed for business. Quickbooks offers so much more. Sorry.”
“I wanted something that was easy to just track the transactions, categorize them, as well as potentially create Pro Forma statements for me based off my data. The main reason why I didn't like Kashoo was because data was not disclosed in REAL-TIME!!!”
“I recommend Kashoo to people all the time.... The only hesitation I sense from people I mention it to ask me why they should choose it over Quickbooks Online which is priced similarly and has the same or more features.”
“The site needs more color... expenses needs to be different from income. Some short cuts up top in the blue area, perhaps where you can choose your own short cuts for sections that you always go to. A quick pay button, where you can choose your favorite account.... Right now it takes 5 clicks to do so, if you want to quick pay a few things without going to the check printing section, you are stuck clicking away.”
I was brought on to refresh the visual design. After analyzing the feedback, I realized that aesthetics alone wouldn’t fix the core usability problems, so I remapped the user journey from an experienced user’s perspective instead.
Smaller decisions
A soft blue and purple palette, chosen for contrast so elements stay distinguishable without feeling jarring.
Select multiple like items and edit them as a group instead of one at a time.
Ranges like “Current Fiscal Year” and “Last Fiscal Quarter”, since fiscal dates vary from business to business.
“As mentioned, I do like the overall features and interface a lot, the program uses restrictions that effectively guide clients towards doing more accurate book keeping and keeps them on the right track away from making mistakes.”
“As far as I can tell on Kashoo2.0 there is no feature to import a chart of accounts, which is unfortunately a big issue in setting it up agriculture clients as the only option is to manually set up each individual account, and may even end up being a deal breaker for most of these types of clients.”
“I loved the Kashoo interface! Way better than Quickbooks. Customer service through CHAT is AWESOME!”
“This is really easy to use! I tried FreshBooks and it was less easy to use. Specifically, in Kashoo your application lets me quickly add/subtract accounts to match my schedule C categories. This is great app for the Schedule C.”
“We are a small Community Interest Company run totally by volunteers and for us most of the functionality that we need is there. The interface is friendly and fairly easy for someone with dyslexia to use.”
“I appreciate the effort to make a layer that is simple and accessible, but I was surprised that there was not more access to the underlying structure.
Useful for those who don't care about accounting. Impossible for those who do...”
Looking back, I’d make four changes. I’d let users import past expenses, so they have a way in without connecting a bank or entering everything by hand. I’d add duplicate detection and automation rules: the system could flag duplicates, let users set rules for repetitive tasks, and suggest rules based on patterns it sees. I’d make AI that doesn’t get in the way, with smarter automation that works quietly instead of feeling intrusive. And I’d add an accountant handoff, a checklist or full document export that makes tax prep easier and removes a major friction point.