Last week Microsoft announced that it would be discontinuing Microsoft Money, the company's personal finance application. Download Squad readers came up with a number of great suggestions for anyone looking for a replacement. But the 800 pound gorilla in the room is Quicken. And now Intuit, the company behind Quicken are reaching out to Microsoft Money customers by offering tools to import Money data to Quicken. The company is also offering discounts of up to $50 on Quicken software.

Those coupons start at $20 off the price of Quicken Deluxe, bringing the price down to $39.99. You can also get $30 off the price of Quicken Premier or Home& Business, or $50 off the price of Rental Property Manager. Or if your finances aren't that complicated, you could just try Quicken Online for free.

The coupons are good through July 31st. Microsoft will stop selling Money at the end of June, although support will be available through January, 2011.

No, that headline doesn't mean that Microsoft isn't making money as in cash profits anymore. But Microsoft has decided to discontinue Microsoft Money, its personal finance application.

Microsoft will stop selling the application in June, although it will still be supported for another 18 months or so. After that point, you'll still be able to use the software to manage your finances, but it won't be able to get automated feeds from banks, credit cards, and other financial institutions. You'll have to download or enter that information manually.

Normally, users get 2 years of service, but if you purchase Microsoft Money this month, the product will still only be supported until January, 2011. It might be time to look at Quicken or another personal finance package. What do you use to manage your finances? Pen and paper? Mint? Let us know in the comments.

[via CNET]

Microsoft has updated its Office Accounting software, and just like last year, the company is offering free and paid versions. Office Accounting 2008 will set you back $199, while the slimmed down Office Accounting Express 2008 is available for free.

If you run a small business with international clients, you might want to shell out a few bucks for the professional accounting package with support for things like multiple currencies and multiuser access. But if you're self employed and are just looking for a way to manage accounts, track invoices and bill payment, and a few other basic business features, the free version looks pretty nice.

The 2008 edition also includes Spanish language support and integration with new online banking services.

[Thanks Gregger!]

You can access your bank account online, and your credit cards, student loans, mortgage payments, etc. In fact, you can pretty much handle all of your financial transactions online these days, which is great. There's just one problem. You have to visit approximately 21,874 websites in order to do it. And that makes it difficult to get a good picture of where your money is really going.

Mint wants to be the one-stop shop for all your online financial needs. You can access all your accounts from one page, and Mint can send you e-mail and SMS reminders when bills are due, and Mint claims it can save you thousands of dollars by offering financial advice. For example if you've got a high interest credit card when you qualify for a lower interest one, Mint will tell you. The basic service is free, the financial advice comes with the paid version.

It's sort of like an online version of Quicken, without the Quicken name. So why should you give your bank and credit account numbers to Mint? We're not quite sure yet. The company's been in beta for a few months now, but it really doesn't have a track record yet that would make us comfortable giving it all of our personal information. We know, it's kind of a catch-22. They won't get a strong privacy record until lots of people reliably use their service without getting ripped off. But people might be reluctant to sign up until the company's been around a little longer.

That said, Mint claims that it found an average of $1000 in savings for each user during the initial beta period. And that might be reason enough for some people to try out the new product.

The leader in personal finance is getting set to launch a strong presence online. All startup finance applications start shaking in their winter boots.

Intuit is getting ready for their winter launch of Quicken Online, a web based version of their personal finance application. If you have worried about security in the past with the recent slew of online financial software, Quicken should ease your mind. Intuit has a strong following due to their consumer trust for desktop applications, and they have been working hard to build that same trust for their web based application. So far it is known that this application will hold basic balance charts, reports, and bill payment services.

Quicken Online is currently in closed testing modes, with beta set to open the middle of September. Look out for further discoveries closer to September.

[via webware]

Rafe Needleman got this crazy email from Charles Schwab (the brokerage firm) indicating that he'd have to change his Quicken password to his Schwab password in order to keep getting Schwab data on Quicken. Read that again. An online service is requiring an end user to change their desktop app's password to match their online info, just to keep getting data. Wow. You think people were a little miffed by that Yahoo/Flickr login issue? C'mon people, this is ridiculous. Who thought this would be a good idea, really? The kicker is that Schwab tech support explained to a justly concerned Rafe that all this was for his "convenience." Yes, well, weak password like "doggy" and "kitty" are more convenient than safer passwords. And it would sure save you a lot of time in the morning if you left the keys in your car too. All ideas I have no doubt Schwab would heartily endorse.