JobBOSS²

JobBOSS as an ERP

Comments: Overall we like the product and have good results with the support teams.

Pros:

JobBOSS as a standalone is good, with some nice Crystal Reports added on. What makes it great is that there are quite a few add-ons available (for Quality, CRM, etc.) , plus it it stores all of its data in a SQL format that works well with Microsoft products.

Cons:

I work mostly in the Finance/Accounting side of the business. There are some basic things that could be added in the next version upgrades.

Jobboss2 for Metal Manufacturing

Comments: We've been using some form of this program the 11yrs I've been with this company. In that time, I haven't had any major headaches with this program. The UI seems good. There is room for minor quality of life improvements, but overall I'm satisfied with it. I believe these minor issues can be cleared up with future updates.

Pros:

This program allows us to manage our parts, all the way from quoting, to shipping and billing. Once you learn the system, there is a lot of information available that allows you to track, schedule, and make sure your products follow all of your customers requirements. If you fully utilize what's available, you have a lot of information available to you, to make your business efficient and make sure you're making a profit on your parts.

Cons:

There is some chunkiness to the program. There are things that take more steps than necessary to find the information you need. There are some things that you can double click, and it redirects you to a different area of the program, which is good. Other things, you not only can't double click on, but it doesn't allow you to copy, necessitating manually writing it down and navigating to the other part of the program. There are a few other features I'd like to see. Things that should be available, but haven't been implemented. I feel all of these issues can be solved with future quality of life updates.

Okay Operations Management, Terrible Customer Service

Comments: We feel the system itself is ok, but outdated for today's market. Other systems provide more digital based solutions that provide faster results more efficiently. When we voiced to them that we were switching to a new provider, they told us to get everything in order in one week and then shut down our subscription until we pay for a year contract for just 3 users. So while their system does have potential to grow, it feels they do not value their customers, no matter how loyal they have been.

Pros:

It allowed us to manage orders throughout the facility using paper-based job travelers. We also ran our invoicing and logistics through it as well.

Cons:

The system was very inflexible and could not change with the company. Training new users was also difficult. The customer service is almost non-existent. It was always very difficult to find out how to get a hold of someone if there was a question or issue.

Our Business is Better with JobBOSS²

Comments: We use JobBOSS² every day and our business is better off using the software.

Pros:

JobBOSS² makes it very fast to get work done as compared to other softwares, There are fewer steps required to complete the work that needs to be done. We like the functionality of the system and we use it every day effectively.

Cons:

Sometimes the system is not as interconnected as I would like it to be. I want the system to speak to every aspect of the ERP to be fully connected.

Effective Software for your Machine Shop

Comments: We appreciate its features for quoting, order processing, scheduling, inventory management, job tracking, and invoicing, among others. It streamlines our workflow and improves overall efficiency by centralizing key functions and providing real-time visibility into critical data.

Pros:

We like the comprehensive functionality, customization options, integration capabilities, real-time insights, user-friendly interface, and dedicated support services, all of which contribute to improved efficiency, productivity, and profitability in our manufacturing operations.

Cons:

There was a bit of a learning curve, especially for those who are not familiar with similar software or who don't have a strong background in manufacturing processes.

JobBoss2/E2 Review

Pros:

Agile, fast and natively clouded. Ease of use is the best around It is not bloated and the workflow is logical for a JobShop environment.

Cons:

Quality module is a little thin. It could use custom user fields to make more robust.

10 year user of the product

Comments: We have had an excellent experience with E2 / JobBOSS from 2015 until now. It has given us a lot more consistency and visibility into the business.

Pros:

It does a great job of capturing all of the work flow in a manufacturing business. We use it from estimating all the way through shipping.

Cons:

I do not believe you are able to upload a csv file as a user or admin. You have to have the company do it for you. It should be able to take a properly formatted csv like most software application will allow.

Inventory Control - Spot On

Comments: In the 8 months of using JobBoss, there was a certain learning curve as with all new software, learning how tasks are stacked to certain functionalities. Once that is learned, you can easily find what it is you are looking for.

Pros:

The detailed control of purchases based on past purchases/cost/vendor to have it flow back into the job bidding process to insure we are keeping on top of making sure we properly bid on work. Making purchases based on specific job requirements/needs is paramount to minimizing overhead that might get stuck in "stock" and left as an unknown costing thousands in underutilized inventory dollars.

Cons:

The difficulty in finding and/or tagging documents to certain jobs that might help the manufacturing process. This might be based on how your company uses related drawings or details for bids that might be won.

Job Shop for Manufacturing

Comments: Overall I think the software is a great entry level ERP that can allow a business to quickly understand their costs and find avenues for improvement.

Pros:

JobBOSS2's simple web-based approach makes the software highly accessible and easy to use. The setup is relatively straightforward and allows users to quickly get in tune with their business.

Cons:

The web application can be finicky and will occasionally log you out without warning, and the inventory module is not very intuitive or conducive for precise inventory control.

Ease of use enabling company control

Comments: Jobboss and ci employee’s help to create a supportive and easy to use product. Increasing efficiency and enabling execution of deliverables to the customer.

Pros:

Ease of use allows my business to execute at low cost overhead of my company

Cons:

That if the web browser get closed you lose unsaved work

Great product

Comments: Very good, has made my business run very smooth

Pros:

Helps me to be very organized on the products we make.

Cons:

I have no complaints that i can think of right now

Love working with such helpful staff.

Comments: So helpful. I have had great experiences using [sensitive content hidden] assisting me. [sensitive content hidden] even sent me some helpful documentation for future use.

Pros:

Just being able to pick up the phone and get help. No delays.

Cons:

I struggle with inventory at times. I was "thrown" into this job as the previous person walked out. Just a learning curve.

Like the software, yet support communication and follow up is very poor

Comments: Our team has 16 years experience with JobBoss. We reviewed other ERP system companies prior to upgrading to JobBoss2. We like the ease of use, yet concerned enough about the support to consider new options.

Pros:

The ERP system features and user interface meets our needs. System provided reports work well. It supports our ability as contract manufacturer machine shop to supply simple parts to more complex assemblies for commercial, defense and aerospace OEMs.

Cons:

Poor experience with customer support and communication to resolve software issues. A recent example is with a system caused large inventory errors. Initial response with repeat follow up took over 3 weeks, and reaching out to others after 4 weeks.Requests to procure custom reports take weeks for feedback.

Does not grow at the rate of your business

Pros:

The designers clearly have knowledge of a shop environment and are pretty comprehensive in touching all the aspects of a job shop. The sales team is very accessible. The product is very easy to get up and operational with which may be attractive to shops starting out or implementing this type of system for the first time. The software does have controls over what users can do what which is useful for keeping employees in check. The reports that it generates are concise and professional looking out of the box.

Cons:

The interface is woefully outdated and lacks cohesiveness throughout, data entry practices in one area do not apply to others and certainly do not conform to defacto software standards. Its a bit embarrassing having state of the art CAD/CAM systems with wonderful imagery next to something that looks straight out of 1996. Looks are one thing but we have had a lot of time lost due to slow workflow and data entry errors. It will open many windows and dialog boxes which demand screen focus. Not only is it cumbersome to work in other windows applications with E2 running, you can not even run more than one task at a time inside of it. The software does not scale well to high resolutions or multiple screens. The software rarely fails gracefully, you'll get cryptic error messages in never ending loops. The software relies on a number of 3rd party frameworks including outdated Java runtimes (insecure) All of your data is stored MSJet databases, for those not tech savvy, its late 1980's technology that is isn't supported by Microsoft any more and was never really designed to be scaled to the point you can potentially reach. They do offer an upgrade to MS SQL which comes at a significant cost (which doesn't include SQL server itself or migration services) and it has the added bonus of breaking any custom reports (which are also expensive commissioned work). Although some user controls are present, there isn't granular control over everything in the system. Its very possible users without clearance to certain information can gain access to things they shouldn't. (ie: ITAR) Nearly every other vendor is offering some type of cloud integration, and although E2 does offer a component called webview (no surprise, its an additional fee), its really a customer portal and doesn't offer much in terms of what a company employee would need. The software will not play nicely across multiple networks, we had several locations connected via VPN which Shoptech does not support. Their solution was to use MS terminal services which is cumbersome and requires additional licensing. In today's global economy, accessibility should be paramount, not a vendor locked afterthought. The software does have provisions for shop floor data collection and although it does work, its cumbersome and our busy and non-technical shop floor staff abhor it and we eventually abandoned it. Support was initially good but as our business grew and our implementation of the software became more complex support has been slow to respond (if at all) and many of the ongoing problems we are facing haven't been satisfactorily resolved.

Buyer Beware

Comments: To anyone that is thinking about purchasing E2, now known as Shop Tech....BUYER BEWARE Our company made the decision to purchase E2 in 2018 at a machine show. The sales associates that were demonstrating the software did an amazing job showing off it's operational talents and expertise. The company paid for two of us top management specialists to travel to a training sight where we worked out of a step by step workbook, which began the wasting of monies....But then 1/1/2019 the nightmare began. The program was not the same as the one purchased by the President of the company. They supplied a brand new version of E2 and told us that it had been a replacement for the one we purchased and the prior was no longer available.. For two years to follow we were nothing but guinea pigs. Our company suffered computer glitches, accounting problems, data loss and production interruption, due to the unready malfunctioning computer software supplied. Numerous hours spent with E2 support, could still not rectify the continuing accounting issues and glitches within the software. Weekly we received updates from E2 tech support to fix problems in their new system. These updates regularly had thousands of changes. Goodbye Shop Tech... and good riddance!

Pros:

The customer service was terrible and we do not have any pros to say about this software.

Cons:

We hired a representative from their company to fly out for some help with direct training and accounting fixes. We had to prepay for his services. Upon arrival he informed us that he too was unfamiliar with the accounting portion and couldn't help us much. His services totaled over $6000.00 We finally resorted to paying our CPA office several hours to go through the process with us and balance the books. In short, $37,000.00 later, not only we would NEVER recommend this product to any sized businesses, but if you're thinking of viewing this product, don't waste your time. They will show you a demo of software that's already setup and operating smoothly, which is NOT what will happen when you implement. As of January 2021 we have since, happily moved on to new software, but recently been forced to pay for the last six months of (non) tech support or risk being sent to Collections from Shop Tech. Classy Shop Tech....very classy.

We think this is the perfect software!

Comments: We can't say enough about the outstanding support and customer service from the folks at Shoptech. They have always been an absolute pleasure to work with - extremely responsive and knowledgeable!

Pros:

We are a 20 person precision machining and sheet metal fabrication shop. We do everything from prototype to large quantity production runs, and E2 Shop System does everything we need it to! This software follows a part from cradle to grave; from establishing raw material part numbers all the way thru to cash receipts, it ties every aspect of a job together, and is extremely user friendly! I love that we can collect real time information on the progress of a job, and when all is said and done, we know EXACTLY how much it cost us to produce a part. It allows us to give our customers the best possible price without any guess work on our end. We have been able to keep our accounting bills to a minimum, as the software allows you to produce balance sheets, income statements, 1099's - EVERYTHING! In 2017 we decided to convert to the Web Based version, and it was an absolutely seemless transition. I LOVE that we can do quoting, bookkeeping, analysis, etc. remotely. No longer needing to maintain a huge server has been great too!

Cons:

I can honestly say that I don't feel like there's anything "missing" with this software. Of course, there are the occasional "glitches", but Shoptech is very responsive and quick to come up with a fix! If I HAD to find something to complain about, it would be that the "maintenance fees" are a bit high for the web based version. However, not needing to maintain a server and the expense associated therewith, it's probably close to a wash!

Solid Product with good flexability

Comments: Our company has now used JobBOSS for around 4 years. We have found that the user interface is quite intuitive and straightforward to use. This is a plus when training new people on the system. Functionally, it has met most of the needs that we purchased it for. We loved the idea behind the scheduling module, but have found it to not be a good fit with our shop. We are primarily a custom high mix, low volume shop. This leads to many jobs that have potential to run in more than one pathway on the floor and most jobs are first run where we do not have a history of expected production run times to fall back on. We also have split our shop floor into three self directed production cells that have a fair amount of cross work. The self direction means many production decisions are made at the cell level and not at a command level. Because of these factors, we found that matching our shop floor to the scheduling module was exceptionally difficult unless we were willing to dedicate a full time person to keeping it accurate. In the end, we believe that the scheduling module would work better in a higher volume production environment with more of a top down command structure than how we operate. The reports that come with JobBOSS are reasonable, however, we have found that digging deeper into the data (at least the directions we looked) required special reporting. It is handy to have someone on staff who is comfortable working with SQL tables, data mining and creating custom reports. Exact does offer custom report creating. Just remember, it come at additional cost.

Pros:

As someone who does look behind the scenes and works to dig data out of the system, I am impressed with the amount of information that JobBOSS does capture. Additionally, it is quite well organized in its structure. On the front end, the user interface is intuitive and lends itself to easy training.

Cons:

Reporting. The stock reports are reasonable for a company that does not need to dig into its data very deeply. But the analysis at deeper levels would either require purchasing many custom reports or have someone on staff that can dig into the data and create custom reports. The scheduling module works best in an environment with minimal chance of perturbation. Systems that have a high degree of variation become hard to model accurately.

Not Pleased with E2 shoptech

Pros:

Being its cloud based that's great because it keeps you virtual anywhere anytime. The system randomly glitches and shuts down and when it does if you haven't saved your 3-5 quotes or orders all those hours of work is all lost.

Cons:

The system isn't streamline. There aren't many good things to say. It's been a horrible experience. Sales team over sold us on the product. When we launched with their cloud based system it was still in BETA which we where ok with at the time because they made us a deal to work with them while their in BETA and they wont charge for user maintenance thoughout the duration. Next thing i know problems still arent resolved and its out of BETA. That was 8 months ago when we found out, guess what problems still arent solved and they dont expect them to be for quite a while. Nor could they promised it would be solved. Here is some ex's: You cannot download any CAD/CAM documents/drawings on their cloud based system. It has to be a image such as: PNG.. NOTE i said PNG and not PDF, DWG, DXF, STEP, etc. That really hinders our flow of operations from the office to the floor. OVER WORKING YOURSELF: Every step takes 2-5 steps to complete. Such as: Making a simple print, whether printing piece of paper or emailing or viewing a document. There accounting software is a joke. You cannot take Ccard transactions. We use SYnc option for QB's pro, That doesn't work at all. When it did work it wouldn't close out the invoice on shop side once its been transferred. Believe me when i say this ppl stay away there are MANY more problems than what was listed. I was warned before we bought it and should've listened.

Best Software Value

Comments: Bottomline, the E2 Shop System is affordable, easy to use, expandable, versatile and worth the price we paid. The support is top notch and the sales process and our data transition was effortless. We purchased our software on February 23, 2005 and have been a customer for over 14 years!! The service and support has remained consistent over that time period and the company seems to be extremely customer focused. I would highly recommend the E2 Shop System.

Pros:

What we like most about the E2 Shop System Software is the ability to expand and customize our databases. We purchased the SQL version which allowed us to put the E2 OEM program on steroids. We added custom fields and tables of things that were very specific to our manufacturing business. We also added a custom front end for our customers to access things like detailed part specifications, testing data, sales history, package tracking, and much more. We also added a custom backend for our employees to enter non E2 items into separate database tables and link the information to the customers and vendors already in E2. The best part is, we have a very high end custom solution at a fraction of the cost of some of the other solutions on the market. We have the ability to barcode scan, track employees time for payroll, calculate exact labor costs based on actual production times, track inventory, import our invoices into Quickbooks, perform accurate estimations / quotations and much more.

Cons:

We started off with the Access database version which is limited in scope, but soon realized that the SQL version was much more powerful and allowed unlimited growth.

We've had this for 7 years and the more we utilize it the more problems it has

Pros:

This program is very basic so if you learn how to use one part of the system you can learn how to use the other parts of the system because they all look the same

Cons:

This software does not allow for any changes to be made, and if you want to make a change you have to pay hundreds of dollars to do so. It is very set in the way it was build and you cannot change anything to make it easier for your company. First the shop floor doesnt account for scraps, they assume you will remake them so if you have any scraps and want to throw them out and move on to the next step of production then it wont count that step as being done. Then the accounting is put into many steps and the system gets easily overcrowded. the general ledger is done in too many steps to be accurate. The system will not work for orders of more than one line because if you want to unprocess an order in a second line after the first one was shipped, you cannot. Youre stuck with this floating error in your system that you cannot get rid of. I personally do not recommend this to anyone. The system isnt very helpful, i feel like you could organize your data much better even on excel sheets than this program does. Finally their customer support do not know anything, as an experienced user of this i call them and ask for help with some easier things and they cannot provide me with an adequate answer, then through trial and error on my own part I find what i was looking to accomplish. Overll I am very dissatisfied with this system;the way its run, the way its reports are made, and how easy it is to create errors but its nearly impossible and in some cases impossible to correct them.

JobBoss - Simple enough but still lots of horsepower for a smaller job shop

Comments: I came on board with my employer in October 2014. They had been using JobBoss for over 10 years. With my ERP background, I quickly discovered that my employer wasn't taking advantage of many of the available utilities, including the Scheduling module. Within 3 months I had all 30 of our machining centers, plus all of the secondary resources and operations, set up and testing completed. Routings were stripped back and rebuilt with proper resource requirement setups to ensure proper scheduling of work and proper timing and load representation. Shift and holiday calendars were constructed properly. We turned on Scheduling in February 2015. With the first pass of the global scheduler (running infinite loading and allowing schedules in the past) we came out with a past-due backlog of some 4000 hours. After updating job progress on about 150 jobs, realigning a few things and making some setup tweaks, we realized that we were still over 2000 hours past due. However, we now had the theoretical start and end dates to work with, we could time materials properly, and could graph our loads to see what we were doing to ourselves with our booking practices. Since then, we have improved our utility of the system across the board. Raw material and finished goods inventories are accurate, so we can now use the Material Planning functionality. Raw material issues due to planning are non-existent. PO's for outside processing are now accurately priced, timed, and generated straight from the job routing. Use of Picks, Transfers, and Extra Quantities have given our inventory transactions full transparency. I look forward to Unite 2017 when I can see hands-on what other companies are doing to tap this system's potential!

Pros:

Simple navigation, use of Favourites shortcuts, level of complexity is perfect for smaller organizations.

Cons:

Would like to be able to access more information directly from the Job (ie from an outside process, be able to access the Purchase Order that is linked to it).

Terrible Software

Pros:

The ability to gather data on cost, and labor. Inventory tracking is probably the most useful aspect of this software.

Cons:

The user interface is very clunky, and hard to navigate. The capability of the program is hard to realize due to how difficult it is to use. I have, on multiple occasions, pulled my hair out trying to figure out why the program will not cooperate, only to find there was some missing information somewhere. Ok, this is my fault, but wouldn't it be nice if even the smallest window could pop up to say there is an error? Sometimes I sign in and forget to actually click on the little green check mark. Turns out if you push the enter key to sign in results in the program window disappearing from the screen with no warning or indication as to why. One winds up waiting the several minutes expected for the program to respond only to find it is not opening after all. The promise of what this software could enable a business to do is amazing. It is truly a shame how non-user friendly it is.

Webversion is costly and cumbersome. Sorry we upgraded

Comments: I'm sorry we ever upgraded to the webversion

Pros:

When we originally purchased the access version of the software that ran on our server. We were pretty happy customers. It preformed up to our expectations and we used the entire suite of modules. We used that version from 2011 through 2017 after which we upgraded to the webversion. The original version was easy to use and very comprehensive. The only pro for the webversion is that you can access it from any device that is connected to the internet.

Cons:

Wait time while tabbing between fields is often delayed which significantly increases the amount of time it takes to complete any task. Most tasks require approximately 20% more time to complete. There are problems with lost work due to connectivity. We are told most of this is a result of our internet connection speeds but when we test internally, the speeds exceed the requirements. There are also many issues related to browser cache files. Each new update fixes one set of problems but rolls out a new set of problems. The time it takes to estimate and quote jobs has increased 20-35% depending on the complexity of the job. We are not able to downgrade to the version we had before without losing data and we are not able to put the new version back on our server without making a major upgrade ($20k est) to our server hardware and software.

One of the best

Comments: I have used JobBoss for the last 6 years and it's great for a shop like ours with custom products. It handles everything from the initial customer quote to turning it into a sales order, defining specific jobs and component jobs all the way through shipping and invoicing. The various processes you might need are logically organized into modules which make performing specific tasks easy. The downside is the occasional lack of communication between the modules requiring you to complete some information multiple times. The only reason I did not give 5 stars across the board is the inability to look at the big picture (all open orders), drill down to the semi-big picture (a specific sales order), and so on down to the minutest detail. If you are looking at any of these areas by itself JobBoss is a great tool that does a terrific job at helping you manage a project; it could use a little tweaking to help you really manage multiple projects with ease.

Pros:

The level of detail available about any project, material requirements for the project, routing steps, and tracking of progress. A complete system available to manage every aspect of the shop from scheduling of employees and jobs, payroll, materials, and more. XML support to allow you to use external programs to exchange data with JobBoss.

Cons:

Inability to really drill down from a broad overview of projects in the shop down to specific details of a single job. Customer support for using XML extremely limited. Poor documentation on using it. Does not allow you to require completion of a routing step before beginning the next. Ability to track progress is 100% dependent upon employees logging into a job and recording their progress without any enforcement policy within the program.

If you are a company that is looking to truly maximize an ERP system to organize your company thoroughly, I would keep searching.

Pros:

E2 user for 13 years, sequel version. Most manufacturing companies hardly utilize more than 50% of an MRP/ERP, and don't put the effort to truly comprehend the system to ever fully utilize. In those cases, this would be a good system to use. It does a lot of muscle work for you if you use it right. If you are truly ok with simply letting their scheduling module spit out a generic schedule that is limited in work-ability, this would be a good system. The most updated version has more bells a whistles which is nice but for us was fundamentally lacking in real change and not worthy of the investment to upgrade - plus the fact it is an entirely new system where you would lose all your history was additionally disappointing.

Cons:

The system has way too many issues. The purchasing module is as stagnant and rigid as it gets. No room for flexibility. The estimating module is also disconnected on very basic levels from the purchasing side. The scheduling module has not been updated in any sort of substantial way since the beginning and is entirely too slow to be of use if you actually want to actively manage your variables. It crashes a lot (and yes, we had it set up by them so no reason there). The support is BASIC. Within 1 year, I was more knowledgeable than the staff trying to help me with questions I had. Constant system issues where quantities duplicate on their own, or system crashes when running a report (which some of them take a really long time).