Everest Software Consumer Reviews

VIRGINIA -- My company had used Everest for over 20 years, since 1999, when the company was called "Icode" and the software called "Accware". The original team with Ali ** and Sanjay was onto something good, but unfortunately they sold the company in the early 2000s to people who have no clue, and everything went downhill.

We went through several upgrades, from Accware 16-bit using Foxpro and ADS to MS SQL server and Everest "64-bit". This software almost bankrupt my business when the company decided to discontinue its web module called "Accware Online". We had to rush and struggle to customize a solution to give us a web presence; we spent over $100k to create our own connector to a third-party software called Nopcommerce, which was merely a patch to keep our business online. They now offer a connector to Magento and I wouldn't dare to watch a demonstration of that; connectors are patches that stifle competitiveness, not a real integrated solution.

Here is why Everest software is worthless. This software is expensive to run and to maintain. Outdated design that slows down operations. Bloated database tables with hundreds of unused fields; ridiculously slow performance, slow to start, slow to print. Every browser, profile, and document took anywhere from 3-5 seconds to open on the screen using top-of-the-line hardware (at that time, Dual Xeon servers with 128GB of memory and SAS drives). The interface can be customized, but it is buggy and time-consuming to do it (you must customize it because the default settings make it unusable). The customizations generated errors and even crashes; it would simply shut down for no reason. We had accounting discrepancies due to system errors that caused inaccurate reporting.

Support is terrible, last year we had a ticket opened to have them help us create fixed assets and schedule the depreciation, but they didn't know how to accomplish this! They kept telling me to look at a page in the manual that had no instructions whatsoever; documentation is poorly written. I am extremely happy that we successfully migrated out of that nightmare.

Unless you have a death-wish for your business, stay away from EVEREST SOFTWARE! There are countless modern software out there at a fraction of the cost, with 20x, 30x, 50x more features with strong web functionality (Everest has none), look into open-source ERP systems, they are thriving. EVEREST USERS: If your business is still alive, get started on your migration ASAP. As soon as you have your timeline in place, give them your cancellation notice, with at least 60 days in advance, do not let it auto-renew.

AUSTIN, TEXAS -- After spending $8,000 a year for tech support from Everest gross negligence on the part of tech support personnel cost our business to be closed for 3 days and an outlay on approx $10,000 for an emergency purchase of a new server and for emergency software and hardware support over and above the cost of the faulty supposed tech support from Everest Software Inc. Everest is not taking responsibility for the fiasco. My new account representative at Everest Matthew is refusing to return my phone calls. The new CEO talks the talk about customer satisfaction but refuses to walk the walk when her employees commit malpractice.

We performed a major upgrade with direct involvement and planning by Everest personnel over many months of planning and discussion and remote access to our Windows 2000 server. Everest personnel blamed the failure of the initial attempts at upgrading to the new software on our Windows 2000 server on lack of sufficient memory space. This even though we were using less than 50% of the available space. Everest supposed experts at Everest Tech support directed us that we need 2/3's free space to successfully execute the upgrade. We totally rebuilt our Windows 2000 server raid array at great expense of time and effort with 5 new hard drives.

When we attempted to run the upgrade a second time and after 24 hours of struggling with the problems along with Everest Tech Support personnel the whole time we found out during a shift change at Everest that the new version of their software would not work on a Windows 2000 server. No one at Everest had ever communicated that fact to us before. This information was not published. Everest personnel had been working on our server remotely for many months analyzing our problems never ever mentioning anything about the software not designed to work on a Windows 2000 server.

Having had the whole books4cars company shut down already for more than a day we had to procure on an emergency basis a new server and new Windows 2003 software and spend another two days building the new server, loading the new software, and upgrading our database in order to be back in business. If the supposed tech support experts at Everest would have publicized or notified us of the fact that their new software was incompatible with Window 2000 server we would not have had to waste the time and money under their direction in rebuilding our Windows 2000 server with all new hard drives.

Had Everest acted responsibly we could have planned ahead and procured new hardware and software using best procurement practices to find best supply and price. Had Everest acted responsibly we would not have had to have our business shut down for three days. We were served with a new tech support bill of $5,000 for the coming year. We asked for one year of free tech support in compensation for our losses. We felt that requesting a $5,000 non-monetary compensation for a $10,000 monetary loss we very reasonable on our part. Everest responded with an offer of 15 months of tech support for the price of 12 months.

Such an offer represents an $1,250 non monetary deferred compensation for a $10,000 loss. We feel this is an insufficient offer of compensation. Everest Software Inc. has shut off our tech support. Everest Software Inc. has changed our account representative. We have tried to contact our new account representative with three calls and an e-mail over several weeks with no response from the new account representative. We are forced to lodge this complaint since we are not satisfied with the service and response from Everest Software Inc, to our attempts at resolving this problem to our satisfaction.

AUSTIN, TEXAS -- Everest's Ecommerce system was advertised and sold to us as being out, available and ready to use shortly after we purchased Everest's software. Not only was it delayed by many, many months but it was misrepresented as
being customizable in a way that Everest's salespeople later admitted they did not realize it was not. At every step of the way, we have indicated to Everest that we were interested in the core product and that we knew we would have to heavily augment the product to make it usable for us.

After Everest was purchased by Versata, Everest's policies constricted such that a maintenance plan was now required for any type of service. Refusal to pay the new maintenance plan fees meant that all of our previously
purchased support was void and could not be refunded.

Furthermore, the hosting we had planned to do with Everest had a contract that stated it included support and now that was rescinded and we were told we would have to pay the additional maintenance fees in order even to have basic hosting support (being able to call them when the website was down, etc.). This was a direct violation of the contract we had and we were not even made aware of it. Our contract effectively changed with no written notification whatsoever.

We approached Everest for a refund of the unused ECommerce system ($8500) and the unused and unusable service/support hours for site implementation ($3840). They said they had a no refund policy. They said that since they had already received payment in full from the leasing company we were dealing with the leasing company now and there was nothing they could do for us.

I won't even get into the fact that it sometimes took their support staff days to answer questions and they routinely still could not answer our questions when they did finally get back to us. Our people had to do everything on their own re: set up and implementation and that was with the hours we did use from the so-called support contract. We have been and continue to be willing to pay for the software components we did purchase and are using and apparently that is not good enough for Everest which is frustrating, disappointing and unethical. Be very careful
in dealing with this company.

VANCOUVER, CANADA -- I too, have a bad taste in my mouth with this company. When I originally paid over $20,000 for my software, I purchased a feature called "forms design" which I used to customize the on screen look of their software to my company. In my initial conversation with my sales rep, I ask "what are the ongoing costs of service" and was told basically that it wasn't necessary, but many "economical" plans would be available. During my first service contract which cost over $2200 for the year, I not only never accessed their support, but showed them several small features their software lacked and my solutions to solving those issues.

When I upgraded my version to the new 5 release, I chose to not have any further support for my "forms design" as I had done all the designing I needed and would no longer use that feature. When I upgraded all my previously created forms were gone!!! Their contention was that I didn't buy support for forms... my contention was that I initially paid $700 for the forms feature to design and KEEP those forms... I understand that if I needed support for them that wasn't there, but I had paid for those forms and they should have still been there after the upgrade.

I could go on and on about the way in which this company spoke to me (suffice it to say, if I spoke to one of my customers in that way, I wouldn't need Everest or any other software!!!) Their new "customer focused" president wasn't much better. They essentially told me that without purchasing a support contract, they wanted nothing to do with me. To cut a VERY long story short, I basically had to pay a further $700 to get "my forms" back and was told and sent an email to the effect that if I wanted to get support in the future, I would basically have to pay "a lot of money" to be reinstated, if they even chose to do so.

I feel like I have been held to ransom by this corporation and the way in which they reacted to my problem was completely unprofessional. I now backup all my data on a separate computer in the event that one day, my Everest Software mysteriously "dies". While I don't have specific complaints with the software, I feel ripped off by this company and would never deal with them again. Caveat Emptor!!

We have been a user of Everest Software since 2005. The company was originally held by the small group of inventors but is now part of Versata, which seems to be a German company that holds a number of small software companies. Our company faithfully paid all maintenance bills and demanded very little support. When it was time to upgrade to a new version in 2009, we paid the upgrade fee as well as paid for customizations to be done to our new version. Then for over 18 months, nothing happened. There were occasional emails from random staff, but all the people we knew there previously were laid off.

At one point we watched a Webinar from the new president of Everest, Danielle Roylston, where existing Everest customers were characterized as "excess baggage". While we were not being provided the upgrade and customization we paid for (by charge card!) we were hounded by anonymous emails threatening to cut off support if we did not pay the new (much higher) yearly maintenance fee. Our costs went from $8,000 to $20,000 per year with no additional benefit. We requested in writing, by email, and by phone, a meeting with a customer service representative which we never got.

Finally, Everest cut us off from all access to "support" (a laughable new website). We are currently installing Microsoft Dynamics GP and preparing a lawsuit against Versata/Everest for failure to deliver those services for which we paid. A visit to the everest website has many broken links and does not even provide a contact capability.