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OpenGov Budgeting & Planning Reviews

About OpenGov Budgeting & Planning

OpenGov Budgeting & Planning is the only end-to-end modern collaborative budgeting software built for the unique needs of government.

Learn more about OpenGov Budgeting & Planning

Pros:

Being able to easily extract datasets from Tyler was key to project success.

Cons:

The implementation process had a few still gaps like the PCF that discouraged us a little but of course, OpenGov heard our cries.

OpenGov Budgeting & Planning ratings

Average score

Ease of Use
4.6
Customer Service
4.9
Features
4.5
Value for Money
4.4

Likelihood to recommend

9/10

OpenGov Budgeting & Planning has an overall rating of 4.6 out of 5 stars based on 20 user reviews on Capterra.

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Merrell
Treasurer in US
Government Administration, 201–500 Employees
Used the Software for: 1+ year
Reviewer Source

Alternatives Considered:

Rock solid implementation methodology sets OpenGov apart!

4.0 4 years ago

Comments: OpenGov's project team and the product itself enabled the City budget to easily move to the 21st century. In addition, with their help the City was able to get the 2021 budget done in record time with high user acceptance from department heads. The project team also was careful to explore many of the other compelling features of OpenGov, even if deploying those will come in this year. Specifically, Open Town Hall, Stories and the Transparency Portal are compelling for engaging constituents and building trust with citizens.

Pros:

The City uses Tyler Incode as its financial system of record but needed a robust budgeting tool that Tyler lacked and wanted to move away from labor-intensive spreadsheets. Being able to easily extract datasets from Tyler was key to project success. In a small City with tight resource constraints, launching a new tool in the midst of the pandemic might have been somewhat risky. I have worked in Tier 1 ERP software and related reporting tools for many years as an implementation consultant. Comparing project methodologies, OpenGov has a superior model. Week by week, our team of three easily stepped through product overview, training, then data extraction from Tyler, then building our own datasets for budgets. OpenGov optimized our time and got the job done on schedule.

Cons:

Initially, the standard reports in Budgeting & Planning were a little limited in scope, but OpenGov is clearly aggressive at pushing out new features. Their "NextGen" report tool came out early on in our project and has been a huge improvement.

Amy
Senior Management Analyst in US
Government Administration, 501–1,000 Employees
Used the Software for: 2+ years
Reviewer Source

Alternatives Considered:

Local Government Use

5.0 5 years ago

Comments: Worked well for communicating budget information to Finance Commissioners and provides easy access to the public. Looking to use more of the functionality to stream line monthly dashboards for management review.

Pros:

OpenGov is very easy to use and is versatile. Users can easily view data in various graphical formats, drill down into and see more detail, download the data and more. It makes communicating large amounts of data fast and easy.

Cons:

Possibility for some users to misinterpret the data. This can be mitigated with dashboards and saved reports. A few times we have ran into glitches where updates don't load properly or chart of account changes don't save and had to rely on customer support which we have found to be very responsive and helpful.

Mike
Auditor in US
Government Administration, 201–500 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

once navigated system easily performs.

4.0 6 years ago

Comments: ability to assemble multiple general ledger accounts easily.

Pros:

support group very helpful and software meshes well with our financial system providing instant visual of various funds and general ledger accounts--by department.. allows great tool for forecasting and budget implementation.

Cons:

some areas are difficult to navigate --you have to make some assumptions not mentioned in the instruction manual. the instruction manual too generic --does not present details for navigating that persons assigned to users end up having to contact support group for answers.

Kim
Budget Administrator in US
Government Administration, 201–500 Employees
Used the Software for: 2+ years
Reviewer Source

Revolutionized our Budget Process

5.0 last year

Comments: OpenGov has revolutionized our budget and reporting process. I could not have imagined how it would set the tone of our entire budget process. The entire agency has adapted to it from budget development, implementation to reporting. I often think about how I could not imagine the budget process without OpenGov, especially during the time of the pandemic. For a small budget office like ours, OpenGov is like having an extra member of the team!

Pros:

There is an ease of use with the product that extends from those who use it only once per year to those who use it on a daily basis. It is always amazing to see how quickly people adapt to using the software. Additionally, the customer service is the best I have seen in over 35 years working in local government budget and administration. I know that whenever there is a question or issue, OpenGov will be there to help support and problem-solve.

Cons:

OpenGov is always improving on its products and implementing new features. Many times, they move ahead with improvements faster than we can keep up! As a result, there are many new features that I have not had time to experiment with, but I know as time permits, I can delve into them and implement on our time schedule.

Stephanie
Enterprise GIS and Open Data Manager in US
Civic & Social Organization, 1,001–5,000 Employees
Used the Software for: 1+ year
Reviewer Source

OpenGov Suite review

5.0 6 years ago

Comments: This platform provides us with a way to provide information to the public in a unified and seamless way.

Pros:

The ease of use and flexibility to customize the appearance and functionality of the dashboards is the biggest pro of this platform. We have a significant number of performance measures plus additional initiatives, and creating a seamless, integrated design to make it easy for people to move through the different measures and data. Open Gov has helped us figure out how to create some navigation that allows us to provide that level of usability without having to design a separate website.

Cons:

The main challenge we have is limitations on the ways we can visualize performance measures where the goal is to be less than something. OpenGov has been helpful for figuring out options and letting us know their road map for when new visualizations might become available

Chuck
Treasurer & Finance Director in US
Government Administration, 51–200 Employees
Used the Software for: 2+ years
Reviewer Source

We have used OpenGov for financial transparency purposes and the experience was very positive.

5.0 6 years ago

Comments: The time saved and the overall ease of producing information are major benefits from using OpenGov.

Pros:

The ability to track requests and also the ability to put the budget book together were two very positive attributes about the budgeting software. Ease of use and familiarity with there products was a huge deciding factor.

Cons:

Sometimes the transfer of data process has been challenging. Going from our ERP solution to the OpenGov platform has been tricky at times and required assistance from support.

Klarryse
CFO in US
Government Administration, 201–500 Employees
Used the Software for: 1-5 months
Reviewer Source

This has been the best, most time-saving purchase for us! Customer service is outstanding!

5.0 6 years ago

Comments: Time, time, time!!! This has been such a time saver for our Finance staff AND for all of our department heads. We have not had one negative review from anyone involved in the budget process.

Pros:

Love the efficiency of collaboration among all of our department heads. Love that we can access from the cloud so we don't have to be in the office to review the budgets or answer questions from our governing board. Also like the export feature & customizing reports. Can't wait to really delve into more of the nuts & bolts after our budget is adopted. I feel we have only just scratched the surface of what it can do for us.

Cons:

We are new users, but still need to train on when we add new codes in our finance system, how to get them into OpenGov. Wish it was automatically done, but we understand that it needs to be set up & linked properly. So I guess that isn't really a con. It is more of a training issue on our part. And all we need to do is reach out to customer support or review the great training videos, & they will get us trained up! So I really can't think of any cons!

Lauren
Management Analyst in US
Government Administration, 1,001–5,000 Employees
Used the Software for: 2+ years
Reviewer Source

Making Budgeting Easier

5.0 5 years ago

Comments: I have used budget builder, book creation through Workiva. Our City has dashboards, reporting, workforce, and stories but we have not used them yet.

Pros:

I like the fact that users can make changes on their own, view their historical data, and use dashboards for analysis while submitting their budget.

Cons:

Right now, the process for users is too absolute. I know that OG is working toward a more granular access listing, but we have not benefited from that as of yet. Right now there are only admin & user.

Kiara
Budget & Management Analyst in US
Government Administration, 1,001–5,000 Employees
Used the Software for: 1+ year
Reviewer Source

Going from Excel to the Cloud

4.0 5 years ago

Comments: The customer service has to be the most impressing. From training our staff, to always answering emails with assistance, we have truly appreciated the level of service.

Pros:

We were using excel workbooks to get Depts to submit their budgets and for our review. This took away from employee moral. We spent nights and weekends combining excel submissions whereas OpenGov has everything in one place.

Cons:

The implementation process had a few still gaps like the PCF that discouraged us a little but of course, OpenGov heard our cries.

Patti
Budget Director in US
Government Administration, 1,001–5,000 Employees
Used the Software for: 2+ years
Reviewer Source

Excellent Customer Support and Developers that listen.

4.0 6 years ago

Comments: We are excited to be able to have more ability to project future budgets as well as eliminate several spreadsheets that we have used in the past for personnel projections.

Pros:

This product has a lot of flexibility, is very reasonably priced, and continues to improve at a very quick rate.

Cons:

I would like to be able to format my reports and charts. I am not a fan of the colors or shading that is currently part of the software.

Dan
CFO in US
Government Administration, 201–500 Employees
Used the Software for: 2+ years
Reviewer Source

Great for transparency!!

4.0 5 years ago

Pros:

Open Transparency for citizen's , import abilities, illustrations....great!

Cons:

Filter time it can take to scroll between searches,,,,,likely my hardware is the issue.

Claude
Assistant Information Technology Director in US
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Used OpenGov for this upcoming Budget Prep Cycle. It made collaboration a little easier.

4.0 6 years ago

Pros:

I feel that the user interface and it being web based are the two biggest plusses for the software. I have the ability to work on the files from anywhere which is great.

Cons:

The budgetary and supplemental views can be very confusing. I don't know if contrasting colors or graphics would help make it beneficial, but for me it is worth mentioning.

sara
City Admistrator in US
Civic & Social Organization, 51–200 Employees
Used the Software for: 1+ year
Reviewer Source

OpenGov Suite Review

5.0 5 years ago

Pros:

ease of use and visuals charts and graphs

Cons:

have not found anything yet that i dislike

Steve
Finance Director in US
Used the Software for: 2+ years
Reviewer Source

We have used OpenGov for a couple of years and it is an effective method for communicating w/public

5.0 6 years ago

Comments: Public Transparency and credibility from being open to the public.

Pros:

Ease of uploading , tracking metrics of public users, being able to attach other documents and that you can use it for NON Financial Data.

Cons:

Set up of the software was easy but yet requires you to decide how to present the data without knowing how the public will appreciate seeing the charts. It was nice to see how others did their presentation and then decide how we wanted to see our data.

A'ja
Management Analyst in US
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

My experience has been exemplary!

5.0 6 years ago

Pros:

What I like most about OpenGov are the visuals produced, whether it be graphs or interactive maps. It elevates transparency and speaks to many audiences.

Cons:

I'd like to see a list of report ideas compiled in one easily accessible location. Honestly, there aren't many cons to the product. The team is really good at finding a solution to any issues.

Brenda
Budget Analyst in US
Government Administration, 501–1,000 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Great for everyday users

5.0 5 years ago

Pros:

Great for storing data without corruptions or user errors.

Cons:

It may take some time for user to become familiar with all of the functions.

BRAD
Assistant Comptroller in US
Accounting, 201–500 Employees
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

Still implementing

4.0 6 years ago

Pros:

Open gov came in and did their part and it seems like a great tool especially when they are operating it. IT is easy to use once they set it the budget that you need

Cons:

It does not seem very user friendly at this point to set up new budgets

Jana
Comptroller in US
Used the Software for: 6-12 months
Reviewer Source

OpenGov has been a great time saver for our County. All of our departments are very happy with it.

5.0 6 years ago

Pros:

It has allowed us to eliminate the use of most of our budget preparation spreadsheets. The different users can easily input their budget requests with the breakdown and descriptions. The worksheet creation process was also simple and forgiving of mistakes.

Cons:

It would be nice to see totals for the historical data so it can easily be compared to our financial software.

Katarina
Analyst in US
Government Administration, 1,001–5,000 Employees
Used the Software for: 1-5 months
Reviewer Source

OpenGov Review by HHSA Tulare County

4.0 5 years ago

Pros:

The ease of use is definitely a plus. I most appreciate the capability to bridge the gap between the consumers and us as the governing agency. Being able to communicate information real time with both constituents and decision makers is gold.

Cons:

We are still in the early phases of use. Getting buy in is big at this point, we would benefit from more webinar type tutorials that demonstrate ease of use.

Lauri
Municipal Budget & Finance Analyst II in US
Government Administration, 1,001–5,000 Employees
Used the Software for: 1-5 months
Reviewer Source

This has been a great improvement over our old solution!

5.0 6 years ago

Comments: Not having to work almost 100% in Excel anymore.

Pros:

The time savings are huge, the routing of proposals to individuals with tracking, the reporting - basically everything.

Cons:

Probably that we can't do our payroll 100% within the software. Mostly because our payroll is too complex, which isn't the fault of the software.