Tellency
Tellency
Comparison · Sage 50 alternative

Tellency vs Sage 50: from the accountant's desktop to the whole business in the cloud.

Sage 50, and Simply Accounting before it, has run Canadian small-business books for decades, and Sage 50 US has done the same south of the border. It remains desktop accounting software. When a business adds locations, inventory complexity or a second entity, the workarounds pile up. Tellency is the system those businesses move to.

Book a walkthroughRead a customer story
Tellency pricing
From $79 / user / mo
Tellency go-live
1–4 weeks
Migration
Sage 50 data brought across
Deployment
Cloud, dedicated instance
01 — Side by side

Where the two systems actually differ.

Sage 50 is dependable accounting software, and many bookkeepers know it well. The comparison below is about the point where a business needs operations and finance together, from anywhere, on one ledger.

ConsiderationTellencySage 50
What it isA full ERP: finance, sales and CRM, inventory and procurement, manufacturing, projects, HR and payroll, retail POS and e-commerce on one ledger.Desktop accounting software with inventory and job costing, sold in editions with separate Canadian and US products.
PlatformCloud, on a dedicated instance per customer, from any browser and the mobile apps.Windows desktop software, with cloud connectivity and hosting options layered on top.
UsersPer user with no fixed cap.Licensed per user with edition-based limits; larger user counts require the higher editions.
Inventory and locationsMulti-warehouse, bins, lots and serials, transfers, product variants and automated reordering, posting to the ledger as stock moves.Inventory tracking with multiple locations available in higher editions; variants and lot or serial tracking are limited.
ManufacturingMulti-level bills of materials, work orders, labor and overhead absorption, quality holds and scheduling.Bills of materials and item assembly in higher editions; no production scheduling or shop-floor costing.
Canadian and US taxGST/HST/PST/QST by place of supply, US state and local tax by jurisdiction, exemption certificates and returns from the ledger.Canadian edition handles GST/HST/PST/QST with tax codes; US edition handles sales tax by code. Jurisdiction-level automation is manual or via a connected service.
PayrollCRA payroll with T4s and ROEs, and US federal and state payroll, on the same ledger as the rest of the business.Payroll available as an add-on subscription within each national edition.
Who it suitsBusinesses with more than one location, real inventory or production, several entities, or a team that needs access from anywhere.Single-location businesses with straightforward accounting and a bookkeeper who prefers the desktop workflow.

Sage and Sage 50 are trademarks of The Sage Group plc. Descriptions of Sage 50 reflect how the product is generally sold and deployed as of September 2026 and are provided for comparison. Confirm current editions and pricing with Sage.

02 — Buyer's guide

Moving from Sage 50 without losing your history

Sage 50 users tend to stay because the books are in order and the bookkeeper knows the software. Both of those survive a move to Tellency. What changes is that the rest of the business joins the books.

The bookkeeper stays in control

01

The concern we hear most from Sage 50 shops is that an ERP will take the books away from the person who keeps them straight. Tellency does the opposite. The chart of accounts comes across as it is, journals and reconciliations work the way an accountant expects, and the new part is that inventory, sales, purchasing and payroll now post to that ledger automatically instead of being keyed in from other systems. AI-proposed postings are always approved by a person and every amount traces to a source document.

Locations, warehouses and the count that finally agrees

02

A second store or a warehouse across town is usually the moment Sage 50 starts needing a spreadsheet beside it. Tellency runs multi-location inventory on one ledger: live stock by site, transfers as a single transaction, location-level margin as a report, and a balance sheet inventory figure that matches the shelves.

GST/HST, QST and CRA payroll without re-keying

03

Sage 50 Canada handles Canadian tax codes well. Tellency handles them by place of supply automatically, so a sale to Quebec, Alberta or Buffalo gets the right treatment without anyone choosing a code, tracks input tax credits on purchases, and produces the GST/HST and QST returns from the ledger. Payroll posts to the same ledger with T4s and ROEs at year-end.

From the desktop to anywhere

04

Desktop accounting software fits a business where one person does the books at one desk. It stops fitting when the sales team is on the road, the warehouse needs to receive stock in real time and the owner wants to see margin from a phone. Tellency is cloud-based on a dedicated instance, with roles that give each part of the business the view it needs.

What migration actually involves

05

Chart of accounts, customers, vendors, items, inventory quantities, open receivables and payables and historical balances are exported from Sage 50 and loaded into your Tellency instance. Balances are reconciled to your closing trial balance, the team is trained, and a parallel month-end is run before cut-over. Most Sage 50 migrations complete within Tellency's one to four week go-live window.

03 — FAQ

Tellency vs Sage 50: common questions

Is Tellency a replacement for Sage 50?
Yes. Tellency includes the accounting Sage 50 does, plus operations: multi-location inventory, manufacturing, projects, CRM, HR and payroll, retail POS and e-commerce on one ledger, in the cloud on a dedicated instance.
Can we migrate from Sage 50 Canada or Sage 50 US to Tellency?
Yes. Chart of accounts, customers, vendors, items, inventory quantities, open receivables and payables and historical balances are brought across from either edition and reconciled to your closing trial balance before go-live.
Will our bookkeeper be able to use Tellency?
Yes. The general ledger, journals, bank reconciliation and period close work the way an accountant expects. The difference is that the rest of the business posts to the ledger automatically, and AI-proposed entries are approved by a person before they post.
Does Tellency handle GST/HST/QST like Sage 50 Canada?
Yes, automatically by place of supply rather than by choosing tax codes. Input tax credits are tracked on purchases and the GST/HST and QST returns are produced from the ledger. US sales tax is handled by jurisdiction for US businesses.
Is Tellency more expensive than Sage 50?
Compare the whole stack: Sage 50 licence, payroll add-on, hosting for remote access and whatever inventory or e-commerce tools sit beside it. Tellency includes those functions in one per-user subscription from $79 per month with implementation quoted once.
How long does it take to move from Sage 50 to Tellency?
One to four weeks for most businesses, including data migration, configuration, training and a parallel month-end before cut-over.
Related
Tellency vs QuickBooks Enterprise→Outgrowing QuickBooks: the guide→ERP software in Canada→Financial Management→
Next step

Bring your Sage 50 trial balance. Leave with a go-live date.

Send us a trial balance and an item list. We will show you your own data in a configured Tellency instance and tell you the week you would close your first month-end in it.

Book a walkthroughDownload the apps