After mishandling service to their customers with their data breach, Blackbaud needs to do some reputation-building. This kind of decision in light of that very recent history really has me wondering. A one month heads up at year-end? Does anyone at Blackbaud even think about and speak up for their customers?

Wouldn't it make sense to ensure that NXT can replicate Crystal Reports before removing access to it?

Agreeing with the many comments and pleas. This is such poor customer service. It's costing our organization many hours of time, the cost of a Crystal Reports license, and likely other costs. Our quarterly statements to our biggest set of donors are suddenly not going to work. Super short notice, awful timing, no talk of reimbursement for lost resources or adjustment to subscription for withdrawn functionality, etc. Precious little in the way of explanation and no apology for the short notice. Really?

It was hard enough when they discontinued support but at least we had access to the software. Completely removing the software with such very little notice is going to require us to purchase a standalone version and we do not have time to get this proposed and approved by the board since our budget is already approved and a standalone version is not cheap. Pushing us to NXT that does not yet have all the reporting fields available yet is ridiculous. We desperately need at least 6 months notice!!!

Removing access to Crystal Reports at this time of year with little notice is a slap in our (your customers - I'll remind you) face. If we need to make changes for our end of year processing we're just SOL. And it that's not the worst of it there is no clear cut avenue for us. Do we purchase our own copy of CR (and it is expensive for my small org) if so how do we connect to our existing reports in a manner that is easy for the report consumer to use. AND.... I could go on. In my opinion BB should have prepared by working with SAP on a CR bulk pricing model to help easy the pain at least for a year or two. Any wonder people are moving to Salesforce and other CRM?

While I understand the desire to end support for something like Crystal, the timing is very much a hardship. We are understaffed with a crazy busy end of year giving strategy that includes a very large radiothon/phone bank, plus year end statements in January and our large gala in February.

While we don't have a ton of reports in Crystal, we do run our year-end statements and our gala receipts/statements out of Crystal. I know that I can go in and update those now but I am currently weighing the amount of time it will take to do that with the fact that I have to figure out a new solution.

If I could customize the NXT giving statements or at least include the fund and a couple of other fields, that would be a workable solution for year-end. However, the statements in NXT and even the canned statements in RE7 don't meet our needs. And they definitely don't meet the needs of our gala. The sad thing is that I will most likely be spending this holiday weekend trying to figure out alternatives and/or update current Crystal reports because it is the only down time I have between now and December 15th.

My organization depends on Crystal Reports for necessary detailed, in-depth reports. NXT does not provide reports that come anywhere close to what we need.

One month's notice is not enough! We're in the busiest time of year. I don't have time to research, purchase, and set up a new reporting system right as we hit year end (when we need all the reports)! Nor do I have time to update all the Cyrstal Reports we will need over the next couple years. At least give us til June 2022 to remove support, and discount the price since we will no longer be receiving the full software we contracted for.

Blackbaud, can you at least give us a little more time?

NXT does NOT have the reports that are needed for us. It is mediocre at best. And not user friendly. The Crystal Reports I have made are intricate and contain so many formulas that NXT will never be able to do. NXT reporting is not nearly good enough for us. I am beyond upset with the change. I will go out and get my own license for Crystal and will have to move all my custom reports and reconnect. This is going to take hours to do. I already had to do that once when we went to NXT because the only way they would work was if I put all the reports and mdb files into the F drive on your hosted site. That being said, I now have to do the same thing all over again. It was bad enough when you stopped providing support for Crystal and left us hanging, but this really is awful! So disappointed!!!

Changing something in our contract at the end of the fiscal year and/or calendar year is bad enough, but to give less than a month's notice to enact this change is unacceptable. In most cases the people who are most affected by this change and those who need to hurry up and find other processes are also the same people responsible for gift entry and data at the end of the calendar year. Very disappointing to say the least!

Blackbaud, if you are going to take away something from our contracts you should be notifying us well in advance. Besides the fact that your platform has been so unstable lately, you always send major notifications and changes out either at the end of a fiscal year or tax year for your customers. Also, asking non-profits, that are coming out of almost two years of a pandemic to have to go out to purchase new software that you are no longer going to support or to BUY YOUR insight designer seems like a sneaky way to get us to spend more money with you. I have been a long time supporter and defender of your products, but I have to say that after this, I don't think I can continue to encourage other organizations to look at you as a solution. There are other systems out there and that is where I will recommend they look. So disappointing. If you claim to be "the leader", please act like one.

A Month is not very much notice. Blackbaud has looked at our reports in the past to see if they can be duplicated with insight designer and they could not! :( Also the reporting in NXT can have a 4 hour delay. There should at least be an option to manually push the refresh for when we urgently need current data!

Agreed! Doing it at year-end? Absurd! We need more time to react to this change.

I did not receive the email notification, which is my first concern. Not allowing adequate time to obtain an alternative, learn how to use it and develop necessary reports is unacceptable. If I read a previous post correctly, the single user version does not support the file type MDB and the other two suggestions are not offered in RE. Please reconsider at least extending the deadline to give users time to investigate and learn and alternative and adequate time to convert current reports.

I agree with these comments. One month notice during the busiest time of year seems completely unreasonable.

We use our Crystal Reports daily at my organization. Taking away the ability to update existing Crystal Reports and telling us to go ahead and anticipate any changes and do them now is just unrealistic, especially with less than 30 days to do it.

Please reconsider ending access to Crystal Reports until you can get your own products to do what it does. The reporting function in NXT is not an acceptable replacement.

I find it interesting that for a company that states it is trying to to the best for it's customers, you find yourself taking away the programs that are vital to us being able to use the system in the ways we need, because RE and RE NXT do not have the robust data tools that crystal reports gives us in order to manipulate the data that is needed for complex processes.

I wonder if you had taken the time to poll your customer base to see how many use it and how vital it is to their day to day functions, if you would have decided to pull the plug on it with no advance notice (I am sorry 30 days during the busiest time of year is not enough notice for people to find a way to re-write reports that may not be able to be duplicated with the less than stellar applications available in NXT).

I hope that you re-consider your position to pull it now, and at least allow it to sunset at the close of the FY for most of us (July 1) so people have amble time to prepare.

I rely on Crystal Reports for multiple items and have spent a lot of time creating the Custom Reports. NXT cannot re-create what is needed and this is very upsetting.

I agree with all these comments - but especially Kylea's that Blackbaud has NO IDEA how organizations use Crystal Reports. There is nothing in NXT that can do what I can do with Crystal Reports! And yeah - great Christmas gift - give us the shaft right before year-end when no one has extra time to update things on a less-than-one-month deadline. I use it for event lists, post-event reports, invoices, pledge reminders, etc. And I trust it because I can verify it. Try that in NXT!

Crystal Reports: old (I first used it in 2000!) and frustrating, perhaps. And yet, it's vital to being able to create the output needed for the vast majority of us. Countless organizations have invested precious time and resources into customizations that we need via Crystal Reports. Raiser's Edge canned reports are lacking, and the dashboards are beautiful to look at, but can only serve part of our needs (could we PLEASE be able to export them?). As others have noted, the timing of this end of support is borderline cruel. Listen to your customers, Blackbaud, and put the brakes on this for now.