Biztree Forms App (for HP Printers)

HP's free Biztree Forms App for HP Web-connected printers is something of a mixed blessing for micro and small offices. The main purpose of the app seems to be to whet your appetite for the full version of Biztree Business in a Box, at $249.95 (direct) minus the $70 savings you get from the coupon you can print as part of the app. In addition to the sales pitch, however, you'll also find a selection of more than 40 useable-as-is business related forms, worksheets, and checklists. The good news is that any given office is bound to find at least a few useful forms in batch, which is enough to make the app worth looking at.

In some ways, the Biztree Forms App is similar to the LegalZoom apps for Lexmark Web-connected printers. Both it and the various LegalZoom apps, including LegalZoom Employment Forms ($29.95 direct, 3 stars) and LegalZoom Business Agreements ($34.95 direct, 2.5 stars), let you print forms from your printer's front panel without needing a computer. There's even some overlap in the forms they offer, with Employment Application forms in both, for example.

There are also three big differences between the Biztree forms app and the LegalZoom apps, however. The first two are fairly obvious: All of the Biztree forms are available through one app, and the app is free. Just as important, where the LegalZoom apps focus on legal forms, the Bizapp forms cover a much wider range, from time sheets, to wire transfers, to customer complaint forms, to a checklist of documents to keep in your employees' personnel files. With the Biztree Forms App, in short, it's much more likely that you'll find forms you can use.

The Basics
According to HP, the Biztree Forms app will work with all current Web-connected laser MFPS as well as Officejet and Officejet Pro ink jet printers, and it should work with all future printers in these categories as well. I tested the App on an HP LaserJet Pro CM1415fnw color MFP ($449 direct, 4 stars). Installation is a non-issue. HP says that if you have a printer that supports the app, you'll find the Biztree Forms icon on your printer's front panel as soon as you set up an account at the HP ePrintCenter.

Using the app is typical of the breed, in general description at least: Pick Biztree Forms from the front panel, find the form you want to print, and print it. The more detailed description includes two extra steps, however. Every time you pick Biztree Forms, you get a short reminder that you can buy the full program. Choose OK, and you move to the main screen, with three choices: Simple Forms, Advanced Forms, and Biztree Coupon.

At the main screen, you need to choose Simple Forms, which translates to Forms you can actually use. The Coupon option prints what amounts to an ad for Business in a Box along with the coupon code for the $70 savings I've already mentioned. The Advanced Forms choice takes you to a hierarchical menu structure with lots of forms. However, they are all either partial or sample forms with an ink-wasting ad, in color, telling you that you can get the full version in editable format as part of Business in a Box.

How Useful is it?
The usable forms are all listed under Simple Forms and are divided into three categories with about 15 choices each. To see a list, you pick Simple Forms and then one of the categories: Forms (Business Credit Application, Credit Card Billing, Purchase Order, and 12 more), Worksheets (Delegation Worksheet, Competitor Analysis Worksheet, and 12 more), and Checklists (21 Things to Do For a Safe Workplace, 19 Strategies for Hiring the Best, and 13 more).

Some of the forms are potentially useful as is. For example, the Electronic Funds Transfer Authorization asks for all the information you need for direct deposit of pay into an employee's account. Others are better understood as templates that you can recreate on your computer. The Time Sheet choice, for example, prints a Weekly Time Record with the hourly pay rate already filled in, and the Depreciation Worksheet has two columns filled with *DIV/0! error messages.

Note too that no matter what kind of business you're in, some percentage of the forms will be largely irrelevant to your needs. In a one person, owner-operated business, for example, there's not much point in filling out a time sheet.

Unfortunately, for many of the forms, the only way to find out whether they're truly useful for your needs is to print them. One feature the app should offer, but doesn't, is an option to print a list of all the forms, preferably with a sentence or two explaining what each is for. Lacking that feature, arguably the smartest thing to do is to print all of the forms yourself. With about 45 forms, this can be a chore, but you only have to do it once, so you can pick the ones you can use, and then keep them all for later reference.

Ultimately, the Biztree Forms Apps usefulness is a little hit and miss, depending entirely on how many of the forms you need. With about 45 to choose from, however, I strongly suspect that most small businesses will find at least a few they can use, even if only as templates for creating their own. Odds are high that if you take the time to look through the choices, you'll find enough here to make it well worth keeping the App available through your printer's front panel.

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