Ease vs Heard

Heard calls itself the financial platform for private practice. It does not process patient payments, does not pay your vendors, does not handle legal or HR, and outsources payroll to Gusto. A financial platform should do all of that.

Start for $99/mo See full pricing

Bookkeeping and taxes.
Not a back office.

Heard is a bookkeeping and tax service for therapists, packaged in a clean app. The team is solid and the tax work is real. If you only need bookkeeping and a tax return, Heard does that part well.

The problem is the positioning. A private practice has more financial moving parts than books and a 1040. Payments from patients. Bills from landlords, software vendors, malpractice carriers, and supply companies. Payroll for the practice owner and the team. Contracts, HIPAA agreements, and employee policies. Entity formation, registered agent service, and state compliance work. Heard does none of those things.

Ease does all of them, and the AI agent runs the work for you.

Heard

Ease

Bookkeeping

1040 Tax Returns

Patient Payments

Vendor & Landlord Bills

Payroll (Owner & Team)

Contracts & HIPAA Agreements

State Compliance & Entity Formation

AI Automation (Runs the work for you)

Feature Comparison

Feature

Heard

Ease

Built for doctors and clinicians

Therapists and wellness practitioners only.

Yes. Every clinical specialty.

AI agent does the work

No. Human bookkeeping team.

Yes. Ease Agent.

Bookkeeping

Included.

Embedded payroll

No. Outsourced to Gusto. $39/mo plus $6/employee.

Yes. Built into Ease. All 50 states.

Bill pay and vendor management

Not offered.

Included.

Patient payments

Not offered.

Included. Ease Pay. Card processing, memberships, invoices.

Entity formation and registered agent

Not offered. S Corp election only.

Included. Multi-state. MSO-PC capable.

Legal, contracts, and compliance

Not offered.

Included as a paid skill. Healthcare-trained.

HR and team management

Not offered.

Included.

Tax filing

Included on Essential and Premium.

$1,000 to $2,500. Included in Full Service.

Multi-specialty support

No. Mental health and wellness only.

Yes

Starting price

$129/mo Lite. $169/mo Essential. $255/mo Premium.

$299/mo. $99/mo for first 3 months.

What Heard does not do

Heard's homepage calls it "the only financial
platform built for private practice." A financial
platform
should give you a complete picture of
practice finances. Heard does not.

No patient payments

A private practice's primary source of revenue is patients paying for care. Heard does not process those payments. You pay another tool (Stripe, Ivy Pay, Square, your EHR's payment processor) to take patient money, then send transaction exports to Heard for the books. The transaction layer and the books are disconnected. Ease processes the payments in Ease Pay and the books update automatically.

No bill pay

The other side of practice cash flow is vendors. Rent, malpractice premiums, EHR software, lab fees, supply orders, cleaning service, accountant fees, and dozens of recurring charges. Heard does not pay any of them. You pay through your bank, your card, or a separate tool like Bill.com. Ease Bill Pay handles vendor payments and recurring bills, approved over text.

No embedded payroll

Heard "Premium" includes payroll, but the payroll is Gusto white-labeled inside Heard. The cost is an extra $39 per month plus $6 per employee per month on top of your Heard subscription. The real product is Gusto. If you ever leave Heard, you'd just be paying Gusto directly. Ease Payroll is built into Ease and runs through the agent. No second vendor. No second invoice.

No legal, contracts, or compliance

Therapy contracts, HIPAA agreements, employment agreements, contractor agreements, informed consent updates, and policy work are part of running a practice. Heard does not touch any of it. Ease Legal handles these as a paid skill, backed by a healthcare-trained legal consultant.

No HR or team records

If you hire a virtual assistant, an intake coordinator, or a second clinician, Heard has no place to manage them. Ease HR handles employee records, contracts, onboarding, reviews, and policy acknowledgments.

No entity work beyond S Corp election

Heard files Form 2553 for S Corp election. That is the only entity work the product does. If you need to form an LLC, register as a foreign entity in a new state, set up a registered agent, get an EIN, or move to an MSO-PC structure, you are doing that work somewhere else. Ease Entity handles all of it.

Therapy and wellness only

Heard's terms restrict it to therapists, psychiatrists, social workers, mental health counselors, marriage and family therapists, dietitians, nutritionists, massage therapists, chiropractors, and life coaches. Primary care, pediatrics, longevity medicine, women's health, virtual care, aesthetics, and most other specialties cannot use Heard at all. Ease serves every clinical specialty.

Who Should Pick What

Pick Heard if…

You need books and a tax return.

You are a solo therapist or wellness practitioner. You want bookkeeping and tax filing only. You are comfortable paying for separate tools for patient payments, bill pay, legal, and HR. You are fine if the bookkeeping process takes longer when handled by a human team rather than by AI that‘s available 24/7. You are not planning to scale beyond a small solo structure. In that exact configuration, Heard is mature and works.

Pick Heard if…

You want one product for the whole back office.

You want one product that covers patient payments, vendor bills, payroll, bookkeeping, taxes, legal, HR, and entity work. You practice part-time, full-time, or as a 1099, You don't want to maintain a stack of separate tools. You want an AI agent doing the work over chat instead of logging into a dashboard and waiting for a bookkeeper.

Pricing Compared

What you actually pay

Heard

$129 – $255/mo

Lite is $129/mo billed annually (no tax filing). Essential is $169/mo with personal tax. Premium is $255/mo with business tax. Payroll on Premium is an additional $39/mo plus $6/employee, paid to Gusto through Heard's white-label.

Ease

$299/mo

Ease Agent and FinancialOS, with payroll, patient payments, bill pay, entity work, and HR included. $99/mo for the first 3 months for the first 250 verified clinicians. Add a dedicated bookkeeper for $499/mo. Tax filing add-on is $1,000 to $2,500.

SWITCHING

Switching from Heard in Three Simple Steps

Bring your books.

Ease imports your transaction history and tax-categorized expenses from Heard in one step.

Set up everything Heard does not.

Connect Ease Pay for patient payments. Set up Ease Bill Pay for vendors. Add employees to Ease HR. Move your payroll off the Heard-Gusto integration onto Ease Payroll.

Start chatting with the agent.

Most therapists who fully migrate to Ease report the agent feels natural by week three.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why does Heard's pricing look cheaper?

It looks cheaper because the scope is narrower. Heard does bookkeeping and taxes. Add patient payments, bill pay, legal, and HR on separate tools and you spend more total. The honest comparison is Heard plus all the tools it doesn't replace versus Ease alone.

Is Heard's payroll actually Gusto?

Yes. The payroll product inside Heard Premium is Gusto, white-labeled. You pay Heard for the subscription plus $39/mo plus $6 per employee per month for the Gusto piece on top. Ease Payroll is built into Ease directly.

I'm a solo therapist who just needs books and a tax return. Doesn't Heard still win?

If that is the entire scope of your need, Heard is a reasonable choice. Most therapists discover later that they also need patient payments, bill pay, and a way to manage contracts and team members. At that point you are managing a stack of tools instead of one product.

Does Ease know therapy-specific deductions?

Yes. Licensure, supervision hours, continuing education, malpractice, professional association dues, telehealth software, office supplies, mileage to client locations. The agent classifies these by specialty.

Can I use Ease if I also serve non-therapy clients?

Yes. Ease has no specialty restriction. If you're a therapist who also does coaching, consulting, or training work, Ease handles all of it together.