Patel based his figures on the $25 per month paid by a QuickBooks Online user for five years for total spending of $1,500 per user. That compared to the initial purchase price and revenue from two renewals paid by a desktop user which adds up to roughly $600 for the accounting application. However, Patel admitted, "There is a fair amount of churn" from users who don't stick with the Internet-based product and that it is higher than the turnover of desktop users.

He was not asked, nor did he volunteer the drop-out rate for the online product.  It has published the desktop rate and at the Intuit Investors Day in 2009, Patel noted that "One out of five QuickBooks customers never gets through the entire product."

Patel also reported that the average QuickBooks user purchases about $800 in additional products after the initial software purchase and that is up from roughly $400 three years ago. These additional products include payroll, payment and website builder applications.