The team at Intuit had seen the clues that Microsoft might be preparing to walk away from its Money personal-finance software, particularly after the Redmond company dropped the software's retail presence in favor of online downloads last year. But the decision to discontinue sales of Money, announced this week, nonetheless came as a surprise at Intuit's Mountain View, Calif., headquarters.

Now the company is working to help Microsoft Money customers shift to its market-leading Quicken software. In an open letter to Money customers today, Quicken vice president and general manager Todd Stanley confirmed that the company is working with Microsoft to help Money customers transfer their data to Quicken.

"This information is the lifeblood of your financial life and is incredibly valuable for you and your family," Stanley wrote, adding. "We’re assessing how we can make this capability a reality in conjunction with the release of Quicken 2010 in the fall."

Details of the data transfer are still being worked out, but Intuit spokesman Scott Gulbransen said that the idea is to make the switch as seamless as possible. Of course, Quicken isn't the only other option out there. See the comments on our original post for a good discussion of such alternatives as Mint.com and GnuCash.

But Intuit is looking for an influx of customers as Microsoft ends sales of Money at the end of the month. The effect could also be apparent when Microsoft ends support for Money in January 2011. "We really feel like customers over the years have voted with their wallets, and we do have a good product that Money customers are going to like using," Gulbransen said.