Microsoft Excel certainly has its place in the workplace, and has helped many start ups and SMEs get off the ground. Once a company begins to grow, however, spreadsheet software has its limitations.

A better long-term solution for financial planning and analytics is to migrate to a more shareable, scalable, and trackable finance solution like Oracle Planning and Budgeting Cloud Service (PBCS).

Excel Nightmares

Here are some of the major problems you run the risk of by keeping a legacy Excel system going, rather than taking advantage of PBCS opportunities:

• Inability to forecast accurately on a long term basis. That means you can do cash flow well enough to get by, but trying to project financial results for new markets or products, will prove more difficult.
• The bomb that shows up at the worst possible time. Finance spreadsheets are heavily dependent upon bits of underlying data. If they are not properly flagged, they could end up being discovered at the worst moment, usually during a reporting period.
• Errors with Merging. When different departments need to merge data from different spreadsheets, expect problems.
• Spreadsheet access. If you do not know who is the spreadsheet’s owner, you have a problem — or maybe even several problems: the missing spreadsheet, the lost spreadsheet, the stolen spreadsheet, the tampered-with spreadsheet, and so on.

Sticking with Excel results in wasted time and wasted talent.

That’s the end result from continuing to nurse a legacy spreadsheet system when a better solution is available at an affordable price.

Excel systems cost time because each user invents a unique solution to a common problem. You waste time merging the data, then waste more time checking it and correcting errors.

Some of the Features and Benefits of PBCS: Oracle Planning and Budgeting Cloud Service (PBCS) drives the financial planning, analysis, and reporting of companies across the globe.

Overview

• Intuitive, role-based web
• Flexible workflow and plan management capabilities
• Built-in management reporting capabilities
• Support for rolling forecasts and best practices
• Same Oracle security and reliability of all Oracle Cloud deployments
• Application diagnostics to simplify administration

Benefits

• No CAPEX infrastructure investments
• Minimal IT resources required; owned by Line of Business
• Simplify technology choices with flexible deployment options
• Mix and move between deployment models as business needs change
• Evolve from disconnected planning tools and spreadsheets, driving planning beyond finance across the enterprise.

PBCS will liberate your talented employees, enabling them to better use their technical and financial skills to grow your business, rather than trying to resolve Excel’s inefficiencies.

Tactic Key Consulting®  has consultants who work with PBCS for financial analytics across a variety of business verticals. We can share with you the many benefits of making the upgrade including auditability, forecasting ability, operational efficiency, and expansion planning.

If you are ready to upgrade to a serious EPM system, if you want more benefits from cloud integration with your planning, budgeting, and forecasting system than you have with your spreadsheet-based or on-premises system, Tactic Key Consulting’s experts are available to help assess, plan, and execute your move to the cloud. Do not delay and contact us today.