Questions to Ask When Researching Finance Software

By Frazer Hardy, Percipient

Choosing the right accounting system can feel like navigating a minefield. With so many different options on the market, each with varying functionality, geographical reach, and deployment options, what questions should finance professionals be asking, and crucially, what should they be looking for?

A New Era for Finance Software

We’ve come a long way since the reign of monolithic, one-size-fits-all solutions, and thank goodness. The new breed of modern finance solutions brings huge benefits: deep functionality and broad capabilities, combined with low TCO and easy-to-use interfaces.

But when selecting the right one for your business, it’s important to evaluate your specific needs, the current system’s shortcomings, and your future goals. Moreover, it’s important to do this with the needs of the wider business in mind, not just the finance department, and with the organisation’s longer-term vision in mind.

Against this backdrop, we’ve highlighted our top 10 questions to ask:

1. What works/doesn’t work about your accounting processes, and what pain points are you currently facing?

This could range from reliance on manual intervention and spreadsheets to an inability to view consolidated accounts across multiple entities. Often, users become so accustomed to workarounds that taking a step back and fully evaluating shortfalls is a crucial first step in identifying requirements.

2. What functionality would your ideal accounting solution provide?

This is obviously incredibly personal to your operations. For some, project accounting capabilities might be non-negotiable, while others might rely on multi-currency, multi-lingual functionality that supports regulatory environments across global operations.

3. Where do you want your business to be in one, three, five- and 10-years’ time?

Depending on the organisation’s ambitions, scale is likely to feature highly on the list of must-haves. In a world where uncertainty has become the norm, the ability to expand, extend services, and pursue growth depends on a robust, scalable platform at the helm.

4. Do you want to move to the cloud?

The benefits of the cloud have moved well into the mainstream, but clouds come in many forms. For some, a hosted approach might suit, while others are ready to embrace full multi-tenant cloud. Evaluating the best approach early on will hone the selection process and ensure the right model for your business.

5. What will a new system cost? How much are you willing to spend?

Frame this question in the context of value. Rather than looking at cost in isolation, review the value new software capabilities will bring, and ensure you’re not investing in functionality you won’t use. The good news is that there is now so much choice when it comes to cost, with software-as-a-service and subscription models alleviating the need for large up-front investment in hardware or a perpetual licence.

6. What level of involvement will be required from us?

Depending on the available in-house resources, we will build a project team based on the demands of the deployment. While clear buy-in at a senior level and commitment are, of course, required, working with a partner such as Percipient brings expertise, experience and resources, all of which take the pressure off in-house teams.

7. What integrations do you need?

Once upon a time, integrations brought both cost and complexity in spades. Thanks to advances in APIs, integration is typically more straightforward, quicker, and more cost-effective than implementations tied to legacy systems. Earmarking business-critical integrations from the outset is crucial in optimising the value of the new software as early as possible.

8. Can I keep my existing data, and will it be secure?

This is, of course, paramount, but it’s important to be realistic about the time it will take to migrate data and ensure it’s in a format that supports all-important business insights.

9. What type of support will we get once the new system is in place? How are future upgrades managed?

The level of support depends on what’s required. For cloud-native solutions such as Sage Intacct, much of the support is built into the system, and upgrades occur as quarterly updates.

10. How long will the deployment take?

It’s important to understand timescales to plan around peak periods and accounting windows. Deployment timeframes depend on many internal and external factors. For cloud deployments, timeframes are shrinking, and we’ve seen recent projects around Sage Intacct, for example, take a matter of weeks.

Accounting Software Experts

If you would like to know more about Percipient or the benefits our software and services could bring to your business, get in touch or call us on 01606 871332.