Trintech, a leading provider of financial software solutions, today announced the release of its 2020 Global Record to Report Benchmark Report. Trintech surveyed almost 200 enterprise companies across 31 countries through January 2020 to evaluate which parts of the Record to Report (R2R) process have been automated, which are in the process of being automated and where finance and accounting (F&A) organizations are looking to adopt automation in the future.
Key findings from the survey on the trends in R2R automation include:
– Reconciliations are currently the single biggest challenge for F&A organizations
– A growing number of organizations identify a lack of standardization across all processes as their main roadblock to efficiency
– Looking ahead to 2025, respondents expect their biggest challenges will be personnel related, as attracting and retaining talent becomes more critical
“Automating low-value, repetitive tasks completed by the office of finance is finally starting to gain traction – we see the interest in the benefits of financial automation growing each year,” said David King, Chief Marketing Officer at Trintech. “These insights show that there is a huge potential for organizations to achieve significant ROI through the implementation of automation technology. Now, more than ever, organizations are looking for ways to be more efficient, while increasing transparency and ensuring data integrity as part of their month end or quarter end close. The office of finance is providing insights almost daily now that are crucial for business decisions across every industry.”
In terms of organizations’ current automation practices, only 20% of respondents have “Established” or “Advanced” automation in place. The report’s findings also show that most organizations are at least starting the move towards automating some parts of their office of finance, and there are few laggards that have not started implementing automation at all.
“Organizations need to spend more time understanding risk and less time managing data – approaches that deliver that efficiently and effectively, and drive quality into the process, have immense value,” said Jim O’Connor, Managing Principal Advisory Practice at The Hackett Group.
To dive into the results of this benchmark report further, Trintech and The Hackett Group will be hosting a joint webinar, How to Prepare Your Organization for the Future of Financial Automation, on Thursday, May 14th, to give companies insight into topics such as:
– The biggest challenges for the month end process
– Roadblocks to having the most efficient process
– The maturity of financial close automation
– Key areas to focus on improving by 2025
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