Five good reasons for NOT switching your finance software

There are a host of apparently compelling reasons why, after weighing up a finance system upgrade, you might consider calling the whole thing off. 

iplicit’s own research among 1,000 finance decision makers in medium-sized organisations reveals some of the reasons they hesitate to switch accounting software.  

Here are five good reasons for NOT upgrading your finance system – along with some alternative ways to think about them.   

1. It’s too disruptive

Most finance teams are not short of work. Why change accounting systems when running things with the old system takes every available hour? 

Our research confirmed this is a common barrier to switching accounting software. We found 24% feared the project would be a distraction from core responsibilities. A fifth were not convinced the outcome was worth the pain and 17% said the process was too complicated – suggesting quite a bit of concern about the disruption of changing. 

Reality: There are ways of minimising disruption when changing accounting software. A key one is not to rush the process.

If you allow plenty of time, avoid your busiest spells (do you really need to do this at year-end?) and perhaps consider bringing in external help, it is possible for the normal work of the team to continue uninterrupted.

2. It’s too costly

Cost tends to be the best reason for not acting on any project – and nearly a quarter (23%) of decision makers in our study said expense was a barrier to changing finance systems.  

Reality: You need to weigh the cost of switching accounting software against the cost of not doing so.  

• What’s the value of the staff time that’s being spent on laborious processes under the current financial management software?  

• Or of the time devoted to manipulating data in spreadsheets rather than generating reports in the finance system?  

• Is it costing you to devote physical space to an on-premises server? Or are you paying fees for a “hosted” cloud provider?  

• If you have more than one legal entity in the organisation, are you paying for multiple instances of the same software?   

• What is human error costing you?  

• And can you put a value on the staff talent you’re losing (or failing to attract) because of clunky systems? 

All these things need to be part of the equation before you can know the cost of updating accounting software. 

3. It’s a big time sink

Time is often in even shorter supply than money.  Our survey found 21% of respondents citing a lack of internal resources as a reason for not changing finance system.  

Reality: There’s a risk of falling victim to the “haven’t got time paradox”, which we covered in an iplicit guide to unlocking the superpower of efficiency in your finance team.

In that guide, we mentioned the story related by author Stephen Covey about the man who’s trying to fell a tree with a blunt saw. Asked why he doesn’t sharpen the saw, he says: “Because I’m too busy sawing.” 

Switching finance systems will require an investment of time – but not necessarily as much as you might think. For years, replacing legacy accounting software meant using systems designed for big corporates. These took months to implement and could disrupt an organisation for more than a year. Today, the best accounting software offers implementation times that add up to weeks rather than months, contained within a single calendar quarter. 

4. It takes too long to see return on investment

More than a quarter (27%) of decision makers in our research feared that it would take too long to see a return on investment in new financial management software.  

Reality: As we’ve seen, moving to a more powerful finance system doesn’t have to be as expensive and disruptive as ERP for finance teams used to be.

Accounting software implementation costs can be kept much lower than they are for those over-engineered corporate systems.  

As a result, ROI on accounting software can happen in months rather than years, especially if you free up substantial amounts of staff time – and a succession of iplicit case studies have shown that time saved can run into days every month. 

5. I need my old data (and it’ll cost a fortune to keep it)

This was the top concern on the minds of finance decision makers in our research. We found 42% of respondents feared losing historical data when switching accounting software – while 32% cited the cost of a “right to use” licence to keep seeing data in their legacy software.  

Reality: It’s understandable that you might be concerned about how to keep old data when switching accounting software.

But modern cloud-based accounting software offers superior data security and accessibility – and data migration can be seamless, avoiding downtime.  

What’s more, those right to use licences – which can often cost more than you were paying for the old software – are unnecessary. It’s possible to smoothly import past data into the new system, where it is available in a read-only version whenever you need it. The best accounting software also gives you the peace of mind that you can export the data again if you ever choose to change systems in the future. 

Doing nothing about your finance system isn’t always the safer option. 

If you’re using a legacy accounting system – or a cloud application designed for small businesses – you’ll be racking up hidden costs.

With a legacy system, those costs range from server hosting fees and inefficiencies to demotivated staff and increased cybersecurity risks.

Entry-level cloud software, on the other hand, is a great solution for many small organisations. Yet as a business grows, the software’s limitations can leave you spending many hours doing manual calculations and laboriously pulling together data to produce reports. On top of this, unstable app stacks can risk disruptions to your work.

In both these scenarios, the inadequacy of the system can make it harder to recruit, while manual processes increase the likelihood of errors or even fraud.  Perhaps most critically, the lack of real-time financial data hinders good credit control, cost management, and strategic decision-making, leaving your organisation flying blind.
Investing in modern accounting software ensures streamlined processes, enhanced security, and up-to-date insights, empowering your organisation to operate efficiently and confidently.

To find out more about iplicit’s cloud accounting software, you can take a tour or get in touch for a demonstration.