Accounting ERPs are user friendly, but Actual ERPs are business friendly.
The aim of this article is not to shoot-down accounting software. It is to highlight, that it is not good enough to help & run the business better.
In many of our first contact with the CEO’s of our Customers, we were first told that we are using an “Accounting ERP” so we do not need any other software. But when we asked them, do you operate your accounting ERP by yourself? almost all them said, No, we don’t. Then we asked them, Do you get any data from your Accounting ERP for your day-to-day operation? most of them said, No, we don’t.
The Accounting ERPs only records basic Sales, Inventory and Financial and Statutory data.
Small Accounting software will add some features here and there and add a ERP to their names. If you observe closely, such software will have 20 forms and 100 reports in their accounts modules. For the other modules like Sales, Distribution, CRM, Service, Purchase, Inventory, Sub-Contracts, Planning, Production, Costing, Plant maintenance and Payroll, they will have name-sake 3-4 forms & 4- 8 reports for each module just to claim ERP tag.
Bright side of Accounting ERP:
- easy to install
- low cost
- enough trained man-power available
- user-friendly
- simple to use
- very flexible
- auditor friendly
- useful for statutory filings
Flip-side of Accounting ERP
- age-old technology
- lesser security
- limited features (does not cover all detailed business functions)
- many process still on manual and semi-automated
- limited combination of MIS reports
- Only accounts & finance users will access the software
- no real-time data access for other department users
With such software, the customers will be in catch 22 situation. They will not know if they have a proper ERP or not. This will hamper their growth.
Acid test for Accounting ERP not enough for your business:
Look closely, all your accounting process is happening in the software. Now take a look at other business functions and list out how many business transactions are happening in Manual, XL sheets and word documents. This are the critical data that is required for your on day-to-day decision making. For these un-structured data, the management team always need to wait for the to come from individuals. Over and above, the accuracy of the data is questionable since it is not a real-time data.
This is a big reason for your delayed and wrong business decisions.
How a typical ERP specification looks like?
As s serious person looking for an Actual – ERP, you may need to spend about 20 minutes of time in reading this document in detail to understand, as to what the Actual-ERP covers.
What you have to do?
- Understand the Actual-ERP specification
- Prepare your own list of your business requirements from the Actual-ERP
- Now go back & compare the missing features in your Accounting-ERP
As said earlier, it is not necessary to rock-the-boat by stopping your Accounting-ERP. You can quietly add the Actual-ERP to your business.
Are you worried about the cost of ERP?
You now must be thinking about the Cost, Complexity and time for implementation.
- 2 users free forever
- Go-live with in 2 weeks
Try this out and take your business to the next level.
