One key to trustworthy financial reports is a streamlined account reconciliation process that accurately captures all activity within each account. Yet in many organizations, manual processes and the volume of accounts lead to time-consuming, error-prone account reconciliation functions.
The account reconciliation solution found in OneStream’s MarketPlace can automate this process, reducing the risk of errors and allowing accounting and finance personnel more time to focus on transactions that require deeper analysis. This is critical whether your company is public and must comply with myriad financial reporting regulations, or whether it relies on its financial statements to inform business decisions.
The Lowdown on Account Reconciliation
Account reconciliation generally refers to comparing two sets of records that should match, and confirming they actually do. Often, one record is internal, such as the cash balance on your company’s books, while the other is external, like the monthly statement issued by the bank. The types of accounts reconciled typically include cash and cash equivalents, accounts receivable and payable, and inventory, among others.
Account reconciliation may seem like a routine administrative task, yet it acts as a control measure, helping to ensure the account balances in your financial statements are accurate, updated, and reflect all transactions. Account reconciliation also can help in uncovering mistakes and potentially fraudulent activity, and in reducing the likelihood of financial restatements, helping to moderate external audit costs.
The Challenges
While account reconciliation is a critical financial process, the volume of accounts to be reconciled, especially in large, multinational companies can be daunting. Moreover, they’re often running on disparate software systems and applications. And if a manual process lengthens the reconciliation period, the information being reconciled can change.
To address these challenges, many companies have turned to spreadsheets. While this offers some automation, spreadsheets often are prone to data entry errors and discrepancies. Another option is standalone reconciliation applications. Like spreadsheets, these provide some automation. Yet data must be handled multiple times, which also introduces the potential for gaps and errors.
OneStream Software’s account reconciliations MarketPlace solution not only automates, but because the solution relies on a single application, security, and user interface, you’re working with one version of base financial information. Similarly, financial statement reporting, and account reconciliations reside within one application, and leverage the same data, data mapping, account hierarchies, enhancing consistency and control. And rather than manage multiple systems, you can focus on one scalable platform that can reside in the cloud
Reconciliation status checks let you know of changes on accounts previously reconciled, reducing the need to monitor them. You’re also able to start account reconciliation as soon as trial balances are submitted, rather than delaying until the corporate close is completed.
The account reconciliation solution is one of more than fifty solutions OneStream Software offers within its XF MarketPlace.
OneStream Account Reconciliation in Action
Post Holdings, Inc.,, is a $6.2 billion holding company for consumer-packaged goods, such as Grape Nuts and Raisin Bran cereals. Through acquisitions, the St. Louis, Missouri based-company had grown in both size and complexity. Connection challenges and errors often interrupted the solution it had been using to aggregate financial and non-financial data and manage account reconciliations. When these occurred, Post had to contact their previous vendor to correct them.
Company leadership looked for a corporate performance management system that could easily accommodate acquisitions, and that the finance team could manage itself. OneStream Software met these criteria, with its unified platform and quality customer support. Its flexibility allowed the finance team to make changes in-house.
HollandParker, a OneStream Diamond Partner, worked with Post Holdings to deploy OneStream for financial consolidation, reporting, and account reconciliation, among other processes. Post Holdings now can rely on a single platform for these functions. OneStream has cut the time required to complete the monthly close and simplified account reconciliation. You can Learn More by checking out the case study.
AFL, an international manufacturer of solutions for the energy, industrial and other markets based in Spartanburg, South Carolina, has implemented multiple OneStream solutions. Its deployment of the OneStream Account Reconciliation marketplace solution helped accelerate account reconciliations by 75 percent, saving the company about $100,000 annually. You Can learn more about AFL’s usage of OneStream Software by reading the OneStream Case Study.
Accurate, timely account reconciliations are essential to accurate, timely financial statements. OneStream’s Account Reconciliation Solution, as demonstrated in this webinar, can help your company streamline its account reconciliation process, reducing the risk of errors and delays, and boosting accuracy.
Final Thoughts
At HollandParker, we understand that change can be grueling, as a OneStream Software Diamond Implementation Partner, we simplify the change. We are committed to 100% customer success during the migration process. Our expert team applies industry best practices to your processes to get the most of your investment in OneStream. We also follow a proven implementation approach to deliver on-time and on-budget.
Get ready to lead with speed and confidence! Contact HollandParker today to discover strategic support migrating to OneStream within your organization.