Excel accounts production on the run post-iXBRL

Accounting practices have reduced their reliance on Excel spreadsheets and Word documents to cope with the demands of filing electronic accounts with HMRC in the iXBRL format, according to CaseWare.

During the summer the accounts production specialist conducted a survey among its clients firms and found that for three-quarters, just one in ten of their clients were still using Microsoft Office tools to produce their accounts.

The result was "encouraging", CaseWare said, but that represented a large number of companies that were still relying on Excel and Word. Seven out of ten of the practices surveyed reported that clients preparing spreadsheet final accounts added on average around two to six hours' extra work for their accountant.

Automated accounts production tools are natural territory for accountancy firms preparing multiple accounts for their clients, but the iXBRL effect was extending into the corporate world, according to CaseWare sales and marketing director Shez Hamill

"iXBRL is starting to drive Excel out of accounts," he said.

"We have experienced many corporate organisations who are using Excel and Word and some are clinging on for dear life to the redundant technology.

"Even from the ones that haven't ditched Excel and Word there are a high number of enquiries looking to improve processing systems, and the accountancy practice sector is instrumental in this," he continued.

Corporate reporting bungles such as the Superdry incident during the summer highlighted the risks of using spreadsheets within statutory reporting processes. Efiling has further encouraged finance departments to bring accounts production in-house. 

"More corporations are doing their own accounts using Word and Excel and for this you need skills for laborious manual tagging. There is a general desire to be more efficient, and not lost time or waste money," said Hammill. 

Centralising accounts production was also happening in response to recession and the need to reduce the finance headcount, he added. Although the compliance workload doesn't diminish, more efficient software can take up the slack.

CaseWare managing director CaseWare Simon Warren said the only way to address the concerns highlighted by the survey was to have software that has a "clear, audited pathway from the source general ledger right though to the completed financial statements".

Are you still clinging on to your spreadsheet-based systems? Comment below to let us know what you think of CaseWare's findings.