Jump to read:
The Risks of Using Spreadsheets for Revenue Recognition
Integrated Revenue Recognition vs Spreadsheets
Top Use-Cases of Integrated Revenue Recognition
Subscription Management Solution with Integrated Revenue Recognition: Key Features
Automate Your Revenue Recognition with Younium
Thinking you can manage revenue recognition with spreadsheets is a common pitfall for many SaaS companies. It's born of the belief that your business can manage complex revenue recognition with just excel formulas, pivot tables, or macros. Sometimes that’s true. But, more often than not, it isn't.
Especially, in the age of recurring revenue, hybrid-pricing models, complex contracts, and accrual-based accounting methods we can confirm one thing: managing SaaS revenue recognition needs special tech support. And that needs to go way beyond the humble spreadsheets.
Yet, 39% of SaaS companies continue to use spreadsheets for revenue recognition.
This means issues ranging from non-compliance to loss of funding opportunities – likely not the future you envision for your SaaS business.
The Risks of Using Spreadsheets for Revenue Recognition
When you're starting off your business, spreadsheets can come in real handy. But, over time, you will find that they cannot cope with the complexities of your revenue recognition workflows.
Spreadsheets are not dynamic enough, nor are they error-proof, or compliance friendly. And they do not automate the subscription revenue recognition workflow.
- Error-prone information: When data entry and formula entry are done manually within spreadsheets, accidental errors in revenue recognition are inevitable – leading to significant financial misstatements or compliance issues.
- Lack of version control: As your business grows, more data may be added or existing data may be updated. You want to be able to manage versions of spreadsheets, and always be in the know about which version is the latest and know how the data evolved over time. Since spreadsheets do not allow for such a degree of version control the accuracy of revenue recognition data is compromised.
- Poor audit trail: When investors or auditors come looking for historical records of your financial statements or to verify data integrity, spreadsheets will not be able to deliver. It's not possible to have a full view of historical changes, verify accuracy, and ensure transparency in this platform.
- Issues staying compliant: Staying compliant with constantly evolving regulation of revenue recognition rules and compliance requirements (or legislations) is nearly impossible in a static spreadsheet.
- Scalability issues: You could build forecasting models, cap tables, P&Ls, and so much more, on spreadsheets. But, the moment your business grows, the spreadsheets will glitch as financial complexity and transaction volumes grow.
- Security concerns: Spreadsheets don't have checks and balances to prevent unauthorized access or accidental changes. This can compromise your sensitive financial data and cause data errors.
- Integration challenges: Generic platforms that offer spreadsheet functionality do not offer the capability of integrating with ERP systems or other data sources. Hence subscription data stays in different systems across your organization in silos, leading to inconsistencies in revenue recognition.
Integrated Revenue Recognition vs Spreadsheets
Subscription management solutions with built-in, integrated revenue recognition, are the remedy for most of the challenges mentioned above.
Here are some benefits of using a subscription management solution with integrated revenue recognition, like Younium, that is purpose-built for B2B SaaS over ordinary spreadsheets.
Top Use-Cases of Integrated Revenue Recognition
As you have just seen, the list of benefits offered by a subscription management solution with built-in revenue recognition is many vis-a-vis spreadsheets. The advanced technology and automated revenue recognition it offers have a large impact on streamlining your day-to-day operations.
Here is how it can help with specific situations that SaaS businesses commonly face:
-
Complex Charge and Billing Types: Many contracts involve a mix of one-time fees, subscription charges invoiced yearly, and additional charges invoiced quarterly. Managing these varied billing types is crucial for accurate revenue recognition. Appropriate rules are automatically applied based on contract terms, ensuring accuracy and compliance.
-
Proration and Offsets: Agreements often start mid-month or include charges that begin after specific milestones. This requires careful proration of charges, credits, and new charges to ensure compliance and accurate financial reporting. Revenue can be automatically scheduled and allocated according to the service period, adjusting for contract variations or prorations as needed.
-
Changes that impact prepaid services: For example, mid-term upsells—necessitate precise calculations for prorated charges, credits, and new invoicing structures. These complexities directly influence revenue recognition schedules and accounting entries. Adjustments to revenue recognition schedules occur automatically to reflect these changes, reducing the risk of errors.
-
Non-Standard Contracts: Sometimes you may have custom contracts featuring clauses that permit annual rate increases, special prices (in lieu of loyalty) that kick in after a period of time, revenue-sharing deal structures, and so on. This makes your subscription billing and revenue recognition quite variable year on year, something spreadsheets were never designed for. This is where subscription management solutions shine.
Use case: A SaaS company added to its contracts a 10% discount for customers who are loyal to them. The discount kicks in only in the third year of association. A good subscription management platform will build such non-standard contract terms into its algorithm so that changes are reflected in subscription billing and revenue recognition from the third year of renewals by the SaaS company.
- Ease of Revenue Reporting: Spreadsheets often are unable to sync with many data sources and are unlikely to automatically pull data (from different sources) in real-time to offer a 360o and up-to-date view of revenue recognition activities and trends. Manually creating reports by copying and pasting data between spreadsheets and connected systems is a recipe for error and low productivity. Not to forget spreadsheets hang, freeze, or stop working even with the simplest of filters. This is why you need a subscription management solution with integrated revenue recognition that can execute, with ease, the granular and calculation-heavy reporting.
Use case: The finance team of a SaaS business wanted revenue recognition reporting that is dynamic, automated, scalable, and flexible. So, they used a subscription management solution that offered a single source of truth for all subscription data, met automated monthly recurring revenue schedules, and offered bespoke reporting focused on unique products, customer cohorts, and other dimensions.
Subscription Management Solution with Integrated Revenue Recognition: Key features
Here is how Younium’s integrated revenue recognition capabilities ensure stress-free and accurate revenue recognition:
- Automated revenue scheduling: Younium allows your business to automatically recognize the revenue earned (and not necessarily just when it's received), based on contract terms (while adjusting for contract variations and prorations). This leads to workflows that are error-free and not labor-intensive.
- Designed with compliance (ASC 606 and IFRS 15) in mind: Our platform follows the latest revenue recognition standards so that your income statement and revenue recognition journal entry practices are always up-to-date.
- Fully-integrated revenue recognition: Revenue recognition is a part of Younium’s native subscription management functionalities, so there is no need for multiple apps or external add-ons. Tailor revenue recognition rules per invoice line, and manage revenue subledger with precision, all within a native, integrated platform.
- Contract management: No need to juggle multiple contracts anymore. Once you load your client contracts into Younium, background processes are automated to handle performance obligations and specific revenue recognition requirements, ensuring that all accounting procedures are streamlined.
- Staying audit-ready with financial reporting: Younium offers bespoke reporting that follows the GAAP standards. You can generate up-to-date financial reports showing recognized and deferred revenue directly within the platform. So, planned or surprise audits are never a problem.
Automate your Revenue Recognition with Younium
In summary, relying on spreadsheets for revenue recognition is not just risky—it can jeopardize your financial integrity, lead to compliance failures, and ultimately affect your company's valuation. SaaS finance leaders must implement integrated revenue recognition systems that provide clarity and confidence in their financial reporting.
With Younium, you get fully integrated revenue recognition that automates complex workflows, keeps you compliant, and scales with your business as you grow. Request a demo to discover how our subscription management solution helps SaaS companies move beyond spreadsheets and streamline their operations.
