For Financial Reporting Using Dynamics GP, there are really only 2 viable options.
Management Reporter
Option 1.) Use what you have & that’s Management Reporter. I’ll make a quick point before I continue… I LOVE MANAGEMENT REPORTER. It makes sense for financial reporting, it works, it’s manageable, it’s scalable & it’s easy to use. It does have it’s downsides though (or else this article wouldn’t even exist).
The features that you should expect to see & are hopefully utilizing with Management Reporter:
- Direct connection to your Dynamics GP data (new accounts, G/L data, etc.)
- Simple implementation and easy setup
- Columns, trees & rows (simple)
- Deploy reports to a file folder, SharePoint or to the MR repository
- Push reports to Excel
- Schedule reports
- View reports directly in MR or in a web browser
- Reports to identify what’s missing from your reports (Missing Account Analysis)
- All general functionality that you need to for basic financial reporting
Where Management Reporter falls short ☹:
- Performance in generating large reports (especially for organizations with a lot of GP companies)
- Lacks the ability to pull in other data sources. If it’s not in your G/L, you’re not reporting on it with MR.
- Can’t filter data post the ‘Account’-level (ie.) no way to show only AJEs, etc.)
- No mobile capabilities
- Inconsistencies in viewing reports across Web & MR Report Viewer
- Minor formatting limitations like the inability to “unwrap” text
- No real ability to develop graphs, charts, or other visuals
Overall Pros / Cons to Using Management Reporter
Pros
- It's free
- It does pretty much everything that a basic financial reporting system should do
- It's designed from the ground-up for financial reporting for Dynamics products
Cons
- Being "sunset" by Microsoft = No more enhancements are coming
- The ability to only pull a single source of data (G/L from GP)
- Mobile functionality
Recommendation for sticking with Management Reporter
At some point in the future… You’ll have to move off of Management Reporter as Microsoft is sunsetting the product. However, I believe Management Reporter should be technically supported until ~2026. After that point, the product will likely still work, you’ll just have to jump through hoops if it doesn’t. With that…
If you’re just now implementing Dynamics GP and you’re a LARGE organization, consider investing your time in another solution. In almost all other scenarios, so long as you can stomach some of the downfalls mentioned above, Management Reporter will work great for financial reporting purposes.
If you need to report on additional data sources other than GP’s G/L, consider a BI reporting tool such as Power BI (per user per month pricing).
3rd Party Solutions (ISVs)
Option 2.) Look into the ~50+ Budgeting and/or Financial Reporting tools that integrate seamlessly with Dynamics GP.
One of the beauties of Dynamics GP is that the software partner (ISVs) market is strong so there are tons of great solutions to choose from (picking the right one is always tricky but more on that later).
Pros / Cons to a 3rd Party Solution
Pros
- Long-term product support
- Nearly unlimited reporting tools to choose from
- Tight integrations with transactions and / or budgets in GP
Cons
- Additional costs. Most typically a cost per user or perpetual license model
- Additional software to maintain
- Effort to migrate to a new solution
- Easy to get more software than necessary
Budgeting / Financial Reporting Software for Dynamics GP Recommendations
If you can dream it, you can do it. There are so many different reporting tools out there that connect seamlessly with Dynamics GP that offer things like…
- Built on top of Excel (or not)
- Available within Dynamics GP
- Many similarities to Management Reporter
- Cloud Apps
- On-Prem Apps
- Incredibly robust capabilities to far more than just Financial Reporting
My suggestion when looking for a new budgeting / financial reporting tool is to consider really what it is that your business wants with a new tool.
- Is it just financial reporting or more
- Are there specific gaps with MR that you’re looking to fill
- Are you “upgrading” from MR just to not have Microsoft shut the door in your face in a few years
- Do you prefer it built on top of Excel or in a separate application
- How important are graphs and visuals
The answers to these questions will help you identify how powerful / how robust of a solution that you should seek.
Some of my personal favorites in the Dynamics GP world that would generally fit MOST GP customers are Prospero, Dynamic Budgets, Vivid Reports & True Sky. They all have a direct-integrations with GP, have a good reputation & presence at GP-focused conferences, & have many customers using Dynamics GP.
However, certainly don’t take my word for it (or really anyone’s word for it as every business is different). Take a look at Solugence.com to find the Best Budgeting / Financial Reporting Software for Dynamics GP. 👍
*Solugence provides free data-driven software recommendations based on what your business requirements & preferences are.
Did we miss anything or do you have experience handling your Budgeting / Financial Reporting differently in Microsoft Dynamics GP? Let us know in the comments below.
