Two panels answering how they run FP&A, where the budget cycle bogs down, and what pushes them off spreadsheets — Centage customers on one tab, external finance professionals on the other.
The panel skews to hands-on FP&A operators — with a healthy tail of finance leaders and controllers doing FP&A on the side.
Most respondents consolidate 2–15 entities across dozens of cost centers — the sweet spot Centage was built for.
How long the annual plan takes, and where the time goes.
Q13 forced them to pick up to two. Reputational risk (numbers that turn out wrong; single point of failure) and forecast surprise dominate.
It means we spent a lot of time and work on something that required more time.
Cash flow is tight for our nonprofit so quality forecasting is critical
Impacts the reliability of my work
Goal is to be as accurate as possible within time constraints to budget
Complex recalculations, revenue rebalancing
Personnel is our biggest expense and variable so keeping up on it is difficult across five agencies.
Our revenue forecast is tied to assumptions about customer contracts, what they actually pull is unpredictable.
Avoidable issues, that aren't priorities for others
They don't, but if they did, it would be because headcount is the major driver to budget success.
Creating extra work at the last minute.
Changes always seem to have a domino effect in how far back we have to go in the budget process and how much re-work has to be done.
Although we are a nonprofit, it is important to have good estimated forecasts as your budgets are measured and analyzed every month and looked at by many individuals in leadership. Could result in a program having to close if it does not look profitable or viable.
not being able to see a trend
We have limited resources . Forecasting errors can be very costly
I'm the only one that knows the Centage products and how they work.
It takes significant time to review the data to re-finalize the plan.
So many manual processes that can cause an error that might not be found due to the volume of data being compiled.
Delays reporting
Both are fears of failure, sometimes I worry that I've made the plan/driver/assumptions so complicated and interconnected that if I make a mistake on one item it will translate to an error across multiple lines. To add to the complexity fear, I'm the only one within our organization that understands how the complex model is setup and works. Someone new would have to make some major changes, maybe start from scratch, just to maintain the budget.
Q15 — if we took one Centage capability away tomorrow. The Analytics Maestro Excel add-in and personnel / headcount planning read as the load-bearing capabilities.
Go back to Excel with Macros.
Explore other ERPs.
Go back to Excel in the short term and look for an alternative solutions in the long term
I have never thought about this.
Look for another budgeting software
Go back to manual imports from ERP software & build out excel-only workflows
Go back to an old legacy software package
Will look into another tool, Data Rails
Budget in Excel while trying to find a new solution.
I would look for another FP&A tool, possible Vena. We looked at that one before we decided to go with Centage. There's no way I'd be able to keep all the current models updated manually and accurately. I would say at this point we have 50-100 versions of monthly reports that I prepare with Centage.
Build something in house. I have extensive programming experience, and would use that as a stop-gap until I found a program that worked for our needs.
Go back to Excel, while another software package is found. Centage is painfully slow to input into. It is what takes the longest in the budget cycle. I am always hoping for upgrades that will speed up the process. Simple things like not having to refresh every time you hit enter. I have never seen this in any other system. Also, reducing the steps in using a simple drop-down menu.
Try another product that can work with our ERP system
Go back to Excel until I could RFP for a replacement.
Search for another tool.
Go back to Excel until we found a new budgeting system.
Would have to go back to using Excel Spreadsheets exclusively and hoping that the calculations work.
I will go back to using Ceres
Move to another platform like vena or Solver
Find new software quickly. We budget at a very detailed level and it's not possible to do it in Excel.
Look for a different solution or augment our existing Excel-based forecasting, which still exists next to Maestro (because Excel provides real-time data when assumptions change).
Try a different tool. Maybe Data Rails.
Go back to excel
Go back to using Excel and Sage InAcct - we already use PowerBI and would continue using it.
Short term will be to use Excel, long term will be using another Tagetik which is already used at the headquarters.
I would find another budgeting/reporting tool. FYI, you're going to scare people by posing this question. They're going to wonder why its disappearing.
How customers describe Centage to a peer, and what ROI actually means to them.
Budget & Reporting Automation but with flexibility
It's a budget tool.
Budgeting and forecasting tool tied to our accounting system that allows for backwards reporting and forward forecasting
It is the tool that I use for budgeting and forecasting.
A software used for creating and maintaining budgets
A software we use to help with our budgeting, forecasting and generation of financial reports
Forecasting and reporting
budgeting modeling software with real allocation ability
Budgeting software where all of our personnel, operating expense, and revenue plans come together.
I describe it as an FP&A tool that we use for reporting and forecasting. For NetYield users, I'd say it dramatically improves reporting capabilities.
Budget and forecasting tool
It is the Financial Budget and Reporting system we use.
Budgeting system
For us, Centage is Planning Maestro and that is a great budgeting software solution.
The tool we use to prepare our annual financial plans.
A cheaper budgeting system meant for an operating budget of < $10M.
A Budgeting Maestro tool that helps make budgeting easier for the everyday person who is not a financial person.
FP & A Platfrom
Planning and FP&A platform
Centage is a budgeting and financial reporting tool.
A flexible budgeting software that is a bit clunky in how many steps are needed to go from data to reporting.
Budgeting and Reporting tool
financial reporting tool
Reporting software that allows consolidations and eliminations
We use it for budgeting, forecast and reporting.
A budgeting and financial reporting tool
Comparing Actuals to Budget.
We tightened up our monthly close time
Time saved in monthly/quarterly/annual procedures (e.g. budget timelines)
Time spent and quickness of change turns
Forecast accuracy is measured by comparing actual results against the forecasted numbers each month, as well as turnaround time for monthly forecasting
We don't really. If there are not many questions or comments on the budget as the year rolls on then that is a win.
We don't.
Time spent in preparing budget against accuracy
The pain point is how long it takes to enter into Centage.
Comparing to the way we used to do things. Time spent and frustration levels.
We continue to add companies and departments without having to add additional staff.
Based on the numbers every month
I am not sure
accuracy of forecast
how long it takes to complete the budget cycle
When the budget-to-actuals variance is small or readily explainable.
KPI of close days and reporting days and whether Preliminary financials have changes before it becomes Final on a monthly basis.
Time spent redoing reports, catching errors, updating information for other teams
Time study
Still too new and onboarding to score any higher just yet, give me a minute and I may go higher when I figure out what I'm doing.
Fix reporting to remove 0 value lines
Add custom selection to Quick Assign via Excel import/export
Improve data consolidation across entities
Direct inputs in to actuals in Planning Maestro
reporting within the system, to eliminate the need for analytics
Update speeds in Analytics Maestro can be slow. We're exploring options to try to simplify some things to help.
Deploy time, random glitches.
auto calculations turn off/on. User accessibility, system bandwidth
Simple upgrades that reduce the need to refresh every time you hit enter.
I need a way to track product enhancement suggestions.
I can answer that better during budget season. Nothing immediately comes to mind.
The quirkiness of the system.
nothing at this time
Faster customer service
We are still implementing. One issue has been our inabiliy to filter on dimension when planning
the refresh time when you are keying data
Bring Analytics abilities into Maestro instead of being an Excel add-on.
We have not had the ability to bring in our detail data because of volume so we can't drill down except to the account balance level.
Usability for the report setup
custom reporting, better use of Analytics Maestro
Reduce the time it takes to deploy the cube and plan.
Q20 · 0–10 scale ("Not great" → "Excellent"; 6 and 7 grayed out in the form). Mean of 7.5/10 · 3 promoters (9–10), 19 passives (7–8), 4 detractors (0–6).
Q22 · single choice — who opted in.
External finance professionals — mostly CFOs and controllers at $5M–$100M organizations. Not existing Centage customers.
Almost everyone is still on spreadsheets — either alone or paired with ERP-driven reports.
Most respondents have hit a meaningful error in a spreadsheet budget or forecast; the question is whether it stayed inside finance.
Just minor formula errors in the spreadsheet - it didn't add some small expenses. As CFO, I corrected it and moved on for the most part, but I did check all the formulas.
Good hygiene is rebuilding old sheets, particularly if teams turn over.
Simple formula copy and paste error, not enough checks in place
Built in contingencies to be able to account for these.
this and several other instances have become opportunities to educate the rest of management about assumptions, relationships of assumptions, process over final output
The mechanics of FP&A — consolidating tabs, fixing links, chasing inputs, reformatting reports — versus actual analysis.
Where the complexity is coming from — most say more departments and more contributors, not more legal entities.
Most agree that spreadsheets can no longer keep up — but far fewer have actually started shopping.
For those actively evaluating or already moved, the moment that finally forced the decision.
I have been in the role a year and I knew it from the beginning, We always need to be adopting new and better ways, but the foundational data needed to be clean.
For the university to implement something across the university.
As we add new entities, the complexity of our budgeting process will increase, so we know we need to plan for this as well as allocations software for each entity. We use Sage Intacct now, and the budgeting module is $11,000 more per year. We will need to balance cost with efficiency based on complexity.
There would need to be ease in the new tool.
Would need to be included in Sage or Excel. we have no need for more software.
Our company is preparing for consolidation and this will likely force this.
Something that was easy to integrate with a trusted partner that gives a clear path to the future. Most consultants we deal with sell us on a pitch and once we close, we work with outsourced teams/etc that are not fully engaged into the system or fully knowledgeable. 9 out of 10 sales pitches are guaranteed to be super easy implementations.
Timing, it would have to come later in the year
Bandwidth to invest the time. We have Adaptive but don’t use it
GP
We would need funding first.
spreadsheets simply cannot keep up with the complexity of our business. we're not there yet and don't expect to be there for several more years.
Respondents who opted in to hear back from Centage.
| Name | Company | Role / Title |
|---|---|---|
| Paul Francis | Ludo.com | Analyst |
| Shondell Sabad | Goldray | CFO |
| Danny McBee | Woven Care | CFO |
| Peter Kwon | Hammertech | FP&A Manager |
| Christopher Nazar | REXA Inc. | Director of Finance |
| Matt Boone | Epic Mtn | Other: Owner/Operator |