Datarails

DataRails Review by Craig Morrow

Kommentare: My experience with DataRails has been first class. I have assisted with a seamless integration for Budgeting purposes and have now rolled out the solution for month end reporting. In both scenario's I have been able to reduce the time required for completion by around 40%. I particularly like the approach of having the Customer Success Manager driving the implementation and having the single point of contact through the customer journey.

Vorteile:

The ease in which the product was to learn and become and expert in. The functionality within the solution is exactly what any FP&A professional should be looking for in a solution. The implementation was extremely efficient as you start to build out real life business processes from the outset which mean you get a return on investment from day 1.

Nachteile:

When deciding to partner with DataRails I was fully aware that they are at the beginning of solution development journey. However, DataRails are always keen to receive feedback on possible suggestions for improvement and are continuously developing and releasing improved functionality.

Fantastic and Flexible Reporting Software

Kommentare: Our setup and integration was extremely easy and fast. I was the dedicated builder and PM for the implementation for a 200+ store retails company and we were able to sync, validate and build out of data in just under 7 weeks. We've only had a few system hiccups along the way that Datarails has fixed or addressed with reasonably speed. We've been very happy with the decision to work with Datarails and foresee that that feeling will remain for a long time to come.

Vorteile:

Datarails' direct integration with Excel has allowed our team to pick up using the system very quickly. It gives us the flexibility of Excel without having to worry about massive data tables or SQL pulls to get the data to represent in a proper manner. Datarails is constantly improving and they continue to work with their customers to advance their software and address needs. The sky is the limit for cuts of data that Datarails can provide, and with nearly constant improvement over our now two years of use, our satisfaction with the software grows with each passing month.

Nachteile:

It's strength with Excel is also it's weakness. Reports are only as good as the logic that is layered into Excel, so it necessitates numerous data checks to ensure that our numbers are accurate. Fortunately, Datarails makes those overall checks simple. I really want to love the Dashboards and Storybook functions, but the overall functionality of their graphing does need some improvement. Their dashboard have a really amazing variance analysis tool, but it needs updating and resources to be fully fleshed out and used as intended.

VIN Product Assessment

Kommentare: The customer support and response is excellent

Vorteile:

Easy to navigate and set-up the dashboards

Nachteile:

It doesn't work well with Quickbook Desktop. It requires a lot of manual processes. It does not automatically integrate with the QB desktop version. It's too cumbersome.

Don't wait any longer, sign up!

Kommentare: My overall experience has been very positive. The implementation team was able to get me up to speed, and also help me build a lot of custom reports that fit my business and the metrics that are important to me.

Vorteile:

I like that Datarails consolidates all of your financial data into one location, while also enabling a lot of customization. The implementation time is fantastic and really helped get me up to speed in a short amount of time. Special thanks to [sensitive content hidden] for all of his help along the way.

Nachteile:

Not much that I haven't liked about Datarails, other than at times the platform gets bogged down and takes a long time to refresh. That's the worst that I have to say though. Outside of that, everything has been great.

A Great Tool

Kommentare: Datarails has been an absolute gem compared to the first FP&A software we had tried to implement. Once we integrated our raw data into the tool, conducting analysis, reconciling our FS, and generating executive dashboards have actually worked.

Vorteile:

Ease of use, scalability and dashboards are user friendly.

Nachteile:

Integration to our ERP system was more difficult than expected due to not having the expertise of both Workato and our system.

Datarails has become an integral part of our management reporting framework

Kommentare: The Datarails product and support team have been very good to work with. The product has automated several very manual processes that save us time and deliver actionable information more quickly.

Vorteile:

Seamless integration with key business applications; strong reporting and dashboarding capabilities; integrates well with Excel to allow for next-level data manipulation and analysis.

Nachteile:

Early in the implementation we discovered a limitation on the volume of data we could effectively pull into and analyze with Datarails. The implementation team helped us reconfigure some workflows, limit the data we needed to expose to Datarails, and we got to a good, workable solution.

Datarails Review

Kommentare: Datarails is a good system, so far we've been using it for a couple of months and haven't had any issues

Vorteile:

The ability to: - drill down on transactions within excel - the ability to create board decks with dashboards and storyboards

Nachteile:

- at times the systems dont seem too advanced when it comes to complex issues

Great Resource

Kommentare: It has been very good. The product works as intended and the support team is strong.

Vorteile:

It is a great tool for consolidating various complex datasets and compiling into a simple dashboard / reporting tool.

Nachteile:

Some of the excel add-in functionality does not always appear to work. Excel formulas often do not work at first or require small tweaks to streamline.

New FP&A user at a public company

Kommentare: I really like it, I would recommend it to a friend in and instance if they work in FP&A.

Vorteile:

The ability to immediately see real time KPis update automatically from integrations from CRM and Sage Intacct is incredibly valuable and saves a lot of time.

Nachteile:

The set up and learning process is lengthy and quite complicated. I don't know how to solve it but just know it takes time.

Growing Together

Vorteile:

DataRails is amazing at increasing the speed of analysis. It has helped us gain a very quick overview of our business and all the branches.

Nachteile:

As someone who needs to teach this to others, it is hard to teach to someone who does not have some background with technology. Even people with some background in excel have a tough time with all of the functionality offered.

CEO-friendly FP&A tool

Kommentare: The company's support and new feature rollout cadence is fantastic. They are very much innovating and doing all the right things. Very bullish on them!

Vorteile:

The dashboard and visualizations are the best part of Datarails. Our finance team can readily create the visualizations on our data that I can benefit the most from. Deltas and variances jump out at you, trendlines are clear, and the data reporting capabilities really are in a class by themselves.

Nachteile:

Like any FP&A tool, it starts out slow. Your team has to learn how to leverage the tool and work with data that is originating outside of financial systems. It's taken us well over a year to get to the point where we're getting results and answers faster through Datarails than by manually creating a one-off report in Excel. The work has been worth it though, and it's just one of those inevitable aspects of leveling up your reporting and forecasting capabilities: it's not going to happen overnight or without a lot of training and validation work.

Best financial tool out there, dependable and accurate

Kommentare: DataRails has substantially improved the accuracy of our budgeting and forecasting. I love the ease of it, how accessible it makes our numbers, and how simple it is to follow real-time statuses. With DataRails we know our figures are accurate and up to date, which is precisely what we need from the numbers we base important decisions on.

Vorteile:

-There are many ways to manipulate and look at your data -Drill downs are amazing. Can look at the smallest of variables. -Can work on both Excel and their Insights feature depending on what I want -Easy to use -Easy to connect with our ERP system

Nachteile:

Sometimes it was buggy when logging out. Other than that I can't think of any other notable cons, it really is a great system.

Best FP&A Software

Kommentare: Fantastic! It has streamlined my workdays allowing me to focus on analysis instead of creating new reports.

Vorteile:

Datarails has massively cut down on the time we spend assembling reports, updating our KPI's and financial reporting package is streamlined with the ability to refresh data in Excel, in addition version control is a thing of the past as we are easily able to keep track of what data we upload and when files were changed. The dashboards and widgets allow for quick and easy visualization of our data that we distribute across our locations for managers to use. Datarails continues to develop the software adding new features at a regular cadence.

Nachteile:

There is not much I have run into that I dislike about the software, in the beginning some of the formula writing in setting up custom columns was difficult but the release of Datarails University with all the tutorials solved many of the issues of needing a refresher on how to do certain things in the software.

Good, but training could be better

Vorteile:

The Excel implementation is great, but the ability to get efficient is labored.

Nachteile:

The inability to know what type of user you are and what access you have. You may be trying to accomplish a task and looking for an option that you may not even have access to. Also, the confusion of File Boxes and Data Mapping and integrations and configurations is all jumbled. More concise direction would be appreciated.

DR.Review.

Kommentare: Very good so far with some improvements which can be made.

Vorteile:

Data aggregation through minimalism. Very easy to learn.

Nachteile:

Sometimes overcomplicated formulas which can take time to understand and remember.

Best FPA Tool on the market

Kommentare: great. Ari was amazing in implementation

Vorteile:

flexibility with excel is key, i find it easy to use and scalable

Nachteile:

integtration with sage is not perfect, requiring workaround

Amazing system with amazing support

Kommentare: DataRails has allowed us to monitor the performance of our business in ways we simply could not before. We have also been able to simplify a number of our reporting processes. These two things have allowed us to share information with a wider pool of stakeholders within our company and monitor the performance of our business much more closely.

Vorteile:

DataRails provides us with version control, data transformation, and visualization tools that we did not have before. We have streamlined many of our reporting processes, and we also use DataRails to feed a number of Excel and PowerPoint-based reports. DataRails support is very responsive.

Nachteile:

Some features don't work as expected, and it can be hard to tell if it because of a bug or user error.

Good software

Vorteile:

Ease of using and how it is connected to excel

Nachteile:

in the begining using datarails formulas was a little hard

Datarails is certainly on "track" to becoming something huge

Kommentare: Overall positive for sure, I think its simple enough to learn and use. Very powerful for reporting.

Vorteile:

The visuals are very impressive. Its simple enough to use if you map correctly from the initial data source.

Nachteile:

There were a few options on the dashboarding side that did not allow me to do specifically what I wanted in terms of data comparisons and splitting the data on the same chart in the way I wanted.

Datarails Review

Vorteile:

the support we Receive. [sensitive content hidden] is the best

Nachteile:

the Storyboards do not work well with Powerpoint

Great reporting tool

Vorteile:

Enjoy the Excel integration functionality. Formulas are easy to use once you get the hang of them. The online platform is clear and easy to navigate.

Nachteile:

It is not an all-in-one tool; it requires upgrades to get additional functionality.

DataRails used as an FP&A solution

Kommentare: Prior to DataRails our FP&A was run exclusively through maintaining numerous excel files which resulted in a much longer monthly close process. Through DataRails, we were able to automate the generation of our allocation based segment/product P&Ls, and monthly variance reporting to Budget/prior forecast. DataRails also reduced the probability of human error.

Vorteile:

The overall flexibility of the platform. DataRails was able to create exactly what I wanted using our existing data structure and financial models. DataRails was able to replicate all of the benefits of other more well known Planning Solutions at a much lower investment cost - both financial and human capital.

Nachteile:

Certain aspects of our monthly forecasting process require more manual intervention than other more mature planning applications.

Holding Company in the Real Estate Industry

Kommentare: Overall, DataRails has been great for our business. We are moving from using manual spreadsheets for financial reporting into automating this process in order to save time and look forward for trends, instead of always looking back in time at our data. It has been smooth and will be an easy transition for us. Above all else, [SENSITIVE CONTENT] has been super helpful. [SENSITIVE CONTENT] is simply the best. In addition, the Dashboard views are something that will be a great value add as we continue to introduce our portfolio companies to this software, as we are trying to sophisticate some of these businesses and force our business leaders to be continually on top of their financials, business, operations, and more.

Vorteile:

My favorite part about this software is how easy it is to understand the logic that is going on behind the scenes. We are a holding company of 18 different operating companies using DataRails to automate our financial reporting process, as well as house all of our financial data in one system. Knowing how it works behind the scenes in critical and using the backend mapping is easy in order to make changes, fix errors, etc.... It makes it pretty easy to understand for the average user.

Nachteile:

There is always room for improvement, like with anything. I think the biggest challenge for our company is not having all our accounting systems integrated into the system due to some industry specific accounting softwares not being able to integrate into DR. I think one thing that would be great would be more training videos or education in order to not rely on the customer success manager as much, just to improve efficiency and time.

A lifesaver

Kommentare: Having a dedicated Customer Success Manager has been wonderful.

Vorteile:

This product has allowed me to maintain my existing excel worksheets while speeding the closing process and allowing me to focus on variance analysis as opposed to simply on reporting

Nachteile:

I would like to see waterfall charts as part of the graphic offered

Product is best in the business

Kommentare: It’s an easy tool to use and train on. Very adaptable, can look at our data in many different and useful ways with the Insights feature. Integrates with our ERP flawlessly. Can make changes in real time so decision makers always know exactly what’s happening and base the organizational direction on fresh data. Model building is straightforward, visualizations are enlightening, integrations are easy.

Vorteile:

Using DataRails I can visualize data that I previously didn't have access to, this is by far the biggest pro-you can tap into data you've always had but previously couldn't work with. Other than that it's really easy to use, implementation is not lengthy, great customer service.

Nachteile:

Occasionally freezes but I figure that happens with any sort of system