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Survey Uncovers Businesses’ Financial Integrity Threatened By Change

External pressures on businesses from mergers and acquisitions, organizational change and regulatory compliance are causing fault lines in financial processes that are exposing businesses to potential fraud, mistakes and inefficiencies. According to new research into the financial practices of 300 global organizations, the greater the level of change experienced by companies, the higher the chances of financial error and risk exposure.

Independent research commissioned by ACL Services across the UK, North America and Germany surveyed 300 global companies. It found that 52 percent of the companies surveyed had either merged, been acquired or undergone a departmental merger in the past 12 months. Against this backdrop, key findings included: 

  • Financial systems undermined by change - Eighty-five percent of businesses have undergone some level of change in their financial analysis applications over the past 12 months and almost half of respondents (47 percent) believe that their financial systems have been undermined by operational change within the business
  • Struggling to control errors - One in three businesses are exposed to regular finance department errors and two thirds are seeking to improve the effectiveness of financial transaction analysis
  • Finding a balance - Forty percent of respondents agree that finding a balance between optimal internal controls versus over controlled systems that can't keep pace with the business is an ongoing struggle.

The ACL survey was undertaken by Loudhouse Research, an independent B2B research consultancy, in July 2007.

 

For a full copy of the research findings, please contact Neil Harper at ACL Services at neil_harper@acl.com. 


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