Top 7 problems solved by Infor SunSystems Cloud in Not for Profit.
Problem #3: Compliance and Audit Risk
This is the third in our series of blogs highlighting seven common problems addressed by Infor SunSystems Cloud in Not for Profit organisations. In this blog, we highlight problems associated with compliance and audit risk.
The Problem
As a charity grows in scale so does its compliance and audit risk. Regulatory demands are greater for large charities than they are for small ones. Larger charities tend to be more complex. They are likely to have more diverse income streams and funding sources. Larger charities are also more prominent in the community and are thus subject to greater public and reputational scrutiny.
The potential impact of compliance failures or adverse audit findings extends beyond financial loss. They pose material risks to reputation, stakeholder confidence, and trustee accountability. In this context, robust financial controls, transparent reporting, and effective oversight are essential to safeguard a Charity’s assets and ensure continued trust in its mission and operations.
How SunSystems Cloud can help
Infor SunSystems has a number of features that make it particularly well suited to the not-for-profit sector. The following are just three of the ways in which SunSystems can help you improve financial control and minimise compliance and audit risk.
Robust Internal Controls
The solution encourages best practice with segregation of duties and a powerful workflow engine to ensure that procedures are followed and errors are kept to a minimum.
Access is restricted to functions and data that are appropriate to your role. Automation also limits the scope for error and can be used to flag unusual activity.
There is oversight of every action. Every transaction is timestamped, every change logged, showing who did what, and when they did it. And where required, you can drill back to source documents.
Analytical Power
SunSystems is highly regarded in UK charity finance. Its analytical power makes it ideal for charities with separation between restricted and unrestricted funds and other complex reporting needs.
Flexible multi‑dimensional analysis simplifies the tracking of activity by fund, project, donor, location, etc. There are none of the restrictions or workarounds required by other systems.
The solution also includes powerful multi-entity and multi-currency capabilities. This is particularly useful for charities with complex programmes, subsidiaries, or international operations.
Reporting Flexibility
SunSystems supports complex SORP layouts and multi-fund reporting out of the box. With SunSystems you can produce reports for all stakeholders including managers, trustees, funding partners, Companies House, and regulators in any number of formats in minutes rather than days or weeks.
Dashboards can be tailored to the specific needs of different users. Dashboards are dynamic and include filters of your choosing. The data they present is real-time. There is no need for periodic updates or lags due to manual procedures. And from there you can expand on any of the charts, or tables and drill down to view the detail that lies behind headline figures.
The solution also comes with a powerful Excel plug-in that enables finance teams to quickly produce audit schedules, trial balances, working papers and board packs that they may need.
Take the Next Step
In the next blog in this series, we highlight the problems associated with a lack of real-time budget oversight.
To find out how Infor SunSystems Cloud from LAKE could help your organisation, download a copy of our SunSystems Cloud Beginner’s Guide – Not for Profit.
By Jon Isherwood