WHITE PAPER: When is it Time to Move Away from Spreadsheets?
When importers are first starting out, the most
critical thing is selling product and getting it for
a good price. When you are only moving a
container or two a month, keeping track of your
warehouse and/or in transit inventory is fairly
simple. A few spreadsheets will do the trick and
take very little set up time or training to get
started. As long as the importer is using
QuickBooks or a similar accounting application,
these are generally all the tools that are
required to operate.
As the importer begins to appreciate the
importance of Gross Profit per shipment, they
also begin to realize QuickBooks is not designed
to keep track of costs at the shipment level so
they supplement with a costing spreadsheet to
keep track of costs for the shipment (Material,
Duty, Ocean Freight, Inland Freight, Customs
Broker Fees, Drayage, Warehousing Costs, etc.)
As transactions grow, it becomes more difficult
to keep track of inventory using QuickBooks
because QuickBooks is not designed to consider
long lead times for inventory in transit or the
fact that you may pay for inventory in transit or
receive unpaid inventory. As a result, the
importer begins a new spreadsheet with
shipment information.
When tracking lots is important to importers,
they will typically keep an inventory
spreadsheet with lot level information as well.
There are several disadvantages to running the
business through spreadsheets:
• Wasting time due to entering the same
information over and over again into
multiple systems
• Costly human error related to entering
the same information over and over