Real-time economy is coming – how companies need to prepare for the development of digital economy?
The transition to a real-time economy requires companies to make leaps in the implementation of modern, automated tools. Real-time, automated financial solution requires consistency of existing systems. In cooperation with the public administration, financial administration actors are now developing a broad economic ecosystem, which streamlines the financial administration and accounting in companies.
What does real-time economy mean for companies?
The digitalisation of the society appears to companies as a rapid development of automation and a transition to a real-time economy. The financial administration industry, and Accountor as a forerunner in the field, are at the heart of this change.
Real-time economy (RTE) refers to an economic system where information about, for example, invoicing, financial reports, taxes and official information flows between different operators in real time.
“The digitisation of financial information streamlines processes. Thus, it enables companies' productivity to increase”, says Niklas Sonkin, Accountor’s President and CEO.
In practice, real-time economy brings a higher level of information security, reliability and certainty to financial administration. The transition to real-time digital economy has significant benefits for business from the point of view of cost efficiency, time saving and streamlining of processes: according to estimates, digitalisation brings annual savings of hundreds of millions of euros for Finnish companies.
Operating in the real-time economy environment will soon be mandatory. In Finland, the government, for example, requires companies to deliver eReceipts by 2025.
eReceipt is one example of the development of the real-time economy. Receipts in a completely digital format reduce the manual work of financial administration and the possibility of errors. At the same time, it facilitates the storage and utilization of up-to-date information.
Accounting and reporting become smoother with the introduction of cloud services, and, for example, the submission of statutory reports to the authorities can be automated. The ability to view the company’s financial data in real time facilitates decision-making and helps in applying for financing, predicting risks, and makes it easier to review the transparency of partners.
Companies must be able to comply with the requirements of the real-time economy in order to continue their business successfully
The Finnish Real-Time Economy project promotes the digitalisation of financial management and develops a national digital ecosystem for business actors. The goal of the project is to create a Nordic ecosystem of financial operators, where financial data moves safely and smoothly between companies and public administrations – in real time, naturally. The project defines framework for digitality, which companies must be able to follow and monitor in their financial management, reporting and accounting.
“A prerequisite for companies’ competitiveness and operating in an international operating environment in the future is their ability to operate in the real-time economy, that is, to deliver eReceipts, international e-invoices and digital procurement messages,” says Sonkin. “Cooperation with modern and agile financial management partners, such as Accountor, is therefore vital for companies.”
Financial administration software companies and accounting firms are at the forefront of development
Real-time economy systems enable companies to access up-to-date information and create the operating environment of the real-time economy that serves as the basis for everything. Companies that offer modern financial management systems and accounting firms that use them are therefore at the forefront of development.
In financial management forerunner companies, digital and automated financial management systems and services are already available to companies.
An effective transition to real-time economy is underway and the first results of the development work are already available to companies. The European standard for e-invoicing, Peppol (Pan-European Public Procurement Online), enables the digital invoicing and exchange of other business documents internationally. E-invoicing and digital eReceipt deliver paper receipts to the cloud, reduce manual workload and the possibility of errors in accounting.
In the future, all trading vouchers will become digital and are transferred automatically between different systems. Instead of running the financial administration, companies can in the future focus on the core of their operation – financial data is transferred automatically, accurately and securely between operators without manual typing.
