Abstract
Real-time reporting in accounting or simply real-time accounting offers many benefits when compared to conventional periodic reporting. Traditionally, enterprises require financial or non-financial reporting based on quarterly and annual periods. Yet, the rapid change that occurs on market and society causes this periodic reporting to become quickly outdated. Higher competition among enterprises demands for more updated information to enable management to rapidly adapt to opportunities and answer problems. Real-time accounting addresses these needs, but needs new technological answers. In this article we present some technologies which can help the implementation of real-time accounting, namely, business process management, mobile devices, cloud computing, business intelligence, enterprise architecture and enterprise application integration.
1. Introduction
The running stream of fast changing, increasingly competitive global market and rapidly shortening product life cycles forces enterprises to analyse accurate and timely information, in order to react instantaneously to changes in its business [1, 2]. Enterprises are entering a new era, the era of the real-time enterprises and real-time economy also called the “now economy”, which can be characterized by a substantive acceleration of business measurement, assessment and decision processes [2]. The now economy poses a new challenge to Accounting Information Systems, which is the real-time reporting.
4. Conclusions
Nowadays, some accounting activities face special concerns that represent serious challenges. Of course, the implementation success of an accounting information system depends on technological issues, but other dimensions should be considered, like the people and the organizational dimensions [47, 48]. Yet, new technological solutions deserve a closer attention and may provide answers to the accounting challenge of real time reporting.
