By Kevin Hachey, Regional Sales Director, WebFilings
WebFilings -- When it comes to sales and marketing messaging, nothing beats a good old fashioned analogy, and I’m sure you’ve heard a few in your day. A well placed metaphor works nicely too, as does the less subtle simile. However, there are times when a choice seasonal reference really fits the bill. In that regard, let me throw this out there:
Just because it is almost Halloween, there is no reason to be frightened of XBRL.
At a time when many public organizations are evaluating their options for Year 1 and Year 2 XBRL tagging, many Financial Printers and other 3rd party vendors are using the foreboding spector of XBRL to pad their customer lists. After all, you’re already overworked and overextended as it is, how could you possibly find the time to learn something new?
Sure, maybe Year 1 won’t be that bad when you’re only required to tag face statements and footnotes into blocks of text , but what about Year 2? What about Level 4 tagging? How will you ever create the bandwidth (one of my favorite industry terms, by the way) to figure out how to tag detailed quantitative disclosures within footnotes and schedules? Concepts, contexts, monetary values, percentages, numbers, lions, tigers, bears! Oh my!
Yikes. Who needs that hassle, anyway? Why not just toss it all over the fence and let the Printer handle it for you, right? Easy peasy, done and done. Next task!
Actual Printer Message: "Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid"
To that I would offer this: Deep breath, count to ten (no need to tag the numbers while you’re counting), and take a step back for a moment to consider all angles.
First and foremost, no matter how busy you currently are, you’re going to be spending just as much internal work on the XBRL mandate regardless if you outsource or not. So why pay someone else to tag your work for you when you have to go back and verify those tags anyway?
Secondly, nobody knows your own accounting better than you do, so why let someone else represent your company for you? May not seem that important now, but as SEC requirements and scrutiny incrementally increase this will be very important down the road.
Compliance Week: "Even if a company chooses to outsource the effort, management must understand the specifics of the SEC mandate, and the responsibility for compliance still remains with management."
Further, like it or not, XBRL is the present and future of financial reporting language, and will continue to spread in relevance across both public and private companies, the government sector, you name it. There is even industry speculation that XBRL will eventually render EDGAR obsolete. So for financial professionals to remain on their game and relevant, it is imperative that they learn XBRL forwards and backwards themselves. The SEC is giving you a window of opportunity to scale that learning curve in the early going, so why not embrace that opportunity now, while you have the flexibility and SEC leniency to do so?
This is all, of course, leading up to my main point: WebFilings has a one-of-a-kind XBRL modeling and tagging solution that is simply unavailable anywhere else in the industry. It enables you to take a hands-on approach with regards to all levels of XBRL, and, with the assistance of a dedicated Customer Success Team, allows you to scale the learning curve from Day One at your own pace, and at your own convenience.
While I cannot overstate the importance and ease-of-use of the XBRL features the WebFilings solution provides, it is merely one of many cutting edge benefits your industry has never seen before. As an entirely web-based, end-to-end, single document data source model, WebFilings allows you to safely and securely access, edit, collaborate, EDGARize, XBRL-tag, and file your ENTIRE document from anywhere, anytime. This includes fully formatted and functional embedded spreadsheets into the document, as well as sophisticated linking throughout your document (or documents).
Oh, did I mention EDGAR on-demand? Like, click a button, your entire document EDGARizes in about ten seconds. No ‘bolt- on’ software required, no waiting until tomorrow morning or later this afternoon to get your EDGAR back from the Printer. Ten seconds, people, ten seconds. As often as you like, and permitting last minute changes to your document right up until filing – XBRL too!
Regardless if you are ready to tackle XBRL internally or not, WebFilings' cutting edge technology will save you time and money over the alternative, both short and long term, with a very, VERY small learning curve required for the base technology. Many of our customers are using all of the benefits mentioned above but have still elected to let WebFilings model and tag the first year (or years) for them. So, YES, we can indeed provide that service too, with some of the most notable XBRL experts in the industry right on our staff. You can execute as much of the tagging to which you can handle on your own but still have the option of allowing our experienced team to help when you get stuck.
Again, scaling at your own pace, and with the assistance of our dedicated Customer Success Team…all with no long term contract requirements. Honestly, there is no downside here, other than the fact that you'll have some extra free time on your hands that you never had before. Gosh, what will you do with yourself.
So forget about those other spooks and their stale scare tactics. Yawn. The WebFilings technology is something you have never seen before, and it will save you and your organization time, it will save your organization money, and it will turn you into the XBRL expert you want to be well before next Halloween rolls around.
Of course, if in the spirit of the season you still want to be frightened, then put that Printer services quote you've already received right up next to ours. Just make sure all small children are out of the room first - talk about scary!