Ameen compared with spreadsheets
Spreadsheets are the most successful business software ever written, and most companies should keep using them for longer than they think. Here is where they stop working.
Spreadsheets are not a bad choice. They are flexible, everyone can read them, they cost nothing extra, and a business that fits in one is a business that should stay in one. We would rather you keep your spreadsheet than pay us for something you do not yet need.
The three failures
Spreadsheets tend to fail in the same order in every company. First, two people edit two copies and neither knows which is current. Second, stock drifts from the shelf because a sale was recorded and a movement was not, or the other way round. Third, the ledger stops matching the bank because entries are typed twice and one of them is wrong.
What changes
In Ameen a document is the record. Issuing an invoice moves stock and posts its journal in the same transaction, so the two cannot disagree. Every movement carries its reason and its document, so a wrong count leads back to the entry that caused it. There is one copy, with named users and roles, and an audit log of administrative actions.
What you give up
Flexibility, mostly. A spreadsheet will let you model anything, including things that are wrong; an ERP will refuse entries that do not balance, which is the point but is also friction. You also give up ad-hoc formulas: Ameen has fixed reports and CSV export, and if you want an unusual cut of the data you will export it and build that cut in a spreadsheet anyway.
Stay on spreadsheets if
- One person maintains the file
- You hold little or no stock
- Your accountant is content with what you send
Move to Ameen if
- More than one person needs to enter data
- Stock counts no longer match the shelf
- You are retyping the same figures into a second file
- You need an audit trail rather than a version history
Updated