Power BI is a powerful tool, but its complexity quickly increases
SUMMARY
This article outlines the main challenges corporate finance teams face when using power bi for financial reporting.
Reading time: 2 minutes 35 secondes
Challenges of using Power BI for financial reporting in corporate Finance
In companies with 100 to 2000 employees, corporate finance teams are increasingly encouraged to use power bi to modernize their financial reporting. While the tool offers strong capabilities for data visualization and analysis, its use in a finance context brings specific challenges. If left unaddressed, these obstacles can lead to reporting errors, significant time loss, and risks to financial governance. It’s therefore essential to understand these challenges to maximize the value of analytics investments and support robust financial processes.
Challenge #1: the complexity of financial modeling in Power BI
Power BI is highly flexible but not purpose-built for finance. Financial modeling requires precise data structures (chart of accounts, multi-entity, multi-currency, complex analytical aggregations) that are not provided by default in power bi. Finance teams often have to build these models themselves, or hire consultants to do so, using dax and power query — a costly and time-consuming process.
To overcome this challenge, it's critical to rely on predefined, finance-optimized models tailored for Power BI. Some solutions offer ready-to-use financial data models that automatically include consolidation logic, analytical aggregation, and currency conversion, allowing teams to focus on analysis rather than technical setup.
Challenge #2: limited access to operational details beyond the general ledger (GL)
Power BI is often fed directly from standard accounting data, primarily from the general ledger. However, effective financial reporting also requires access to detailed operational data — contracts, purchase orders, projects, inventory, hours worked — which are not always integrated into the gl. This limits the depth of analysis possible.
To address this, companies need to implement specialized connectors and enriched datasets that pull missing information directly from a centralized analytical finance model or other source systems. The most effective solutions provide predefined modules to access non-gl data, enabling a complete financial view directly within Power BI.
Challenge #3: governance of financial data and models
In Power BI, without strong governance, it’s easy to end up with a proliferation of custom reports and inconsistent models across departments. This creates discrepancies in reported figures, version control issues, and increased risk to financial integrity — especially in environments with multiple legal entities and departments.
To mitigate this risk, companies must establish a clear analytics governance structure: centralized data models, user access controls, validation of critical calculations, and standardization of financial reports. Some solutions embed these practices and offer a secure, unified ecosystem for reliable financial reporting in Power BI.
Conclusion
Using Power BI for financial reporting can significantly enhance the analytical performance of corporate finance teams — as long as the modeling is under control, the right data is accessible, and governance is secured. The FP&A Swiftfinance solution provides a comprehensive response with its predefined financial modules, enriched ERP connectors, and integrated governance standards, empowering finance teams to fully leverage power bi without compromising on reliability or speed.
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Challenges of using Power BI in Finance