Real time data and being able to customize easily in excel.

Pulling in data for large files can take a while if there are a lot of formulas and if you have the automatic calculation turned on, it will refresh even if you didn't want it to.

We have been very happy with Spreadsheet Server and have completely replaced Financial Reporting Studio. The speed with which we can issue reports, modify financials, or create new reports/analysis has greatly improved by using Spreadsheet Server.

Spreadsheet server gives the control of report writing to accountants all within native Excel that we are all familiar with. Implementation was simple and quick and involved very little IT support. The tool is simple to use and only required a few hours of training to get everyone started on building their own reports.

With Oracle Cloud our Oracle tables have to be replicated to a separate server. This means reporting isn't real time (but it is close).

Reporting times dropped from 3 to 4 days to overnight.

The product offers great flexibility, looks at the live data and all hierarchies. Distribution Manager and Profile Scheduler really enhance the reporting functionality.

Performance is slow particularly for transaction based reports. Updating to the very latest software was of great help but we had to move the transactions to a table for quicker queries. This allowed reports to be able to complete overnight (around 8 hours) but we are limited to only a periods worth of data at a time for transaction based reports. The translated ledgers are not currently working but consolidation ledger are so not a top priority but something to fix in the future.

Spreadsheet server is easy to use and refreshes my data immediately. I love all the options I have, I can access any GL data I choose. I'm able to build all of my financial statements, budgets, and financial ratios in one file and it updates effortlessly from period to period.

I spend less time mining data and more time analyzing the data. I use this for financial reporting and budgeting and any scenario I can think of or want to analyze, I'm able to build it into my spreadsheet and have it update the data based on the period I want to analyze.

My only drawback is occassionally Spreadsheet Server loses a connection to my data and I have to contact support for a reboot. Which isn't inconvenient during the week, but support is not able to assist me on the weekends.

The ease in which I can create reports and do on the fly analysis.

There isn't much. The only drawback is change control. Since it is an add-in to Excel, anyone can go in and change a report. Also, you have to touch every report if a change is made. This is definitely a minor drawback, as there are ways to implement controls.