Key takeaways_

• Business Central gives finance teams four complementary reporting routes: Financial Reporting, analysis mode, Excel and Power BI.
• The right tool depends on the question being asked, from statutory statements to ad hoc analysis and business-wide dashboards.
• Reliable reporting depends more on dimensions, chart of accounts design, data quality and ownership than on the tool itself.

Better reporting starts with understanding what your finance team actually needs to see, how often they need it and who relies on it to make decisions.

Business Central gives you several ways to report on performance. In this guide, we explain where each option fits, how they work together and the foundations you need in place to make reporting faster, more reliable and easier to maintain.

Why reporting still feels harder than it should_

Ask a Finance Director what they want from a new finance system and reporting is usually near the top of the list. Yet many finance teams still spend days each month exporting trial balances, updating spreadsheets, reclassifying figures and rebuilding management packs. This happens often, but you can improve it step by step rather than through a complete redesign.

Often, the underlying issue is that the system does not yet reflect how the business wants to analyse performance. If the ledger only records account codes, questions about site profitability, project margin or departmental spend move into spreadsheets.

With the right structure in place, Business Central can bring more of that analysis back into a controlled, repeatable process. For the finance team, that means a shorter month-end, fewer manual reconciliations and management figures that people can rely on.

Whether you already use Business Central or are evaluating it as a replacement for an older finance system, it helps to know what the reporting options are. Business Central offers four broad routes and they work best together. Most organisations use all four in some form. So, the practical step is to match each reporting need to the most suitable tool and build from there.

Option one: native financial reporting_

Business Central’s Financial Reporting feature, formerly known as Account Schedules, lets you define report rows and columns against the chart of accounts, budgets and dimensions. It’s well suited to structured financial statements such as profit and loss, balance sheet, cash flow and budget variance reporting. The platform also supports consolidated reporting where the required company and consolidation setup is in place.

Financial Reporting is included within Business Central, using current ledger data and providing a governed report definition that authorised users can run on demand. This reduces reliance on separately maintained spreadsheet versions, although report design, configuration and ongoing ownership still require time and appropriate expertise.

Presentation is where it has limits. Financial Reporting is designed for structured statements rather than narrative board packs with commentary and charts. Financial reports can be exported using Excel templates to give a formatted starting point, but commentary and board pack presentation will usually still be finished outside the report definition. What it gives you is a clean, accurate and repeatable set of numbers to build from.

Option two: analysis mode and built-in analytics_

Analysis mode lets users group, pivot and filter list data directly in Business Central, for example aged debt by salesperson, purchases by category or item movement by location, without exporting anything. Copilot can also suggest an analysis from a plain-language request. This is one of the most underused features we see, and it answers many of the ad hoc questions finance is asked during the week without a spreadsheet.

Think of it as the quickest way to answer a “can you just tell me…” question rather than as a reporting platform. Users can save their own analysis views, and because the work happens inside Business Central, the figures are always current.

Option three: Excel, used properly_

Excel remains a valuable part of most finance teams’ reporting. The opportunity is to use it in a more controlled way. Business Central offers three routes:

1. Open in Excel produces a static copy of a list
2. Edit in Excel uses the Business Central add-in for Excel to refresh data and publish changes back
3. Excel layouts let authorised users run a report that returns a formatted workbook with current data each time it runs. Used well, these replace a copy taken several weeks earlier with data drawn from the system when it is needed.

A workbook with a defined, refreshable data source can become a reliable reporting asset, while a static export still needs manual checks and reconciliation. Once you understand where each approach is used today, you can improve reporting after go-live.

For finance teams that want to keep designing reports in Excel while working from governed Business Central data, ISV solutions such as Cosmos Reporting add further flexibility.

Option four: Power BI_

Power BI is where reporting moves beyond finance and supports the wider business. Microsoft provides ready-made Power BI apps for Business Central covering finance, sales, purchasing, inventory, projects and manufacturing. These can also be extended or combined with data from other systems. Reports can be embedded in Business Central or shared with people who never log in to the ERP, subject to the appropriate Power BI licences. Operational managers get the figures they need directly and finance spends less time producing one-off spreadsheets on request.

To get the best from Power BI, it helps to agree who owns the dataset, how each measure is defined and how refreshes will be monitored. These do not all have to be solved at once. Start by prioritising the dashboards that matter most, establishing shared definitions and introducing governance at a pace that suits your business.

What makes reporting work in practice_

Whichever tools you use, four foundations make the biggest difference.

• This is the decision that shapes everything else. Dimensions are how Business Central understands your business beyond the account code, such as site, department, project, contract, fund or cost centre. Set them up well during implementation and most future reporting requests become a matter of filtering. Leave them too late and spreadsheets tend to creep back in within months.
• Chart of accounts design. A chart that has grown over many years, with accounts added to solve one-off problems, produces reports that need manual reclassification every month. Migration is the best opportunity you will have to simplify it.
• Data quality at the point of entry. Users often leave optional dimensions blank. Default dimensions on customers, vendors, items and G/L accounts, combined with Value Posting rules such as Code Mandatory or Same Code, mean Business Central checks the dimension when a transaction is posted. That is what keeps reporting reliable without someone checking every entry.
• Give every report an owner. They are responsible for what the report means, who receives it and when it is reviewed. Without one, reports gradually lose relevance and are replaced by spreadsheets.

In summary_

Moving to Business Central is an opportunity to decide how your business should run, report and make decisions. Then, build those foundations into one connected ERP platform. The reporting tools are ready to use from day one, but the bigger gains, such as a quicker month-end, less time reconciling spreadsheets and better-informed decisions, come from getting the structure, data and ownership right from the start.

That is where Infinity Group can help. As a specialist Business Central partner, we support organisations with everything from licensing and implementation to reporting, optimisation, support, security, AI innovation and long-term improvement. Whether you are moving from a legacy finance system or trying to get more from Business Central today, our team helps you turn the platform into a reliable operational hub.

Ready to make reporting one of the strongest parts of your finance system? Speak to our Business Central experts about building a clearer, more connected and easier-to-manage ERP platform.