Host Analytics works, but the UI is underwhelming
May 16, 2019

Host Analytics works, but the UI is underwhelming

Joshua Henke | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 6 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Modules Used

  • Planning
  • Reporting and Analytics

Overall Satisfaction with Planful (formerly Host Analytics)

Only our Financial Analysts and the financial execs use Host Analytics directly. The primary purpose is budget forecasts.

Pros

  • I often hear from my users, "the best thing about Host Analytics is the export to Excel feature so we can do our work there."
  • I'm struggling to come up with things it does "particularly well," so I think it would be a disservice to readers to make up something

Cons

  • User interface, while not bad, really could take some cues from basic interfaces. Strange to navigate. Perhaps its method of often requiring double-clicks is smart, but it's not consistent with most web interfaces
  • Their newly touted native NetSuite integration is techncially GA, but really needs more time to bake. Documentation for this new feature is improving but still is confusing.
  • It's surprisingly configurable, perhaps overly so for a point solution. "Surprising" also because it's hard to navigate and find the configurations.
  • When there are problems with data loads, my experience is its challenging to find the problem (weak error messages and reporting), and fixing the problem often means deleting entire periods of data and reloading again.
  • While a lot can be done with reporting, the way to generate custom functions is...uncommon. I forget the name of the query language.
  • Can't speak to this.
The UI in Oracle's Planning and Budgeting Cloud is surprisingly fresh, especially compared to Host. Navigation, colors, clicking, graphics all feel relatively modern, especially for business software. It offers a lot of features that appear more fully baked than Host Analytics' offering. The NetSuite integration is especially attractive for two known reasons right now: 1) it can extract any data we put in a saved search in NetSuite and 2) it pulls metadata (departments, accounts, etc), neither of which can be said of Host Analytics.
If you can use their provide Boomi integration, you may have a better experience because they say they'll have greater insight to data loads than we seem to have with our own Boomi integration. I also consider that we have had Host Analytics for several years and think we would benefit from a reimplementation (a somewhat common scenario with systems (or cars or girlfriends): "that system looks much more attractive, I'm ditching this... or maybe I should consider revisiting some basics")

Planful Feature Ratings

7.0
Long-term financial planning
7
Financial budgeting
7
Forecasting
7
Scenario modeling
7
Management reporting
7
6.0
Financial data consolidation
7
Journal entries and reports
Not Rated
Multi-currency management
7
Intercompany Eliminations
Not Rated
Minority Ownership
Not Rated
Local and consolidated reporting
Not Rated
Detailed Audit Trails
4
9.0
Financial Statement Reporting
Not Rated
Management Reporting
Not Rated
Excel-based Reporting
9
Automated board and financial reporting
Not Rated
XBRL support for regulatory filing
Not Rated
Not Rated
Personalized dashboards
Not Rated
Color-coded scorecards
Not Rated
KPIs
Not Rated
Cost and profitability analysis
Not Rated
Key Performance Indicator setting
Not Rated
Benchmarking with external data
Not Rated
7.0
Flat file integration
7
Excel data integration
9
Direct links to 3rd-party data sources
5
Not Rated
Pixel Perfect reports
Not Rated
Customizable dashboards
Not Rated
Report Formatting Templates
Not Rated
Not Rated
Drill-down analysis
Not Rated
Formatting capabilities
Not Rated
Integration with R or other statistical packages
Not Rated
Report sharing and collaboration
Not Rated
Not Rated
Publish to Web
Not Rated
Publish to PDF
Not Rated
Report Versioning
Not Rated
Report Delivery Scheduling
Not Rated
Not Rated
Pre-built visualization formats (heatmaps, scatter plots etc.)
Not Rated
Location Analytics / Geographic Visualization
Not Rated
Predictive Analytics
Not Rated
8.0
Multi-User Support (named login)
Not Rated
Role-Based Security Model
8
Multiple Access Permission Levels (Create, Read, Delete)
Not Rated
Single Sign-On (SSO)
8
5.0
Responsive Design for Web Access
5
Mobile Application
Not Rated
Dashboard / Report / Visualization Interactivity on Mobile
Not Rated

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