The Inovis Blog

Getting called into the CFO’s office is always a just a little bit fun. It means I might get an interesting data set or some insight I didn’t have before and my last trip to Ken Williams‘ office was no different. The most interesting thing was this discussion centered solely on data exchange standards, specifically XBRL. While the current SEC mandate is for “all companieswith a worldwide public float of more than $5 Billion” according to AFP’s latest edition of Exchange, there are some added benefits which can measured in other areas of the business as well.

XBRL stands for extensible Business Reporting Language. It’s just like documents we use every day such as ASC X12 and OAGi. Essentially this is a common way for defining financial data not only for B2B exchange, but for interoperability between financial systems and a common way for analyst to look at filings, such as a 10-Q or a 10-K, across companies for quicker analysis of publicly filed information. The use of standards for business reporting in systems will make it easier to create financial reports more quickly in finance teams and to reduce the ongoing reporting requirements for companies. Christopher Cox, SEC Chairman, believes XBRL “will do for business reporting what bar coding did for product distribution.”

Secure file exchange for financial organizationsnow requires not just support for the sending and receiving of data from say a lock box, completing IRS filings and other critical financial information, it also requires support for XBRL. The deadline for this government mandate is 2009 for the first set of companies by SEC, but all accelerated filers must do so no later than 2010. This requirement is not only for the companies that need to file, but also for those that do filings on behalf of others as well.

So the next time you get pinged by someone in your finance group, it might not just be about whether or not you received the most recent payment file or remittance advice from your largest trading partner. It might just be able your ability to support the emerging XBRL requirements within your current B2B gateway, translator or Managed File Transfer solution and whether or not you can fit yet another B2B project into the IT stack by the end of the year.