Sample report
A sample Finance Grader report
An anonymized walkthrough of what the diagnostic returns: a complexity score, the seven-dimension breakdown, the hidden-cost estimate, and the three priority fixes. Based on a representative $18M apparel brand on Shopify + Amazon.
This is a representative report, not a real customer's. The brand below is a composite: an $18M apparel brand selling on Shopify and Amazon, running QuickBooks Online for accounting and Shopify's built-in inventory. It is a common, and commonly painful, stack.
The headline score
The composite complexity score for this brand comes back at 71 / 100, which is high. The score rises with channel count, SKU complexity, and the automation gap between the accounting and inventory tools. A score above 65 signals a stack that has been outgrown.
| Metric | This brand |
|---|---|
| Composite complexity | 71 / 100 (high) |
| Estimated hidden cost | $9,400 – $13,800 / month |
| Likely month-end close | 11 days (top quartile: 5) |
| Channels reconciled manually | 2 (Shopify, Amazon) |
The seven-dimension breakdown
The composite hides where the pain actually is. The breakdown shows this brand is fine on basic controls but bleeding on the inventory-and-reconciliation axis:
| Dimension | Score | Read |
|---|---|---|
| AP automation | 55 / 100 | QBO handles bills; no 3-way match |
| AR automation | 32 / 100 | Amazon + Shopify payouts reconciled by hand |
| Inventory costing | 21 / 100 | FOB-only COGS; no landed cost |
| Catalog layer | 40 / 100 | SKU mapping across channels is manual |
| Real-time visibility | 28 / 100 | Month-end batch close, no continuous view |
| Financial controls | 68 / 100 | Adequate; QBO audit trail in place |
| FP&A analytics | 30 / 100 | No channel-level margin; spreadsheet-driven |
The story the breakdown tells: this is not a controls problem, it is an inventory-and-reconciliation problem. The three lowest dimensions (inventory costing, real-time visibility, AR automation) all trace to the same root cause: QuickBooks plus Shopify inventory cannot represent multi-channel COGS or continuous close.
The hidden-cost math
The $9,400 – $13,800/month estimate is not a guess. It is built from this brand's profile:
- Estimated invoice volume at $18M revenue: ~180/month.
- Manual hours implied by the low automation scores on AR, inventory costing, and visibility: ~210 – 305 hours/month across the finance function.
- At the $45/hour loaded labour rate, that is the cost band above.
- Plus the opportunity cost of an 11-day close vs the 5-day top-quartile benchmark: six finance-team days a month spent reconciling instead of analysing.
The three priority fixes
Every report ends with the three highest-leverage fixes, ranked by cost recovered per unit of effort. For this brand:
- Automate multi-channel payout reconciliation. The single biggest manual-hour sink. Reconciling Amazon settlements and Shopify payouts by hand is where most of the 210+ hours go.
- Move from FOB-only to landed-cost COGS. The inventory-costing score of 21 means gross margin is overstated. Fixing this changes which SKUs the brand thinks are profitable.
- Shift from month-end batch to continuous close. Cuts the close from 11 days toward the 5-day benchmark and turns the finance team from reporters into advisors.
Your report will differ. A food & bev brand on NetSuite gets a very different breakdown than this apparel brand on QuickBooks. The structure (composite, seven dimensions, hidden cost, three fixes) is the same; the diagnosis is specific to your stack.
Get your own
Run the diagnostic at finance-grader.com. About 60 seconds, no login. Curious how the scoring works first? Read the methodology.