The Hidden Costs of Manual Data Entry Between Dynamics 365 and Business Central

Manual data entry might seem harmless, but it’s costing your business more than you think. For those using systems like Dynamics 365 and Business Central, the lack of smooth integration means hours wasted on manual data transfers—time that could be better spent growing your business.

Beyond the frustration, manual processes lead to higher costs, increased errors, and missed opportunities. In today’s fast-paced world, efficiency is key, and outdated methods can slow you down.

The solution? Seamless integration to save time, cut costs, and let you focus on what really matters. Let’s explore this in the blog.

The Unseen Time Drain: How Manual Data Entry Devours Hours

Evaluate the extent to which you or a team member’s time is consumed by manual data input. It’s probably beyond your estimation. Although it may seem like just a few minutes sometimes, time accumulates rapidly.

Each instance of inputting client information in Dynamics 365 or recording a financial transaction in Business Central may incur previously higher costs.

A new study report by The Harvard Business Review indicates that manual data input results in mistakes, causing workers to use up to 50% of their discovery time to look for and rectify these inaccuracies. Envision if that time was allocated to activities directly related to expanding your company.

Every minute dedicated to manual data entry represents a significant potential cost, and cumulatively, this loss in productivity may result in substantial financial expenditures for firms over time.

Engaging staff in repetitive duties detracts from their focus on strategic initiatives, such as enhancing customer relationships or refining product offerings. In summary, you are employing skilled experts to do commonplace operations that might be readily automated.

Human Error: The High Cost of Simple Mistakes

Mistakes happen—that is part of being human. However, those human errors can run rampant in business and lead to huge problems when data is manually entered across different platforms. It is very easy to write a customer address wrong, or mix up two digits in a financial report. Those errors can initially feel insignificant but gradually morph into major headaches and impact your entire organization.

Recent research shows that 95% of businesses complain about data quality impacting their business processes. Poor data quality usually occurs due to manual entry mistakes. Just as an example, sending wrong invoices in Business Central due to a misplaced decimal point or wrong product code could result in late payments and even loss of clients. These are not mere errors; they are deadly black marks on your brand.

So where is the context in this — one incorrect data entry takes several hours to correct when discovered. Besides leading to increased labor costs, these additional hours can slow down the process of providing services or goods. All because someone had to copy and paste nine columns of data from Dynamics 365 to Business Central.

The Financial Impact: Why Manual Data Entry Costs More Than You Think

One of the aspects of manual data entry is that it is easy to ignore how expensive it can be. It’s just paying staff to work with data, isn’t it? Wrong. The real thing being paid for is inefficiency, and as always, inefficiency costs a lot of money.

Let’s break it down. Every single one of those manual entries costs money in the form of time. Your employees who could be working on initiatives that drive growth are busy doing data input, and the more time they spend on it, the lesser the ROI you get on their salaries.

The inefficiencies created by manual processes cost businesses nearly 20-30% of their revenue every year, according to research. There are a ton of dollars falling through the cracks here—dollars that could be reinvested in your business.

Then, when you add the time spent correcting errors and following erroneous pieces of data, not to mention compliance risk management (which we’ll cover in a moment), the cost gets larger. Manual data entry doesn’t just eat away at your staff’s time—it eats into your bottom line too. And every correction needed is an expense as well. Each hour spent on data entry is more money out of your pocket.

Customer Satisfaction: The Silent Victim of Manual Data Errors

As customers, we know the drill — getting the wrong product sent to you, or receiving an incorrect invoice, and worse of all, waiting on hold forever for someone to “fix it!” All these little irritants add up, and soon enough, your customers will walk away. Manual data entry is usually the culprit of such issues, creating a disconnect between your promises and what you actually deliver.

A study by Experian found that 29% of businesses attribute customer dissatisfaction—such as inaccurate customer information, slow service, and complaints—to poor data quality. If your business is still handling manual entries between Dynamics 365 and Business Central, it’s only a matter of time before a mistake slips through, costing you money and customer loyalty.

Now imagine: A customer calls your support team to check the status of their order, and thanks to poor data entry in your system, the support rep can’t provide a clear answer. It’s a frustrating experience for the customer, and repeated instances like this can harm your brand reputation, erode trust, and ultimately result in lost business. The hidden costs of manual data entry go beyond financial losses—they rob you of your most important asset: your customers.

Opportunity Cost: What Could Your Team Be Doing Instead?

Manual data entry doesn’t only consume valuable time; it consumes potential. Each hour that your team spends manually moving data from Dynamics 365 to Business Central is an hour wasted on low-value activities, instead of focusing on business strategy, innovation, and ultimately customer engagement.

In fact, 52% of business leaders think that 10-30% of their daily tasks could be automated, with process automation being more crucial than ever as an element of digital transformation. Industry-leading digital transformation reports provide detailed insights on how automation is reshaping operations. This isn’t just a statistic; it’s an actionable opportunity for growth. Employees no longer burdened by manual processes can focus on strategic work that truly impacts the bottom line.

We all know manual data entry is mundane work. If your employees are performing processes that could be automated, you’re not only wasting their time but also killing their morale.

Research shows that employees who feel they’re performing redundant, low-impact work are significantly more likely to disengage. This leads to decreased productivity and higher turnover rates, costing your business in the long run.

Data Silos: A Breeding Ground for Inaccuracies

Data silos are a disaster for a business, and the cause of them is usually manual data entry. So here is what you can imagine: your salespeople are working on Dynamics 365, while your finance team is working in Business Central. This means these teams are essentially using two different databases, as there isn’t an automated data flow between the two.

According to a survey from the American Management Association, 83% of executives acknowledge that their companies are experiencing data silos, and an even higher 97% believe that those silos have detrimental effects on the company.

Unsurprisingly, siloed data isn’t merely a headache; it’s an impediment to enhanced decision-making and streamlined processes. Without real-time data integration, your teams are likely working with stale or missing data, resulting in uninformed decisions and expensive errors.

These silos are also compounded through manual data entry. Imagine this scenario—if your sales team updates a customer’s details in Dynamics 365, but the data does not sync to Business Central, your finance team may still be using outdated information. That chasm between departments leads to duplicated work, incorrect reporting, and, in the end, lost revenue.

Compliance Nightmares: Why Manual Data Entry Puts You at Risk

With regulations becoming stricter, no business can afford to be lackadaisical when it comes to data ownership and management. Be it tax compliance, GDPR, or industry-specific regulations—the stakes are high. A single mistake, and you might end up with fines or a lawsuit.
Gartner conducted research that states that around $12.9 million per year is lost because of inefficient data, missed opportunities, and compliance risks that arise due to poor data quality affecting businesses. Those risks are even further aggravated by manual data entry, which is never free from the risk of human error.
One mistake in your financial reporting or customer data can put you out of compliance, and the fallout may not just be a heavy financial penalty—it could hit your reputation as well.

The Unseen Cost of Manual Entry: Where Your Cost Center Turns Into a Labor Sink

When we think about labor costs, we usually start with salaries or wages. But there are hidden labor costs associated with manual data entry that often go unnoticed. One common issue is the need to constantly correct mistakes, re-enter data, and find missing information, which all add to your workforce’s workload. This additional work can also lead to employee burnout, raising turnover rates and necessitating hiring more staff to keep up with the increased workload.
Gallup estimates that disengaged employees cost employers $7.8 trillion in lost productivity worldwide. That’s 11% of global GDP—a phenomenal figure that indicates how repetitive tasks like manual data entry are stalling businesses.
Workflow automation reduces the need for manual processes, so it not only increases the accuracy of your data but also minimizes employee dissatisfaction. Removed from the minutiae, employees become more engaged and productive in their work, eager to focus instead on how to help achieve bigger company goals.

Why Integration Is the Key to Success?

Integrating is the obvious solution to these issues. If you automate the flow of data between Dynamics 365 and Business Central, you do away with manual entry, cut down on errors, and allow your employees to spend time working on higher-value tasks.

With connected systems, data is exchanged between Dynamics 365 and Business Central seamlessly, so everyone has access to the same up-to-date information in real-time across departments. This creates an operationally efficient environment and gives teams the enhanced capability to make better decisions based on real-time data.

Integration solutions like Aonflow can help automate tedious and often manual data entry processes while also minimizing human error and providing insights that may otherwise drown in countless sheets and platforms. An integrated system allows your teams to focus on what truly matters—growing revenue, increasing customer satisfaction, and driving innovation.

The Cost of Doing Nothing: Why Sticking to Manual Processes Isn’t Sustainable

For a lot of businesses, the idea of manual data entry as a problem to solve later is easy to accept. However, as your business scales, the cost of continuing with manual processes will only grow. Having more data leads to extra manual entry, causing more errors and bigger inefficiencies. Meanwhile, competitors who automate and integrate systems are setting themselves up for sustained success.

According to a McKinsey & Company report on automation and the future of work, companies that fail to invest in automation will face significant productivity challenges. The research suggests that failure to adopt automation technologies could result in productivity levels 40-50% lower than competitors over the next five years.

Automation increases efficiency and creates new opportunities, but businesses that lag behind may face rising operational inefficiencies, higher labor costs, and missed growth opportunities. The gap between automated and non-automated businesses is widening, and companies that delay action risk being left behind in a digital-first world.

Not integrating Dynamics 365 and Business Central is costing you time and money now, but more importantly, it could cost you dearly in the future. While implementing an integration solution has a cost, the cost of doing nothing is far greater. The longer you wait, the more challenging and expensive it will be to close the gap.

Conclusion: Automate to Elevate

The costs of manual data entry between Dynamics 365 and Business Central are just too great to overlook. The impact of manual processes can often be subtle: wasted time, human errors, compliance breaches, dissatisfied customers, and financial losses, all quietly dragging your business down. However, with the right integration solutions, you can eliminate these costs, boost efficiency, and unlock new opportunities for growth.

Automation isn’t just an option—it’s essential for businesses that want to stay competitive in today’s fast-paced market. By investing in a streamlined system, you’re not just saving time and money—you’re creating a path to take your business from good to great. Dynamics 365 and Business Central are incredibly powerful platforms in their own right, but when seamlessly integrated, they unlock endless possibilities for your business.

Don’t wait until manual data entry becomes a bottleneck for your operations. Automate now, and watch as your business transforms into a time-efficient operation with fewer errors, happier customers, and a more productive, engaged workforce.