Oracle E-Business Suite Reviews

At Dekalb County, the most valuable feature of E-Business Suite is the integration of all the different modules. It's truly become our financial database from a projects and procurement point of view. It's all connected and logical.

Oracle has clearly brought experts to the table for the their design and development roles. In the early days, E-Business Suit was comprise simply of programmers' coding, but that's not their model anymore. I like that Oracle's brought in experts who know payables, who know what CFO's want to see, etc. They've got real-world experience and it shows because when you stand it up for the first time, it's an absolutely useable system. From that perspective, it's 100% worth the investment.

For example, sub-ledger accounting was new to release 12. If I am an international company or I want to deal with a company outside of the United States, they record things a little bit differently in their accounting. If I want to value my company and I have inventory in the United States, we put that on our books. I could have $100 worth of inventory, so therefore my company looks like it's $100 better than maybe Italy, but Italy doesn't record inventory on their books. It's not an asset.

So with E-Business Suite, Oracle has built a product from which I can make entity/business decision adaptations without changing the underlying code.

What sub-ledger accounting allows me to do is recreate the accounting structure, so I could still have my primary books, which is in US GAAP, but I could have secondary books. Now that I'm working in county government, where E-Business Suite really helps is with cash management.

I am fine with where E-Business Suite is now. From a county standpoint, I would like to see them integrate fund accounting into fixed assets and cash management. Right now, E-Business Suit really isn't 100% public sector. I guess we're not the market to roll out to.

Also, I'm not impressed with the out-of-the-box analytics. It's really the bare minimum.

Moreover, out-of-the-box, Oracle E-Business Suite's cash management module does not do fund accounting. It puts a strain on our accounting staff because the data doesn't really represent properly, but I was able to get it to work by using sub-ledger accounting to redefine the delivered Oracle out-of-the-box method.

I've been using E-Business Suite since 1989.

We've had no issues deploying it.

Whether we have stability issues depends on how long a module has been out. With the evolution of E-Business Suite, each new module has had its hiccups and challenges. The longer the module is out, however, the more stable it becomes. This has been our experience with GL, accounts payable, accounts receivable, fixed assets, cash management, and fund accounting.

The frustrating part of that is because it's new, you don't have the expertise out there to pull on. You could call Oracle support and yes, they're going to help you eventually, but one of the things that the user group gives me is, I know people who know GL, accounts payable, etc. I can reach out to my network, but I don't have a network on new products.

So the answer to the stability question is both yes and no.

E-Business Suite is scalable. We don't have to worry about it at my organization, but I know from my prior consulting experience that it's absolutely scalable, from mom-and-pop shops to large multi-national companies.

I have up and down days with Oracle support. Like anything, it depends on who your support analyst is. They have some phenomenal analysts. Unfortunately, the lifespan, as I understand it, is only maybe 18 months. They come to know this product inside and out, but then they go on to do other things. If I look at it realistically, here we only call support when there's an issue. We're always complaining. If I was on the receiving end of that, 18 months of listening to complaints might get old. There are the people who can answer my questions and who will get it done, and then there are those who don't.

Actually, I'm dealing with a support ticket now. I have had to on multiple occasions put in the ticket 'read my question' versus what I think is happening. I don't know if it's a computer that spits out the first few e-mails, but it's "hello, my name is X, Y, Z", and as a business, you get sick of the same old stuff. I need this resolved and, honestly, the time it takes for me to log into Oracle support and read the stock e-mails has become extremely frustrating.

The setup to me is straightforward, but I've been using it for so long. For a new person, I don't think that companies could use the software without consulting help of some sort. You need to understand your business. There are very good consultants who could come in and they will ask you the right questions to help drive the setup. They're decisions that need to be made that, if wrong, you can still live with. But, there are other, more critical decisions that you make that you can't undo. So is it easy to set up? Physically going into the screens is as simple as can be. The question really needs to be, how much time do you need to put in prior to sitting down to set the system up? You really need to understand your business and you need to understand what you're trying to do.

We had outside help, but what causes problems is the fact that when you're a company and you're looking for new software, you are sitting there and you're saying, "OK my old software doesn't quite do what I want," so you want to buy something else. You go out, you do your RFP, you decide you're going to get E-Business Suite. The problem is, the experts at the company know their business. They also know their business using their old system. The consultants that they get to come in, they know E-Business Suite, but they don't know your business. The two don't always mesh correctly. What I've noticed over the years is you end up re-implementing the old system you just came off of. You're not utilizing all of the neat features that E-Business Suite has.

If you haven't implemented it and are considering purchasing it, don't be afraid of it. Go ahead, jump in. Oracle is a phenomenal company and they will stand behind their product. The best advice is to take your time, know your business, and don't always take 100% judgement from your consultant. Use their advice, but listen to that little voice in your head of what you know as well. Have a good collaboration between you and the consultant. Don't try to do it on your own.

The last piece of advice and what many companies fail to do is the education portion. I can't tell you how many companies I've gone into to do training only after they've gone live. And it never fails that they've scaled back their education to save money. Like where I am now at Dekalb County, they never train the end users. These end users know absolute basics to get by, but they don't know all the great tools. Even though once it's implemented, they need to keep learning it. Just because you've implemented a product, you're not done. Now, after it has settled down and you've used it, you can go and see what else your product that's live can also do. So remember to get educated.

The ability to streamline all of our information is the most valuable feature for us. Right now, we are on several ERP systems, most of which are not fully integrated so we don't have the ability to track our inventory through these systems.

It is still being implemented and this has been slow, so I would say we have not seen a lot of benefit yet. We do believe it will help us track our inventory from multiple ERP systems.

The biggest frustration I have with Oracle is that they have taken an acquisition approach. Because of this, the modules don't talk to each other. It is touted as being a fully-integrated system, but if something happens and purchasing doesn't necessarily follow through to the cost module, the amount of programming and specific manipulation required to get the modules to talk to each other is surprising to me, especially for a package from a company of Oracle's size.

We are partially implemented. We have been partially implemented for two-and-a-half-years. We started two-and-a-half years ago and are probably still three to five years out of a full implementation.

We had deployment issues with the modules not fully integrating with each other.

I haven't been particularly happy with it, but I think it is because we are transitioning from an ERP system, so that right now we don't run it as a fully web-based solution. I think all of the additional frustrations also have to do with internet speed and long wait times. Most ERP systems that aren't tied to the internet have quick response times, but with Oracle it's very slow.

We have struggled with it. The portions of our company that have implemented it are the smallest divisions, and in each instance when we've brought another one on, we've discovered that it creates a lot of challenges particularly from the volume of part numbers and transactions that are required to make anything happen.

That is actually where we are right now in our implementation, and we have paused it because we are about to go into the division that requires the most complexity and the highest number of transactions, and the scalability is a concern.

I don't interact enough with them to be able to answer. I know that we occasionally have to open service requests with Oracle. Of course, the IT team handles that and I am not part of the IT team. Sometimes the response time is a little slower than we would like, particularly when it has to do with month-end close. Very often we can't close a module because we are waiting on an SR.

It has been a very slow process that's very complicated and very rocky. We have used a consulting partner to get it implemented and there have been a lot of bumps and hurdles to get over.

It lacks integration between the modules, and the amount of customization required is surprising.

The most valuable feature for us is integrity in the sense that the General Ledger module is directed connected with our payables. And our Human Resources is connected with payroll, so it's one unit from HR's perspective, which is very efficient. Also now, we have the iRecruitment module, so it's a single continuum from HR to finance. We don't have to deal with different software.

Another important aspect for us is safety in the marketplace. We know it's not going to go away and that our investment in the solution is OK.

I mainly support human capital solutions, so the biggest benefit for me has been with the iRecruitment module that took very paper-driven tasks to just a few clicks. It's saved me a lot of time and provided connections between tons of separate interfaces.

iRecruitment is, however, a very weak module that gets a lot of user complaints. And even though we get good responses from Oracle Support, it's really clunky and is one of the weakest module that I think Oracle has.

We also didn't like the Time and Labor module. We replaced it with Chronos, and that's made a big difference.

I've been using it since 1999. Back then, we used only basic applications such as Payables/Receivables, Ledger Projects, HR, and payroll. We went with iProcurement in 2005 and then iRecruitment in 2006.

The issues with deployment depend on which modules are deployed as well.

We've had no issues with instability.

We've been able to scale for our needs.

The TARs assigned to us have improved a lot over the years. They have a lot of scripts that can be registered as concurrent. Previously in 1999, I'd have to think twice before logging a ticket because it was a back-and-forth nightmare. Now we can chat online very quickly.

As a developer, I have no power or decision in the selection process. But I think it was market presence and the stability that won over management. We purchased PeopleSoft before Oracle acquired them, and after they did, our whole organization uses Oracle now.

I think that the initial setup is complex, especially since we were unfamiliar with the software. We were talking to consultants who were unable to relate to us. We were coming from a mainframe world and a lot of our decisions were wrong. I don't fault Oracle for that, though. It's just part of any implementation.

Getting the right consultant is key, and sometimes rapid implementation doesn't pay.

I'm an Oracle die-hard, but I think that iRecruitment and Time & Labor are very weak.

It's out there in the market and the suite of products seem to cater really well to the business needs of our organization. When we buy Oracle's different products, we look to see how they integrate with different modules. With E-Business Suite, they all talk to each other.

So E-Business Suite is kind of one solution, and it's also a well-known product. It's highly stable and we get great support for it.

It's very stable, which directly affects our business from an assets and support perspective. It provides us with purchasing, financial, procurement, payables, and order management modules. These are all business assets for us that E-Business Suite directly affects.

The Oracle support site needs to be better. We go to it for pretty much any sort of issue we have, and I'd like for the search capability to be improved. Sometimes I can get as good if not better results from Google compared to the Oracle site.

Also, there have been issues where we've had to play with E-Business Suite to develop custom fixes because the solution itself isn't precisely catered to our requirements. We're able to get it to work, but it would be nice to not have to customize our own fixes so much.

We haven't had any issues with deployment.

There have been instances of instability, and we've been able to resolve those with custom workarounds from either the Oracle support site or from simply Googling the answers.

We haven't had any issues scaling it.

The support site is the only bad thing I've seen with Oracle. Unless you type in the exact right words, you don't get the right answers.

I think its quality seems to have gone down a little bit compared to the way it used to be when I started working when I always had good support.

I am more on the development side so I didn't install it. The initial setup was done by OBPS. It seems that because it's a popular product, we can find answers on the support site. For my part, development for it has been easy.

I think it's the leader in financial software. I've talked to people who aren't Oracle fans, but who like E-Business Suit anyways. It's a very good product.

The extensibility that we've needed over the past several years is the most valuable feature for us.

It's allowed us to add our own customizations to it, which is highly important to our organization. We have many, many customized processes that we've needed to add on top of it in order to bring value to our company.

The complexity around configuration and deployment need improving. When I look at some of my previous companies, they spent millions of dollars on deployment and even just doing an upgrade. We did an upgrade two years ago and it took quite a bit of an investment just to upgrade as-is.

Deployment is complex and expensive.

Since we upgraded two years ago, it's been very stable. We haven't had any issues with instability since then.

There have been many times in which we could have used additional initial processing power, but we were constrained by the licensing structure we were in. That's prevented us from scaling to the extent we wanted.

We just dropped our maintenance with Oracle last year and have gone to a third-party service provider. It was less than half of the cost, and we didn't see the value of the money that we were spending at the time with Oracle.

I wasn't involved with the company that I'm at now, and it was definitely complex in the previous companies that I've been with.

The re-licensing is a large cost proposition so we may be looking at alternatives, I think, in the next couple of years.

I definitely think it's an investment. It's definitely a very robust product, so it's just going to depend on what type of investment a company is willing to make and what their future plans are as well.

It's a very comprehensive solution that enables us to manage customers, customer service, finances, projects, HR, and other business operations. It adds a lot of value for us because it gives us solutions to all these areas.

There are a couple of areas for improvement, I think, which are implementation via the cloud and they need to bring down the price. Cloud implementation would make it much easier to begin, and the price is a little high.

We didn't have any issues with deployment, but, again, it would be better if we could implement that solutions via the cloud.

It's a very stable product. We haven't had any issues with instability.

It is very scalable and we've had no issues scaling it for our needs.

The technical support personnel are knowledgable, but I feel they're too aggressive and kind of pushy.

E-Business Suit setup was complex, but I think that every Oracle product has a complex setup. It wasn't easy and it wasn't straightforward. In fact, it took us one to two years to complete the setup.

Oracle scales the pricing, but E-Business Suite is still very expensive for small to mid-sized businesses. I heard that this is a common complaint throughout the market for these sorts of solutions.

Make sure that you have a very solid project management plan prior to implementing it. Be sure to assess your timeline, duration, and everything else that's relevant to successful implementation and actually using the products. It really, really helps if you have a solid assessment performance done prior to starting the implementation.

The most valuable feature is definitely the ability to go in as a manager or as an individual and do everything in one place, for example, to add/change/remove a goal. 

Mandating a goal plan was a really good idea because it forces you to actually think about it, and it makes it easier at the end of the day for a user. 

The ability to see the goals and move them over to next year in one place is really great. They can copy, extend, and delete all in one place.

We've only been playing with it less than a year - so not long - but it forced us to be able to have a change in management. It is really helping management to have a conversation about goals. 

Previously, goal management wasn't something we did well. Now that we have implemented Fusion, with powerful competencies, it's simplified the process. At the end of the day, the goal thing was awesome.

The account executive was good, but when it came to training HR, it really failed - on this point I'd rate Oracle as 3/10. 

The webinars are OK but they definitely didn't hit the target. 

This application is so large for a small company like ours, so it was very hard to train everyone with such an extensive product.

We implemented it this year.

Getting everyone on-board was a tad slow, but there were no major pick-ups, and all was well for the most part.

No issues encountered.

We had other Oracle products, but I can't remember which ones.

It was seamless and went very well.

We use a vendor who is really great.

For us it's high, because now we can focus on gathering the right amount of info about our information.

We did, but I can't remember which ones.

I like the new version as it's easier to manage. The problem is that the timing is bad - they did quite a bit of work to the goals feature, and changed it around quite a bit. For me, it's hard work because I need to train everyone to use but it's much more fluid and easier to navigate.

We needed a lot more training and best practices for a small company. Oracle hasn't done a good job preparing best practices for small companies. However, it's great for goal management.

A couple of things-- one is the support for the multiple languages, locale, so the internationalization is a valuable feature. The ability to extend the system and capture the duration of data points and extensions on customer processes, so it's also adaptable. Furthermore, I like the support for mobile apps, which I think they are catching up on.

Looking at the product on a large scale, some of the features are more spreadsheet-based with data updates. Oracle does have a few data spreadsheet loaders but these are not extensive, and a lot of data screens do not give you the option to download the data, modify, and the upload it. Spreadsheets are now becoming the fastest way to download and modify data. This would be handy especially when working with larger data sections.

I've used it for 12 years.

No, you can deploy with very little downtime which is a great feature.

It all depends on what highway you are hosting it on. Based on how many resources you are provided. I've used the product across the organization for the past 12 years and depending on how much hardware, and how fast it is, in terms of design, it does have scalability built in to it.

Most of my interaction has been through the support website which is mostly technical support. Most of the support is through the customers, through the support portal. The best part about the support is the vast knowledge base. 9/10 times you can find a solution to your problem through some kind of published notes from the support website.

There were some modules that were more complicated. All I would say is that it wasn’t too simple and it wasn’t too complex.