Hidden Dangers of Homegrown Billing Systems

As a leader in a company driven by recurring revenue, you understand that efficient financial management is not just important—it’s critical to your survival. Many businesses start with homegrown billing solutions, thinking they’re a perfect fit. But beware: clinging to these makeshift systems can expose your company to severe risks that could jeopardize your future.

Ignoring the potential pitfalls can lead to costly errors, compliance issues, and operational nightmares that might be impossible to recover from. Don’t let your business be the next victim of a flawed solution—here’s why it’s time to make a change.

The Hidden Costs of Homegrown Billing Solutions

Inflexibility: Homegrown systems lack the agility to adapt to changing business needs. As your company grows, these solutions become cumbersome, forcing you to invest more time and resources in maintenance rather than focusing on strategic initiatives.

Look at SA International. SAi specializes in developing cutting-edge design and production software for sign-making, printing, machining, and many more applications. SAi struggled with its costly in-house subscription management platform, which needed to be more flexible and required developer intervention for changes.

This inflexibility led to high costs and delays, with staff spending excessive time on system maintenance.

The platform’s weak and insecure code was a major concern, impacting over half of the company’s revenue. Marden decided SAi needed a professional revenue management solution to ensure reliability and security.

Scalability Issues: When your company grows, your billing needs to become more sophisticated. Homegrown solutions can’t scale efficiently, leading to inefficiencies and revenue leakage.

Brevo is the leading digital marketing platform that enables businesses to use powerful tools for CRM, email campaigns, live chat, marketing automation, and more. Growth leads to complexity, and Brevo’s expansion brought subscription management challenges for its finance team. Serving SMBs and large enterprises required addressing both self-serve and sales-driven models; expanding to new regions introduced new languages, currencies, and pricing.

The rise of digitalization among SMBs, accelerated by the pandemic and recent acquisitions, fueled its hypergrowth. Brevo’s legacy billing system couldn’t keep pace. Unable to scale, it lacked visibility on customer subscription payment statuses, directly affecting the bottom line.

Lack of Integration: Many homegrown systems struggle to integrate with other essential business tools. Lack of integration can create data silos, making it difficult to get a comprehensive view of your financial health and customer behavior.

Gitkraken faced this very issue with its legacy subscription management system. GitKraken’s product suite is designed for agile, fast-moving teams that always focus on efficiency. But, as CFO Dick Davidson reveals, such agility must also be reflected in the subscription models—something they knew couldn’t be achieved without a significant overhaul.

Transforming its subscription models wasn’t just about adding new features or changing prices—it required GitKraken to have a seamless back-office system that didn’t heavily rely on its engineering or finance resources. With a proposed rebuild cost exceeding $1 million for the previous subscription system, Chargebee was a strategic choice.

Chargebee integrates smoothly with essential business tools like HubSpot, Avalara, NetSuite, and Slack. GitKraken also uses flexible payment options through Chargebee, including Stripe, Apple Pay, Google Pay, PayPal, and GoCardless for ACH.

Chargebee Billing supports GitKraken’s sales model, aiding in expanding product lines and managing a hybrid B2B/B2C subscription process across all countries and markets GitKraken serves. Key features include a parent-child hierarchy, support for multiple currencies, various plan types, and efficient tax handling. Chargebee improved GitKraken’s operations and allowed it to reduce about 80% of its existing go-to-market system while creating an intuitive platform for managing backend operations.

Compliance Challenges: Keeping up with regulations and compliance requirements takes time and effort. Homegrown solutions don’t automatically adapt to these changes, putting your business at risk. Don’t live in fear of an audit. Investing in a best-in-class platform can help you navigate challenges effectively and pass audits with flying colors.

Why Now Is the Time to Switch

Every day that you continue to use a legacy or homegrown billing solution costs you money—unrealized revenue and inefficiencies are steadily eroding your bottom line.

Transitioning to a dedicated billing solution will free you from the limitations of your legacy system, enabling you to focus on what matters—growing your business.

The Benefits of Choosing a Dedicated Billing Solution

Streamlined Operations: A robust billing solution automates many manual processes, reducing errors and saving time. Automation lets your team concentrate on strategic initiatives rather than manual, time-consuming tasks.

Dick Davidson, CFO of Gitkraken, says, “Chargebee has given us the gift of time. Time to not worry about subscription complexities but to ensure our product helps our customers crush their development goals.“

Data-Driven Insights: With a dedicated solution, you can access advanced analytics that provide deeper insights into your revenue streams and customer behaviors. This data can drive informed decision-making and improve your strategy.

Seamless Integration: Modern billing solutions easily integrate with other software tools, ensuring a unified view of your business. This connectivity helps break down data silos and fosters collaboration across departments.

Joaquim Lechà, CEO of Typeform, says, “We’ve streamlined our processes thanks to Chargebee’s richness and versatility, reducing our vendor count from 10 to around five. Additionally, improved integrations and automation have simplified tasks, eliminating the need for intermediary software. This allows seamless communication between our systems and Chargebee without the necessity for additional vendors.”

Scalability: A dedicated solution can grow with you, adapting to your changing needs without requiring a complete overhaul.

Lechà adds, “The world has changed. We have to do more with less; therefore, efficient growth is at the top of the CEO’s agenda. We think about it at Typeform in two ways—one, more focus. More focus is placed on customers who get the most value from our tool. The second is continuous scaling with partners that empower us to achieve more.“

Ongoing Support and Updates: Choosing a reputable billing provider means you’ll benefit from regular updates, added features, and dedicated support—ensuring your system remains cutting-edge and compliant.

Dave Christensen, Chief Product & Technology Officer, FMG, told us, “With Chargebee, the APIs are modern and not from 1998, so it’s easier for our engineering teams to integrate directly and do what they want. Chargebee is constantly innovating. Even during our implementation phase, things that were nice to have when we were considering switching became available for us to use. Chargebee is consistently delivering on its roadmap.”

Wrap up

Sticking with a homegrown billing solution may have served its purpose initially, but the drawbacks outweigh the benefits as your company grows. Transitioning to a dedicated billing solution isn’t just an upgrade; it’s an investment in your company’s future. Don’t let outdated systems hold you back— switch today to unlock efficiency and growth. Be the change your revenue and subscription billing needs!