It's 9:47 AM on a Tuesday, and your finance team is already three hours behind on month-end close. Your warehouse manager just called asking why inventory levels don't match what's showing in NetSuite. Meanwhile, your sales team is manually calculating commissions because the automated process "isn't working right."
Does this sound familiar?
Here's what most business owners don't realize: even the best ERP system breaks down over time without proper care.
We've looked at over 200 NetSuite setups, and companies that ignore regular system checkups lose about 23% of their productivity within two years.
But here's the good news.
A thorough NetSuite Health Check can spot these problems before they cost you thousands in lost time, compliance headaches, or data messes that take months to fix.
Let's walk through the ten biggest warning signs that your NetSuite system needs attention, and more importantly, how fixing these issues can turn your daily firefighting into smooth, predictable operations.
10 Warning Signs Your Business Needs a NetSuite Health Check
You depend on NetSuite to run your company, but when's the last time you actually looked at how well it's working?
These ten red flags tell you it's time to get a NetSuite Health Check and see what's really going on under the hood.
1. Your customizations are silently breaking your core processes
Every NetSuite customization seemed like a great idea when it was implemented. That custom script to automate invoice processing, the workflow that routes purchase orders, the saved search that generates executive reports – they all solved immediate problems.
But here's what happens over time:
Common customization problems we find:
- Custom scripts break after NetSuite updates (happens twice yearly).
- Workflows route to employees who no longer work there.
- Saved searches pull incorrect data due to field changes.
- Integration scripts fail silently, leaving gaps in your data.
- Revenue recognition calculations drift from compliance requirements.
Real client example: During a recent NetSuite health check, we discovered a client's custom revenue recognition script was incorrectly calculating tax liability across ten states, creating a $180,000 compliance exposure they had no idea existed.
The business impact: What once streamlined operations now creates bottlenecks, data inconsistencies, or complete process failures. A comprehensive NetSuite Health Check reveals which customizations add value and which ones have become productivity killers.
2. Your approval process is a mess
Your approval workflows worked great when you had 20 people. Now you have 200, and that purchase request that used to get approved in two hours is sitting in someone's inbox for two weeks.
Workflow problems that kill productivity:
- Approvals get stuck when specific people are out of office.
- Role changes don't get updated in the approval chain.
- Emergency purchases bypass all the controls you set up.
- Expense reports pile up when managers travel.
- Nobody knows who's supposed to approve what anymore.
Real story: We worked with a BPO company where expense reports took weeks to get approved because their previous consultant had set up individual-specific approvals with no documentation. They couldn't even test fixes because they didn't have a sandbox environment.
After we used NetSuite's Release Preview environment to rebuild their workflow with role-based approvals, they cut approval time from weeks to days.
What this means for you: Most companies cut approval delays by 80% just by switching from person-based to role-based approvals. Their finance team went from spending half their day on manual stuff to actually analyzing the business.
3. Your data integrity is compromised (and you don't know it)
Data problems are like a slow leak in your roof - you don't notice until there's water damage everywhere. They build up through user mistakes, failed imports, or integration hiccups, then show up at the worst possible moment.
Hidden data problems we find all the time:
- Duplicate customer records messing up billing.
- Inventory counts that don't match what's actually in the warehouse.
- Financial numbers that don't add up during audits.
- Integrations that stop working but don't tell anyone.
- Tax calculations that drift away from what's actually required.
- Revenue numbers that look right but aren't.
What happened to one client: A manufacturing company found out their inventory system had been double-counting raw materials across multiple locations for eight months. Nobody caught it because it happened gradually and the reports still "looked right" on the surface.
Result? Their inventory was inflated by $2.3 million, and they'd been making purchasing decisions based on completely wrong numbers.
Why this matters: The longer data problems go unnoticed, the more expensive they get to fix. A NetSuite Health Check catches these issues before they blow up your financial reporting or create compliance headaches.
4. Your security settings haven't evolved with your business
Your security setup was probably perfect when you first launched. But businesses change, people leave, and those "temporary" access permissions from six months ago are probably still active.
Security gaps we see everywhere:
- Former contractors still have system access.
- Sales team can see financial data they shouldn't.
- Inactive user accounts that should be turned off.
- Integration passwords that never get changed.
- Broad permissions that made sense once but don't anymore.
- No one tracking who has access to what.
The bigger picture: With data privacy laws getting stricter and cyber attacks on the rise, sloppy access controls aren't just risky - they're expensive. A NetSuite Health Check reviews who has access to what and makes sure it actually makes sense for your current business.
5. You're not using NetSuite's latest features
NetSuite keeps adding cool new features, but most companies never use them because everyone's too busy putting out fires to explore what's new.
Features you're probably missing out on:
- Better reporting tools that could replace your manual processes.
- Mobile features that let your team work from anywhere.
- Automation tools that could eliminate repetitive tasks.
- Enhanced dashboards that actually show useful information.
- Integration improvements that could fix current headaches.
Real example: NetSuite's improved dunning letter feature helped one client automatically handle 350 of their 500 monthly collection activities. That freed up their team to focus on the 150 accounts that actually needed personal attention.
But they never would have known about it without a NetSuite Health Check pointing it out.
The opportunity: A structured review process shows you what new tools are available and how they could actually help your specific business instead of just being "nice to have" features.
6. Your reporting is telling you half the story
Executive dashboards and financial reports are only as good as the data and logic behind them. Over time, saved searches become outdated, custom reports lose accuracy, and KPI calculations drift from their original intent.
During a NetSuite Health Check, we evaluate whether your reporting provides actionable insights or just pretty numbers.
We've found reports that excluded critical data segments, dashboards that displayed metrics no one actually used for decision-making, and financial statements that didn't properly reflect the business's economic reality.
One client's executive dashboard showed healthy profit margins while their actual cash flow was declining.
The issue? Their custom profit calculation wasn't accounting for all cost categories, masking a serious profitability problem that required immediate attention.
7. Your integration architecture is creating bottlenecks
Third-party integrations often work beautifully at implementation but become problematic as data volumes grow and business requirements change. API connections slow down, data synchronization fails intermittently, and integration errors accumulate in ways that aren't immediately obvious.
A thorough NetSuite Health Check assessment examines integration performance, error rates, and data flow efficiency. We look for integration points that have become bottlenecks and identify opportunities to optimize data exchange between systems.
Recent client example: Their DocuSign integration was failing to capture contract details properly, requiring manual validation of every agreement. The issue wasn't with DocuSign itself, but with how the integration was configured in NetSuite.
Once identified and corrected, they automated their entire contract approval and customer onboarding process.
8. Your users have developed workarounds that compromise your system
When NetSuite doesn't meet user needs, they don't usually complain – they find workarounds.
They export data to Excel for analysis, use manual processes to compensate for broken automation, or create shadow systems to track information NetSuite should handle.
These workarounds seem harmless but create significant risks:
- Data exists outside your controlled environment.
- Manual processes introduce errors and inconsistencies.
- Important business logic lives in individual spreadsheets rather than your ERP system.
- Compliance and audit trails become fragmented.
A NetSuite Health Check identifies these workarounds and addresses the root causes.
Often, the solution involves configuring existing NetSuite functionality differently or implementing standard features that users didn't know existed.
9. Your system performance is degrading without you noticing
NetSuite performance degradation happens gradually. Searches take a few extra seconds, reports load a bit slower, and pages occasionally time out. Users adapt to these slowdowns without realizing how much productivity they're losing.
Performance issues usually stem from:
- Inefficient saved searches that scan excessive data.
- Custom scripts that consume too many resources.
- Poor data organization that slows database queries.
- Integration processes that run during peak usage hours.
A systematic NetSuite Health Check evaluation identifies performance bottlenecks and optimization opportunities.
We've helped clients reduce report generation time by 60% and improve overall system responsiveness through configuration adjustments and script optimization.
10. You're missing compliance requirements you don't even know about
Regulatory requirements change constantly, and what was compliant last year might not be today. Tax regulations evolve, industry standards update, and new reporting requirements emerge.
Your NetSuite configuration needs to evolve accordingly. This is especially tricky for companies doing business in multiple states or countries.
Real situation: A technology company processing invoices across 10 US states had their Avalara integration set up wrong when their internal person left with no documentation. Instead of properly segregating tax by state, everything was using one generic tax code.
Daily operations looked fine, but they were creating potential IRS filing issues across all ten states - a compliance disaster waiting for an audit.
A comprehensive NetSuite Health Check reviews your configuration against current compliance requirements and identifies gaps before they become expensive problems.
What Happens When You Skip Regular NetSuite Health Check Assessments
Here's what we've learned from analyzing hundreds of NetSuite implementations: the cost of problems you don't know about always exceeds the cost of finding and fixing them proactively.
Companies that perform regular NetSuite Health Check evaluations typically see:
- 25-40% improvement in processing efficiency.
- 60-80% reduction in user-reported system issues.
- Significant improvement in data accuracy and reporting reliability.
- Better preparation for growth and system scaling.
- Reduced risk of compliance violations and security breaches.
More importantly, they shift from reactive problem-solving to proactive system optimization, freeing their teams to focus on growth rather than system maintenance.
Turn Your NetSuite Investment Into a Competitive Advantage
Your NetSuite system should be driving business growth, not holding it back.
When properly maintained and optimized, NetSuite becomes a competitive advantage that scales with your business and adapts to changing requirements.
The difference between companies that maximize their NetSuite ROI and those that struggle isn't the size of their implementation or their technical sophistication – it's their commitment to ongoing system health and optimization.
Regular NetSuite Health Check assessments ensure your system evolves with your business, maintains peak performance, and continues delivering the productivity gains that justified your initial investment.
Ready to Maximize Your NetSuite's Potential?
What if your next productivity breakthrough was just one assessment away?
While other companies struggle with system limitations, you could be maximizing every feature, automation, and integration NetSuite offers.
Get Your Comprehensive NetSuite Health Check – Free!
Our certified consultants (each with 3+ years of experience, NetSuite certification, and CPA credentials) will evaluate your entire system and provide specific recommendations for immediate improvements.
Plus, with our 30-minute response guarantee, you'll never wait for the support you need.
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