Spreadsheets are excellent. That is the problem: they work well enough for long enough that nobody notices when they stop.
The short answer
The moment to replace one is not when it breaks. It is when maintaining it has become somebody's job. Four hours a week is about 200 hours a year, and that number is usually larger than whatever would replace it.
The five signs
More than one person needs it at once. You now have three versions with slightly different data and a naming convention involving the word FINAL.
A mistake in it costs real money. A wrong cell in a quote, a stock figure, or a rota is not a typo any more, it is an incident.
Only one person understands it. That person is now a single point of failure, and they cannot take a holiday without something breaking.
Someone spends hours a week just keeping it current. Copying between systems, reformatting, chasing people for numbers.
You cannot answer simple questions. "How many jobs are open right now?" takes twenty minutes and a phone call.
Cost the hours before you do anything else
| Example | Yours | |
|---|---|---|
| Hours per week maintaining it | 4 | ___ |
| Hours per year | 208 | ___ |
| Fully loaded hourly cost | £25 | ___ |
| Annual cost of the spreadsheet | £5,200 | ___ |
| Cost of errors, best guess | ? | ___ |
That annual figure is the honest comparison point, not zero.
What to do instead, in order of cost
Try these first
- Fix the spreadsheet properlySometimes the real problem is that it grew organically and nobody ever restructured it. Cheapest possible answer.
- Move to a shared database toolAirtable, Notion, or similar. Genuinely good, and often enough.
- Buy off-the-shelf software for your sectorIf something fits, buy it. It will be cheaper than anything custom.
- Build something customWhen the above fail: your rules are too specific, per-seat pricing punishes growth, or you need something customer-facing.
Common questions
When should we move off a spreadsheet?
When more than one person needs it at once, when a mistake in it costs real money, when nobody but one person understands it, or when someone is spending hours a week maintaining it rather than using it.
Isn't a spreadsheet cheaper?
The licence is. The labour is not. Four hours a week of someone's time is roughly 200 hours a year, and that is usually a larger number than the software it replaces.
Could we just use Airtable or Notion?
Often yes, and you should try before commissioning anything. They break down when your rules get specific, when per-seat pricing bites, or when you need something customer-facing.