Cost Management and Financial Management plugins - what's the difference?

michaelcassidy · ‎01-22-2019

I can see both of these plugins in the product documentation, but I can't seem to find any info about which plugin/product is most appropriate for various use cases. Or do they work together?

I'm curious about:

Subscription costs - seems like Cost Management is free with standard ITSM... but Financial Management requires ITBM licensing?
History & purpose - what came first? Is one designed to replace the other? Eg Cost Management replaced by Financial Management within ITBM? What are the major differences or limitations of each product?
Can a customer begin using Cost Management, then migrate to Financial Management if required? Looks like they both make reference to Expense Lines.

We're in early days of considering using ServiceNow for IT cost reporting & chargebacks/showbacks and looking for advice on plugins related to achieve that.

Thanks!

Sunil B N · ‎01-22-2019

Hi Michael,

Licensing: Cost Management and Financial Management work together. Cost management is free with Platform. The Financial Management Core (com.snc.financial_management) plugin requires a separate subscription from the rest of the Now Platform.

History & Purpose: Cost management helps to track associated to CI(configuration items) and create related expense lines and allocations to Business Units and cost centres. Financial Management includes Financial modelling(formerly known as Cost transparency) which provides fiscal periods, allocation engine, workbench and reports and dashboards. It also includes Financial Charging(formerly known as Service Charging/ Showback) which helps in reporting the financial aspects of a business service to the various stakeholders in the organization that consume this service.

Plugin Detail: Financial Management Core (com.snc.financial_management) plugin activates the following applications:

Financial Modeling: Activates Financial Modeling application, formerly known as Cost Transparency.
Financial Charging (com.snc.service_charging): Activates the showback and service charging features of Financial Charging application, formerly known as Financial Reporting.
Cost management

Read more here.

For chargeback/showback Financial Charging Plugin is something you may be interested in.

I hope I was able to give some glimpse on what you are looking for.

Best Regards,
Sunil B N

View solution in original post

Sorenrv · ‎05-14-2020

Hi Kohei

At the moment we are helping a customer setting up Cost Management for tracking CI costs. I was involved in the initial stage of that project and in my preparation I came upon a Servicenow Cost Management data model which I revamped and used in my pre-sales presentations. I found that quite inspiring and comprehensive. Please see the illustration below. Actually I also found the Servicenow doc instructions very helpful. E.g. they made me aware that costs which are not tied to specific CI entities, e.g. "Cost of Power in the Data Center" can be set up using Distribution Cost functionality.

I hope this helps a bit :).

terisevick · ‎04-14-2021

Sunil,

For the platform cost management functionality is there a plug-in to turn that on? If so, what is the plugin name / documentation and also what does a customer get from just the platform capabilities?

Terise Vick

Solution Consultant, Core ServiceNow

Pooja Mallikarj · ‎01-22-2019

Hi,

Refer the below link ,it may help you.

https://www.getsmarter.com/blog/career-advice/the-difference-between-cost-management-and-financial-a...

Regards,

Pooja

michaelcassidy · ‎01-23-2019

Thank you that's helpful. Was so focused on technology/servicenow, did not even consider the generic business terms in use.

Sorenrv · ‎12-09-2019

Hi Sunil B N

As a Service Management consultant I am having trouble navigation Cost Management and Financial Management in the New York Release.

Earlier this year it was announced that ITBM Financial Management will not be developed or supported moving forward even though it is still available in the ServiceNow platform. Do you agree that we should not recommend customers to use this application since it is withdrawn from ServiceNow's portfolio?

Which ServiceNow functionality is available in New York related to cost allocation, chargeback, cost models, and price rate cards? And which should be used for which purpose?

Any help will be much appreciated.

Regards,

Soren