Reconciliation: build, buy, or done-for-you
Last reviewed 2026-07-02
There are three ways to get reconciliation done: build it in-house, buy reconciliation software, or hand it to a done-for-you service. The right choice comes down to volume, engineering capacity, and whether you want a tool or an outcome.
- Build in-house: maximum control, but real engineering and ongoing maintenance cost.
- Buy software: powerful, but you still need people to run it, and enterprise tools run $1,000 to $5,000+/mo.
- Done-for-you: you get the recovered dollars, not another tool to staff, at a flat fee.
- Most operators below the enterprise tier are underserved by the software-only options.
Build in-house
Building your own reconciliation means an engineer, or a finance analyst in spreadsheets, matching statements to records every period. It gives you total control and no per-seat fees, but the real cost is ongoing: every new processor, carrier, or format is more maintenance, and the work competes with everything else your team could be doing. It makes sense at high volume with dedicated finance engineering, and rarely below that.
Buy software
Reconciliation platforms (the Ledge, Numeric, Modern Treasury tier) are genuinely capable and built for scale. Two catches: they price for the enterprise, commonly $1,000 to $5,000+ per month, and they are tools, not outcomes. Someone on your team still has to configure them, work the exceptions, and chase the recoveries. You are buying leverage for a finance team you already have.
Done-for-you
A done-for-you service runs the reconciliation for you and hands back the result: the documented, recoverable dollars, ready to claim. There is no software to staff and no exceptions queue to work. It fits operators who have the leak but not a finance team to point at it, and it is priced as a flat fee against the work, not a percentage of what you recover.
How to choose
Ask two questions. Do you have the engineering or finance capacity to run a tool every period? And do you want a tool or the outcome? High volume plus a finance team points to build or buy. The leak without the team, or a preference for the answer over the apparatus, points to done-for-you. There is a real gap below the enterprise software tier, and it is mostly filled today by spreadsheets and hope.
Common questions
Where does Recouped fit?
Done-for-you, flat fee, you keep 100 percent of what is recovered. We run the reconciliation and hand you the documented dollars, tuned to your industry. It is built for the operators the enterprise tools price out.
Can't my accountant do this?
Most bookkeeping and accounting matches totals, not individual transactions against the source statement, which is where the errors hide. Reconciliation at the line level is a different, more specialized job.
What does done-for-you cost versus software?
Enterprise reconciliation software commonly runs $1,000 to $5,000+ per month plus the staff time to operate it. A done-for-you flat fee is priced to the data and the work, and you are not also paying to run a tool.
See what you’re owed, free
A free three-month review reconciles your real data and shows you exactly what is recoverable. Pick your industry to start.
- How two-sided reconciliation works
- Why deterministic matching beats AI guessing
- What is three-way reconciliation?
- Two-way vs three-way reconciliation: what is the difference?
- What is payment reconciliation?
- What is account reconciliation?
- How often should you reconcile?
- What causes reconciliation discrepancies?
- How do you reconcile accounts, step by step?