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Why we compare building it yourself on these topics
| Topic | building it yourself with Claude | Control.dev |
|---|---|---|
| 01 What you build and keep alive | A server per ledger, the group model and the glue, yours to run Hosted servers exist for some ledgers, such as Xero’s Remote MCP1 and Stripe’s at mcp.stripe.com2; for Netvisor the API pages give partners best practices for a server of their own3, and Procountor lists its MCP as coming4. The group chart of accounts, the eliminations, the currency translation and the checks are code or prompts you write, and each API change is yours to follow. | In the price: connectors, mapping and eliminations, kept by us Our team sets up the integrations and the account mapping with no setup fee, the consolidation, the eliminations and the currencies come with the plan, scheduled syncs run at least daily and re-sync backdated entries, and a connector we would build anyway comes at no extra cost. |
| 02 What the client reads | One company per call, the ledger’s own records first Each Xero Remote MCP tool call runs against one organisation, and with several the agent has to track which one it acts on5; Netvisor’s practices keep every tool call in one company’s context3, and a Spiris connection works in the company chosen at login6. The client reads one ledger’s accounts, entries and reports, and the group above them is what you build. | The consolidated group, statements first, every figure open to its entries Claude, ChatGPT or Codex reads the group over MCP (Model Context Protocol), built for group accounting: every entity on one group chart of accounts with the eliminations in their own column, the statements and the group structure before any single entry, and every figure open to the transactions behind it. |
| 03 Who may change what | The user’s rights in each ledger, confirmation as you set it up Xero’s V1 tools do not elicit confirmation, and Xero says to ask the agent to confirm before it writes anything back7; Stripe requires a person’s confirmation for refunds and outbound payments8, and Odoo exposes only its read tools by default9. Anthropic says the developer of an MCP server defines what its tools do, creating, modifying or deleting data included, and advises switching off write-capable tools when they are not needed10. | Read-only on the ledgers, your role over MCP, a reason on every write Control.dev reads each ledger with read-only access by default, a connected client gets at most the access your role allows and a read-only session rejects write tools, a budget value it writes carries its reason, and a locked version refuses every write. |
| 04 Time and cost | Your engineer’s time, plus each vendor’s price when it comes The vendors’ own servers are free today where they run in beta: Tripletex says a monthly price arrives before launch and the AI provider’s subscription is paid separately11, Spiris is free while in beta12 and Zoho MCP free as of now13. The group model, the mapping, the eliminations and the checks cost the time of the person who builds and keeps them, for as long as the group reports. | Live in under two hours for most companies, published monthly prices, MCP in every plan Most companies have live data in under two hours from the first call and a larger group in days, the prices are public with no setup fee and no multi-year contract, the notice period starts from one month, and MCP access is in every plan. |
Control.dev consolidates the ledgers a group already runs into one group view with eliminations, plans the three statements in versions and gives your AI client the group over MCP.
Where building it yourself with Claude is the better choice
- One company and one ledger, with nothing to consolidate and no plan to keep. Xero’s connector in Claude is a read-only connection, free to add, within the user’s Xero permissions14, and Stripe’s server comes with setup steps for Claude, ChatGPT and Codex2. Control.dev adds the group and its plan above the ledger, so with one ledger and no plan to keep there is nothing for it to add.
- Work inside the ledger: creating an invoice, posting a voucher. Spiris’s draft tools prepare one for review and book it when the user approves15, and Tripletex’s server waits for the user’s approval before it sends an invoice or posts a voucher16. Control.dev reads the ledgers; its one write is a draft journal an Owner or Admin approved, on Netvisor and Procountor today.
- A model on your own schema. A data team that keeps a warehouse and wants every rule in its own repository adds a remote MCP server to Claude Code with one command and signs in with OAuth 2.017, then writes and versions the group logic itself. Control.dev’s data model is ours: you change the mappings, the layouts and the eliminations, not the model.
Keep what you built
- Your own agents and skills Your client keeps its other MCP servers in the same conversation, the ledger’s own server and the CRM included, and brings that data next to the group’s actuals.
- Your warehouse keeps reading On the Enterprise plan, tell us what your warehouse needs and we set up the versioned Parquet snapshots your pipeline reads, with the mappings and the currency conversion applied.
- Your sheets and models stay live On the Enterprise plan, a Google Sheets output or a managed Excel output keeps the tables your models read in sync, and on every plan the Transactions Browser exports the matching transactions to CSV or Excel, up to 100,000 rows.
When teams look at Control.dev
From what finance teams have told us about the moment they started looking. We name no customers.
- Thirty budget owners, one connection. Give every cost-centre owner the same AI connection and each of them sees the whole ledger, salaries included; the workaround was a spreadsheet and a chat client per person.
- Each ledger answers alone. A group with a different accounting system in every country had not started its group-level analysis, because getting the data reliably out of every company needed thought first.
- Eighty percent in days. An adviser told a team that a coding agent and a workflow tool get most of the way in days, and that finance needs all of it, every month, with the entries behind each figure.
Which fits your finance team
Choose building it yourself with Claude if you have one ledger, no group to consolidate and no plan to keep in versions, or an engineer who will own the connectors, the group model, the eliminations and the plan for as long as the group reports.
Choose Control.dev if your finance team wants the consolidated group, the plan and its own AI client on the same numbers within weeks, with nothing to build or keep alive, and keeps what it built for the warehouse.
30 minutes on your ledgers and your first question.
Working with Control.dev
- Live in hours or days, not months Our team sets Control.dev up with you. Most companies have live data in under two hours from the first call, a larger group takes days, the hardest a few weeks, and there is no setup fee at any size. The comparison hub shows how long each vendor says its own rollout takes.
- Prices on one page, nothing billed on the side EUR 249, 499 and 999 a month excluding VAT, on the pricing page, with no multi-year contract and a notice period from one month. Support, user changes and settings changes are in the price, and nothing is billed per ticket or per request.
- Close support from the people who build the product Your questions go to the team that builds Control.dev, most are answered within minutes and almost all the same day, and we work through accounting and group-structure questions with you, not only software questions.
- Your AI client on a structure built for group accounting Claude, ChatGPT or Codex works on Control.dev over an MCP built for group accounting. The client starts from the statements and the group structure, not a raw export of the general ledger: it finds what needs attention and traces it to the entries, within the access your role allows.
- Built with the finance teams that use it, at pace Our roadmap comes from our customers, demanding finance professionals, and a gap in a feature list is the best news we can get. A missing feature typically ships in days and a larger one in weeks. A ledger connector we would build anyway comes at no extra cost; today Control.dev connects Netvisor, Procountor, Easor, Fortnox, Spiris (formerly Visma eEkonomi), Tripletex, e-conomic, Xero, QuickBooks, Zoho Books, Odoo, Xledger (receivables and payables) and NetSuite, plus Stripe, as the integrations page shows.
- A younger product, and who it is for Control.dev is built by Finata Oy in Helsinki since 2024, by a team from finance roles and finance systems. It fits a team that already works with AI tools, or wants to, and would rather not keep data engineers or system consultants for its reporting. If AI is not something your company wants to work with, we are probably the wrong partner, and where another tool covers more than Control.dev, the page above says so.
What switching looks like
- 1 Keep the build running while Control.dev reads the same ledgers with read-only access by default. The 30-day free trial covers up to three integrations, so the two answers can be compared on one month.
- 2 Point your client at both servers in the same conversation: its own tools and skills stay, and the group questions go to Control.dev.
- 3 Decide what stays. On the Enterprise plan the warehouse reads Parquet snapshots from Control.dev, the connectors you no longer run are switched off on your side, and on ours there is no multi-year contract and the notice period starts from one month.
Questions
What do setup and later changes cost?
With Control.dev, our team sets up the integrations and the mapping with no setup fee, and most companies have live data in under two hours. Later changes to a mapping, a layout or a dashboard are made by your team or its AI client, with no consultants to pay. With a build of your own, the cost is the time of the person who writes and keeps the connectors, the group model and the checks, the client subscription, and each vendor’s price for its server when it comes: Tripletex says a monthly price arrives before launch11. Control.dev publishes its monthly prices, excluding VAT: EUR 249 for one entity and one integration, EUR 499 for consolidation with three integrations and EUR 999 with five, where a Stripe connection counts as one integration, with no implementation fee, no multi-year contract and a notice period from one month.
Can we keep Claude, ChatGPT or Codex the way we use them now?
Yes. The same client connects to Control.dev as a remote MCP server with your own Control login, within the access your role allows, and keeps its other servers in the same conversation. The client starts from the statements and the group structure, not a raw export of the general ledger. Anthropic’s help pages say custom connectors over remote MCP are available on every Claude plan, and that on a Team plan an Owner adds the connector once and members connect to it18; Claude Code adds a remote HTTP server with one command and signs in with OAuth 2.017. Control.dev’s own setup for Claude Code is on Claude and Control over MCP.
We already built it. What does Control.dev add?
The group above the ledgers. Each entity’s accounts are mapped to one group chart of accounts, the intercompany eliminations and the currency translation are done before the client reads, the CTA is kept apart, every figure opens to its entries, and the plan sits on the same numbers in versions you can lock. The connectors, the sync and the mapping are ours to keep alive, and what you built keeps its place: on the Enterprise plan the warehouse reads Parquet snapshots from Control.dev.
Who may change what, and what can the client write?
Control.dev reads each ledger with read-only access by default. In a write session the client can do what your role can do in Control through the same API: budget values, each with its reason, manual transactions, file imports, comments, dashboard drafts and connector setup. A read-only connection gets none of these tools, and a locked version refuses every write. With a build of your own, the client holds the user’s rights in each ledger: Xero’s V1 tools do not elicit confirmation and Xero says to ask the agent to confirm before it writes7, and Anthropic says the server’s developer defines what its tools do, creating, modifying or deleting data included10.
What happens when the person who built it leaves?
With a build of your own, the connectors, the group model and the prompts go on only as far as they were documented and handed over, and the next API change waits for whoever picks them up. With Control.dev, the integrations and the mapping are set up and kept by our team, your questions go to the people who build the product, most are answered within minutes and almost all the same day, and a connector we would build anyway comes at no extra cost.
Where is the data processed in each case?
Control.dev’s data is hosted on Google Cloud in Hamina, Finland, encrypted in transit and at rest, Finata Oy’s security management is ISO/IEC 27001:2022 certified, and Control.dev’s own AI features process data in the EU. In both cases what your client reads is processed under your agreement with its provider: with Control.dev it reads the statements and the entries your role allows, and with a build of your own it reads whatever the server you connected returns, which is why Anthropic tells users to connect Claude only to servers built and hosted by organisations they trust18.
What support do we get?
Close support on every plan. Your questions go to the team that builds Control.dev, most are answered within minutes and almost all the same day, and we work through accounting and group-structure questions with you, not only software questions. Support, user changes and settings changes are in the price, and Enterprise adds a dedicated Slack channel and priority support.
