Little did we know back in January, when we first surveyed finance executives concerning their company healthcare costs, that we would be debuting the findings of our survey within what appears to be a rather pivotal week for healthcare reform.

Earlier this week, President Obama for the first time provided a detailed road map for what he wants a health overhaul to look like — and today, of course, the president is convening an all-day televised healthcare “summit” at Blair House. The event, seen by many as a political maneuver, is intended to jump-start the reform movement.

No matter what its intended purpose may be, the gathering in Washington serves as an interesting backdrop to the discussions taking place daily inside the finance departments of large, medium-size, and small companies.

That discussion is not about whether finance executives are pro or con healthcare reform. There has always been an acknowledged need for change here, and the possibility of new business opportunities is something finance executives savor along with the rest of business. The healthcare discussion taking place in finance departments really concerns control.

How CFOs View Healthcare Reform

For instance, more than half of the finance executives surveyed believe they will have less control to manage healthcare costs in the wake of reform measures. What’s more, a majority of survey takers (61 percent) believe the legislation lacks personal responsibility for health. more

At a meeting earlier today, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) reaffirmed its intention to require that U.S. publicly listed companies move to global accounting standards.

This is no surprise; the important outcome of today’s meeting was the announcement of a “Work Plan” (that is to be created).

Among other objectives, the Work Plan will “aid the [SEC] in its evaluation of the impact that the use of IFRS by U.S. companies would have on the U.S. securities market. Included in this Work Plan will be consideration of IFRS, as it exists today and after the completion of various ‘convergence projects’ currently underway between U.S. and international accounting standards-setters.”

As this release explains, the SEC expects to finally decide exactly how and when to incorporate “by 2011.” ###

As fans of TV shows like 24 know, transferring money via wire is secure and instantaneous. That means you can grab it and go – which is critical when the bad guys (or gals) are on your tail. Nonetheless, the system has some shortcomings that have frustrated companies that send or receive money via wire transfers.

Chief among these is the fact that today’s wire transfers lack much remittance information. In fact, the remit info often is limited to just several hundred characters – definitely not enough to let a vendor know, for instance, that your payment covers half a dozen invoices, minus a credit that you’re owed. If your company is like most, you end up sending faxes or emails to accompany your payments and provide directions on applying the money. Your vendor then is left with the task of making sure this information makes its way to the appropriate payments. Perhaps it’s not surprising that 94 percent of respondents to a 2006 study conducted by The Federal Reserve Banks and The Clearing House indicated that they found it valuable to include remittance information with payments. In fact, more than half said they would pay more for wires that included remittance information.

Instead, both sides are stuck with a process that is time-consuming and next to impossible to automate. more

Why do you need a physical office for finance? If you can’t provide a good answer to that question, your organization might very well benefit from a virtual finance office.

Telecommuting is the key to establishing a virtual finance department. Through telecommuting, secure online collaboration and document-sharing space, and using financial applications delivered through the software-as-a-service (SaaS) model—all issues previously discussed here—you don’t need a physical finance office at all. In fact, your organization might not need a physical office for any department—marketing, sales, IT, customer service, R&D, HR—but certainly finance could easily lead by example.

Driven by the poor economy and the need to cut expenses, companies are turning to telecommuting and virtual offices as a way to lower costs and boost productivity. As SonicWall, a virtual private network (VPN) provider, notes in a recent report, “increasingly, financial considerations such as gas prices, the credit crisis, and hard cost savings drive telecommuting programs.” Almost any business can capture these benefits. more

A $15 billion jobs-creation package may be heading to a final vote in the Senate today after gaining a measure of support from some Senate Republicans Monday. The linchpin of the bill is a provision that lifts part of the employers’ payroll tax for companies that hire unemployed workers this year, together with a $1,000 credit for keeping those employees on the books for a year.

Critics of the payroll tax deduction have claimed that it might actually slow job growth if businesses decide to lay off current workers and hire the unemployed (see, for example, this post at futureofcapitalism.com).

The Congressional Budget Office doesn’t agree. more