Chris NergaardFinance systems · North East England
I help everyone in the room understand their next finance system.
Senior Technical Solutions Consultant at Sage. I lead discovery and tailored demonstrations for CFOs, financial controllers, finance teams and IT stakeholders, and act as an escalation point for complex presales and live customer issues. I design solutions and build tools where gaps exist, supporting both customer requirements and the presales team.
The day job: demos that land, and problems that get solved
Five years of implementations taught me how finance teams actually work. Now I use that in the room with prospects, and behind the scenes when something complex goes wrong.
Every large and complex deal
All of our large and complex deals involve me, especially those with difficult integration points. I simplify challenging requirements into achievable solutions, and turn a long list of technical questions into a clear plan the buyer trusts.
Senior responsibilities, day to day
I mentor consultants and graduates, run partner enablement, lead the technical review for new marketplace partners and support the team on escalations. I’ve managed directly too, leading 16 technicians through a UK product launch.
How I run a demo
How I handle an escalation
- TriageWhat’s the impact, who’s affected, what’s the deadline?
- ReproduceRecreate it in a demo company, with Postman for API issues, so it’s a fact rather than a theory.
- Find the root causeConfiguration, data, API usage, or the product itself.
- Fix and explainA fix or workaround, explained one way to the finance team and another to their developers.
- Close the loopWrite it up for the team, and feed product issues back to Product.
Problems I noticed, and what I built
Tools that help win sales and keep customers. Some solve customer problems, others make presales faster. I designed and built each one on my own initiative. Tap any card for the full story.
The accounting behind the technology
The tools help win sales and keep customers, but only if the accounting underneath is right. Two examples, starting with one you can try.
Revaluing 100,000 open foreign-currency invoices
A prospect asked how the system handles a period-end revaluation of 100,000 open FX invoices. The first problem was creating that many invoices in a demo company; my Demo Data Lab did that. The accounting is the same whether it’s five invoices or 100,000. Move the closing rates to see the journal.
| Invoice | Amount | Booked rate | Carrying £ | Revalued £ | Gain / (loss) |
|---|
Unrealised gains and losses are reversed on the first day of the next period, so each period starts again from the booked rates. When a customer pays, the actual difference becomes a realised gain or loss.
A cut-over that reconciles
Opening balances only count if the AR and AP sub-ledgers agree to their control accounts, and the trial balance matches the source at the cut-off date. My migration ETL checks this before anything loads, and anything held back is listed with its value.
See it in the demo →Multi-entity without the spreadsheets
Groups with several companies need intercompany transactions that balance, consolidation in one place, and reporting by entity or for the whole group. I’ve implemented multi-entity and consolidation setups, I’m certified in both, and my migration ETL moves multi-entity companies in one go.
For when you want the detail
Closed by default to keep the page short. Open whichever interests you.
The full project registerEverything I’ve built, filterable by status and area
Interactive migration demoA legacy export taken through mapping, validation and a reconciled load, with synthetic data
How I’d approach three common problemsMigrating many small businesses, CRM to ERP, and assessing an ERP for a UK finance team
Every side of the finance system
Financial services, support, launch, implementation and presales. Tap a role for detail.
About me
I started out in financial services, in collections and debt management at GE Money and Virgin Money, before moving into finance software. I’ve sat on the customer’s side of the screen, and that’s where most of my ideas come from.
Outside work I’m usually spending time with my son, at the gym, watching football, getting outdoors or gaming. Based in the North East of England.
My experience decides. AI makes it faster.
I’ve fully embraced AI, and I use it the way a senior consultant should: I bring the finance and systems knowledge, decide what’s worth building, check everything it produces, and own the result.
- My tools, including the Demo Data Lab and the Marketplace Assistant, are built with AI pair-programming
- AI inside the tools: ranking partners against a requirement, proposing rules I then test
- AI for customers: connecting finance data to assistants like ChatGPT and Claude
- Nothing goes in front of a customer until it’s been tested against real data
Not tied to one product
My examples come from Sage Intacct, but the skills apply to any modern ERP or finance platform.
- Discovery and demos for any finance audience, from AP to CFO
- Integration design: REST APIs, OAuth, SSO, events and middleware
- Migration and reconciliation from any legacy system
- Finance processes: close, AR and AP, multi-entity, FX, VAT
- Enablement: mentoring, playbooks and partner training
CertifiedSage Intacct Implementation Specialist and Accounting Specialist, plus Global Consolidation, Multi-Entity, Projects and Contracts
Let’s talk about what you’re building.
Happy to walk through any of this live, with synthetic data. Full CV on request.