UK financial leaders embracing AI, new study reveals

New research conducted by Equals Money has found that 95% of UK financial leaders are currently using or considering the implementation of Artificial Intelligence (AI) into their day-to-day operations. This increasingly widespread adoption highlights a general optimism towards AI, despite the underlying concerns surrounding job loss due to automation.

Surveying 400 UK financial decision-makers, the research provided insightful data showcasing that over three-quarters (77%) of financial leaders are actively incorporating or experimenting with AI in their workflow. A further 18% expressed an interest in adopting AI tools in the near future, aiming to improve efficiency, decision-making, and to streamline numerous tasks.

Interestingly, the study illustrated that on average, UK employees spend 65 minutes a day on tasks that could be automated. This equates to an astounding total of 38 work days per year. The potential for automation was apparent within financial processes as 59% of businesses had automated receiving payments, issuing payments (52%), and generating invoices (57%).

Top processes that businesses showed an eagerness to automate included buying or spending in foreign currency (46%), receiving market analysis (45%), tracking expenses (45%), inventory management (50%), regulatory compliance (50%), and IT operations (46%).

"The foundation of finance is reconciliation and AI is inherently adept at following rules," comments Steve Paul, Deputy CFO at Equals Money. "If you can design, implement, and then automate those rules, then AI holds great potential within finance. This could allow finance teams to provide a greater value for their organisations."

Despite the promising aspects of AI, risks and concerns are still prevalent among decision makers. 85% of businesses that have adopted AI tools reported impacted workloads, with almost half (46%) stating that AI helped to liberate employee capacity by eliminating or reducing certain tasks. However, 39% felt that some roles were at risk of redundancy due to automation.

Innovation Strategist and AI expert, James Poulter, addressed these concerns saying, "While there are valid worries about AI making certain roles redundant, increased adoption will actually create a number of specialist jobs to oversee its operation. AI can be used to help more junior team members learn and develop. So, it has real scope for improvement at all levels going forward."

Barriers to the adoption of AI include concerns surrounding job security (33%), cost of investment (42%), security worries (48%), doubts over accuracy (41%), and a lack of understanding (36%). Countering these challenges, businesses recognised the significant benefits of AI adoption including cost savings (49%), improved accuracy, and standardised work output (33%).

Recognising these advantages, businesses are investing heavily in AI. The mean spend per business on AI was reported to be 74,297,52 in 2024 alone. Paul concluded, "Embracing AI automation is crucial for finance leaders to gain a competitive edge. Get AI right, and we boost decision-making, efficiency, and free up time for strategic work. That's not to say we should let AI run unchecked – it's key to understand which tasks can be given to AI, and which should be left to the experts."