BUSINESS ADMINISTRATIVE SYSTEMS AND BANKRUPTCY FINANCIAL DISTRESS

Business Administrative Systems (BAS) is commonly considered to be a condition that improves the economic efficiency of firms. Literature considers BAS as a set of tools, methods and structures that support management in the continuum of decision-making, monitoring and reporting. It includes, therefore, planning and control (plans, budget, cost accounting, reporting), financial analysis and management (cash and credit management, investment, funding), organizational arrangements (organization charts, job descriptions, operative procedures, etc.) and the organizational structure of the CFO function (Anthony et al., 1998, Merchant and Van der Stede, 2007, Chenhall, 2003). The arguments about the positive effects of BAS have been developed largely with reference to either healthy companies or companies in crisis that thanks to the most advanced management systems able to anticipate the effects of crises by launching successfully a restructuring process (McKinley et al., 2013). However, we have little knowledge on the role of BAS in companies in bankruptcy.