How Shadow IT Works & Utilising Our Discovery Feature
Shadow IT refers to software subscriptions and tools that are being used within your organisation without central visibility or approval from IT or finance teams (tools and software that an employee has purchased on their own accord with a company card). These subscriptions are often purchased through expenses, company cards, or individual accounts, making them difficult to track using traditional methods.
Over time, Shadow IT can lead to unnecessary SaaS spend, duplicate tools across teams, and increased security risk, as organisations lose sight of what software is actually in use.
Shadow IT Discovery in SaaSi Hub
The Shadow IT Discovery feature in SaaSi Hub is designed to uncover these hidden subscriptions by analysing your financial data. Rather than relying solely on integrations with SaaS platforms, this feature scans your accounting and expense systems to identify recurring payments and SaaS-related transactions.
As shown in the Shadow IT screen, you can connect your accounting software directly to begin this process. Once connected, SaaSi Hub will automatically review your expense data to detect subscriptions that may not yet be tracked within your platform.
How It Works
To begin using Shadow IT Discovery, you simply connect your accounting or expense platform using the Connect Now button. SaaSi Hub supports a range of common accounting tools, including QuickBooks, Xero, Sage, FreshBooks, Moneybird, and FreeAgent.
Once connected, the platform scans your financial records to identify transactions that match known SaaS vendors or subscription patterns. These are then surfaced within your Shadow IT section, giving you visibility into tools that may otherwise go unnoticed.
This process runs alongside your existing integrations, allowing you to build a more complete and accurate view of your SaaS environment.
Connect & Take Action
After your accounting software is connected and data has been analysed, SaaSi Hub will begin to populate the Shadow IT section with discovered subscriptions.
Each identified tool will include key information such as the vendor name, associated spend, frequency of payment, and any available context about the source of the data. This allows you to quickly assess whether a subscription is valid, duplicated, or no longer required.
Once Shadow IT subscriptions are identified, you can decide how to manage them. This may include reviewing whether the tool is still required, consolidating duplicate services, or formally adding the subscription into your tracked SaaS environment.
By doing so, you turn previously hidden spend into something structured, visible, and manageable within SaaSi Hub.