Can I do HIPAA compliance in a spreadsheet?

Yes. Nothing in the Security Rule requires software — it requires that the analysis, the policies and the records exist, are documented, are kept for six years and are reviewed. A disciplined organization can meet all of that with documents. What documents do badly is anything with a date attached and anything that has to be produced on demand, which is why the switch usually happens when an outside party starts asking rather than when the folder gets messy.

What is wrong with using a free HIPAA risk assessment template?

Nothing, as a starting point — the HHS Security Risk Assessment Tool is free and legitimate, and our own checklist and readiness score cost nothing either. The limits show up afterwards: a template captures a moment, and the requirement is ongoing. Nothing in a template chases a training renewal, notices that an agreement expired last month, tells you who acknowledged the current version of a policy, or assembles an answer set when a client asks this week.

Spreadsheets and a shared drive — when they stop being enough

Most HIPAA programmes start as a folder: a risk analysis in a document, agreements in a subfolder, training certificates in someone's email. That is free, it is legitimate, and for a five-person organization it can be entirely adequate. It stops working at a specific and predictable point — the first time somebody outside your organization asks you to prove any of it.

Stay with spreadsheets if…

You are very small, nothing has changed in a year, and nobody has ever asked you for evidence. Paying for software to manage six documents is not a good trade.
You have one person who genuinely keeps it current, and the folder is organized well enough that they could send a client the whole set this afternoon.
Your budget is zero. A maintained folder beats an unpaid subscription, and our free tools — the checklist, the readiness score, the BAA template — work without an account.

Switch to us if…

A client has sent you a security questionnaire. Assembling the answers from a shared drive is the week most organizations decide this was worth paying for.
You cannot tell, today, which of your vendor agreements has expired. Dates are what spreadsheets are worst at, because nothing in a spreadsheet tells you when one has passed.
More than one person maintains it, and you have started finding two versions of the same policy.
You need to show who acknowledged which version of a policy, and when. Version history plus per-person acknowledgement is the hardest thing to retrofit into documents.
You would struggle to show a record was not edited afterwards. An append-only log is a different kind of artifact from a file with a modified date.

Comparison with spreadsheets
	CompyMax	spreadsheets
Cost	From $79/month	Free
Things with a deadline	Renewals, reviews and notification clocks count down on their own	Only if somebody remembers to look
Policy versions and acknowledgements	Versioned, with who signed which version and when	Filenames ending in -final-v3
Answering a security questionnaire	Answer library filled from your own live records	Assembled by hand, every time
Showing a record was not changed later	Append-only, hash-chained log	A file modification date
Six-year retention	Records keep their own dates; export whenever you want	Whatever survives the next laptop change

Being straight with you

If you are small, static and nobody has asked you for anything, a well-kept folder is genuinely fine and you should keep your money. We would rather you used our free checklist and readiness score for another year than paid for something you are not going to open. The moment worth watching for is the first security questionnaire — that is when the folder stops being a filing choice and starts being a delay.

Try it before you decide.

14 days free, no credit card, no sales call, and cancel from account settings in one click. Run your assessment and export an evidence pack before you commit to anything.

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Common questions

Can I do HIPAA compliance in a spreadsheet?: Yes. Nothing in the Security Rule requires software — it requires that the analysis, the policies and the records exist, are documented, are kept for six years and are reviewed. A disciplined organization can meet all of that with documents. What documents do badly is anything with a date attached and anything that has to be produced on demand, which is why the switch usually happens when an outside party starts asking rather than when the folder gets messy.
What is wrong with using a free HIPAA risk assessment template?: Nothing, as a starting point — the HHS Security Risk Assessment Tool is free and legitimate, and our own checklist and readiness score cost nothing either. The limits show up afterwards: a template captures a moment, and the requirement is ongoing. Nothing in a template chases a training renewal, notices that an agreement expired last month, tells you who acknowledged the current version of a policy, or assembles an answer set when a client asks this week.

Keep reading

Comparisons reflect information spreadsheets publishes about its own product at the time of writing, plus our own assessment. spreadsheets is named for identification only and has no affiliation with us. Verify current capabilities and pricing with them before deciding — vendors change both without notice.