Inconsistent info here..
1) If the financial reporter is opened and immediately closed with no statement actually being opened, the financial reporter closes quickly and without a problem
2) Financial reporter froze (or at least closed VERY slowly) 100% of the time when accessing data on the server (regardless of if a statement was opened or not)

Does other computers on their network exhibit the same problem?

In any case I would suggest they get rid of the XP machine and get their network running at 1 GIG not 100 Mbps.