Fractional controller services: the numbers, closed monthly

What a fractional controller does

A controller owns whether the numbers are right and readable. A bookkeeper records transactions; a controller reconciles every balance sheet account, reviews the coding, posts the adjusting entries the bookkeeping could not decide on its own, and closes the month so that the income statement means what it says. Then the controller turns the closed month into a reporting pack, refreshes the forecast, and keeps the file in a state a lender could open without warning.

The fractional part means you buy the function, not the person. A growing business rarely has a month of controller work in the month; it has a few days of it, in a predictable rhythm, and a fractional controller does those days for a fee fixed in writing. The same CPA who closes the month prepares the T2 at year end, which is why the year end stops being an excavation.

The month-end close, to a checklist

The close is the controller’s core deliverable and the thing most small-business finance functions do not actually have. Not “the bank is reconciled” — every balance sheet account reconciled and supported, on a stated working day each month, so the income statement below it can be trusted. The close page lists the full checklist; the shape of it is:

• Bank, credit card and loan accounts reconciled to statements, with every reconciling item explained rather than carried.
• Receivables and payables agreed to the sub-ledgers, aged, and reviewed for anything that is not going to be collected or is already paid.
• Sales tax accounts agreed to the returns filed, GST and any provincial tax kept apart.
• Payroll liabilities agreed to the remittances made; accruals and prepaids rolled forward; fixed asset additions recorded and depreciation posted.
• Intercompany and shareholder loan balances agreed both ways; a short list of open items with an owner and a date.

The date matters more than the detail. A close that lands on the same working day every month can be built on; one that lands “when the bookkeeping is caught up” cannot.

Budget, forecast and the thirteen-week cash view

The controller builds and maintains the model; the owner, or a fractional CFO, sets the assumptions. The annual budget is built from how the business actually earns rather than last year plus ten per cent, and the forecast is rolled every month against the closed actuals. Alongside it runs a thirteen-week cash forecast: receipts and payments week by week, the obligations that arrive on a calendar, and the week that looks tight, shown while there is still time to do something about it.

Audit, review and lender readiness

The fifth deliverable is a file that can be opened by someone else: a bank testing a covenant, a purchaser’s accountant in diligence, a review engagement, a CRA review. Each asks for the same supporting file, and a controller keeps it assembled month by month rather than reconstructed under a deadline. Audit and review readiness sets out what that file contains.

What it costs, and why it is priced by the month

The fractional controller engagement starts at $1,500 a month, on top of bookkeeping from $300 a month, and the fee is fixed in writing after a free consultation. The final figure depends on transaction volume, how many entities are involved and the state of the books on day one. The fractional CFO tier starts at $2,500 a month; the two are bought separately or together. Every figure is on the published fees page, not quoted on request.

It is priced by the month because that is the unit of the work. A close happens twelve times a year on a date; a forecast is rolled twelve times; a pack lands twelve times. An hourly rate would put a meter on the very conversations the engagement exists to have.

Part-time controller or full-time hire

A full-time controller is a salaried position with employer costs on top, and the honest question for a business under about thirty staff is whether there is a month of controller work in the month. Usually there is a week of it. The fractional arrangement covers exactly that gap, with a CPA’s sign-off behind it and no recruiting risk; when the business grows into a full-time role, the checklist and the model are already built for whoever takes it on.

How the engagement runs

1. A free thirty-minute conversation. What the business does, what the books look like, what you cannot currently answer. You leave with a fixed monthly fee in writing.
2. Setup month. Access to the accounting file and bank feeds, the chart of accounts tidied, the close checklist agreed and the close date set. Anything behind is brought current first.
3. The first close and the first pack. Delivered on the agreed working day and walked through with you on a video call.
4. Every month after. Close, pack, forecast refresh, open-items list. A question between closes is answered by the same person, without a bill.

Everything runs remotely: documents by secure upload link or straight from the bank feed, meetings by video, approvals by e-signature. A business in Vancouver, Calgary or Toronto gets exactly the engagement an Abbotsford one does.

Common questions