Differences between your Bookkeeper, Fractional Controller and Fractional CFO

When you’re hiring a virtual accounting team, you have the flexibility to contract for what you need.?

But how do you know what you need? What’s too much or too little?

It can be challenging for small- and medium-sized business owners to move from doing their own bookkeeping to hiring professionals. We’ve discussed before?how to know when it’s time to hire accounting help.?

Sometimes it makes sense to hire accounting help at a certain stage in the business, such as when you are regularly having trouble keeping up with the books or if your business has grown so large that the financials are well beyond your knowledge base and comfort zone. It could also be seasonal or project-related – perhaps before you get ready to try to attract investors.

Recognizing that it’s time to hire help is the first step. Then you need to determine what kind of accounting help you need – and?outsourcing accounting to a virtual accounting team?is often ideal for small businesses when hiring full-time accounting professionals would be prohibitively expensive.??

Let’s consider the unique roles and functions of different members of a virtual accounting team:?

Bookkeeper:?This role focuses on recording and reconciling payments, bills and invoices. It’s transactional based, overseeing the bank reconciliation, handling regulatory remittances, and perhaps managing payroll. There are?many ways virtual bookkeeping can help?a small business.

Fractional Controller:?A Controller focuses on past results, compliance, and financial reporting (and fractional means part-time or on demand). The numbers tell a story and a good Controller will help you to understand what they tell you about your business. It’s important to understand where you are financially so you can get on track or stay on track to meet your goals. You can?learn more about the Virtual Controller?who recently joined our team at Finatics.?

Fractional CFO:?A Chief Financial Officer (CFO) focuses on all the forward-looking and more sophisticated aspects of accounting. This includes things like financial planning, budgeting, forecasting, cash flows, and capital funding.?Here’s more about?the benefits of hiring a Virtual CFO?for your business.

If you aren’t sure what you need, don’t worry. We’re happy to talk with you about your business requirements, goals, and objectives. The accounting solutions we offer can be tailored to your unique needs of your industry and are easily scaled up or down as required.?

Interested to learn more??Contact?our friendly team at Finatics for a free, no-obligation consultation.?

This article was originally published on the Finatics Accounting Solutions blog.