Frequently Asked Questions

A Fractional CFO is a senior finance executive who works with your business part-time, rather than as a full-time employee. You may also see the role called virtual CFO, outsourced CFO, or part-time CFO. These are all names for the same service. The Chief Financial Officer ("CFO") title is the industry label for this role. In a small or medium-sized business, the same work is more accurately that of a Financial Director: the senior person who manages the company's finances, planning, and financial decisions. We use the term Fractional CFO, but in practice this is a part-time Financial Director working with you to move your business forward.

No. “CFO” is the industry term, not a sign that the service is built only for large corporates. In a small or medium-sized business, the role is really that of a Financial Director: senior financial leadership scaled to your size and stage. You are not hiring a corporate executive, and you are not paying a corporate salary. We match the depth of our involvement to what your business actually needs, from financial control and clarity at the Core level, up to embedded leadership at the Executive level. For more information, refer to our Services page.

We work with South African small and medium-sized enterprises ("SME"), typically with annual revenue above R10 million, whose financial needs have grown beyond accounting and tax filing. At this stage, real financial management is required: forecasting, working capital decisions, scenario planning, and bringing financial data into everyday decisions. Often this responsibility lands on the owner or managing director, who is not a finance specialist. They do their best, but their attention is consumed by financial management rather than steering the business. Best practice goes unimplemented, important issues go undetected or unaddressed, and the information necessary for good decisions simply is not there. The result is a capable leader who is distracted and stretched by finance, instead of focused on what they do best. Larger clients may already have some finance staff, typically operational but not usually at the strategic, executive level.

We work alongside your accountant and tax adviser, not in place of them. Your accountant prepares the financial records and statements; your tax adviser handles compliance and filing. We build on their work, making sure they produce the high-quality data your business needs. We then turn their output into better decisions for your business. In practice we coordinate the relationship, introduce best practice, and find efficiencies, so everyone delivers more value to you. We see good accountants as partners and often refer clients to them, just as they refer clients to us. You keep the professionals you trust and gain senior financial leadership that makes your whole finance function work harder for your business.

A growing business needs a handful of financial fundamentals working well. Cash flow forecasting gives you predictive visibility, so you see what is coming before it arrives. Active working capital management (the cash tied up in stock, debtors, and creditors) improves liquidity and the return you earn on your invested capital. Budgeting is an invaluable tool for judging decisions and results against your goals. Financial risk management is the practice of identifying where your business is exposed to risk and then taking action to reduce or manage it proactively. Performance analysis turns your data into insight, showing you where your opportunities are. These fundamentals form the basis of our Core bundle, the minimum standard for growing your business. For more information, refer to our Services page.

We work on a view-only basis. We take read-only access to your systems so we can analyse and report, never Operator access, which is the ability to transact, move money, or initiate transactions. Creating and releasing payments stays with your existing authorised signatories. We are advisers to you and your business, not signatories on your accounts. For Core and Premium clients, view-only is the firm rule, with no exceptions. Executive clients may arrange Approver access as a second-layer control, but only by specific arrangement, and never as the default. You keep full control of your money while gaining senior leadership and oversight over your finances.

Onboarding begins when you sign the service agreement and ends when we present the first full CFO Report. We target 30 days for completion, but this may be longer depending on the circumstances. The monthly CFO Report is the foundation for everything that follows. It combines your financial history with analysis, a full-year forecast with budget variances, and the Key Performance Indicators ("KPI") that we track as we steer your business towards your vision. Building it takes time because it depends on the quality of, and our access to, your information. We need your accounting data, your bank data, and access to any other systems you use, such as an ERP or CRM. Once we have these, we build the report, then we refine it with you. Finally, once the full report is set up and presented, onboarding is complete.

We typically reach net positive value within about 60 days, meaning the measurable value we add is greater than what we've billed to date. We look to deliver this value as early as possible. Our pre-onboarding steps include the Orientation meeting and the Free Financial Assessment which we use to screen for quick wins, such as recovered cash, cost savings and the benefits from renegotiated payment terms for customers and suppliers. We share many of these as recommendations from the free financial analysis, giving you value before onboarding even begins. Because some value is realised immediately and some builds over time, we track the value we've added throughout the engagement. By the end of the first year, we target a 10x return, meaning ten rands of measurable value for every rand you spend.

Yes. We offer a money-back guarantee for onboarding. If you are not happy with your experience after the first CFO Report, we will refund your onboarding fee in full. The value of strong financial leadership builds over time; the money-back guarantee simply de-risks your first step towards achieving your business goals.

We contract our service bundles for 12 months with an auto-renewal clause. However, clients who wish to end the engagement need only give us 30 days' written notice. We, on the other hand, commit to giving clients at least 90 days' notice if we ever need to end the engagement. Our termination provisions are designed so that we continue to earn your business month after month.

Confidentiality is built into every engagement. We sign a Confidentiality Agreement with every client when we start pre-onboarding, and we handle all personal information in line with the Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA). Your data is stored securely within Microsoft 365 cloud infrastructure, not on unmanaged local drives or consumer file-sharing tools. We limit access to only what the work requires, and our view-only system access means your accounts always stay under your control. Your numbers stay private, protected, and in safe hands.

Start with a free consultation. Book one through our Contact page and we will arrange a short, obligation-free call to discuss where your business is today and where you need it to be. If you’re interested but not convinced, we offer a free Financial Health Assessment. Only once you’re satisfied with the scope of work and the fees do we proceed with Onboarding. The first move is simply a conversation. Contact us to get started.