The job most owners are trying to fill is not a finance team. It is the person who sits in the board meeting, holds the lender relationship, owns the budget and makes the call on price, margin and where the next dollar of capital goes. That is a senior person on a fixed monthly fee with agreed responsibilities, without the full-time salary.
A fractional CFO engagement is priced by the annual revenue of the business and how much is being carried. The first tier covers the board meeting, the monthly review and the reporting review. The second adds ownership of the budget, the thirteen week cash position and the lender reporting. The third adds one live workstream carried through, being a raise, a refinancing or exit readiness. The monthly fee and responsibilities are agreed before work begins, with a three month minimum.
You have a board or an investor group and nobody senior enough to own the financial conversation in the room.
Your lender relationship is handled reactively, which means you hear about the covenant position after the quarter rather than before it.
The budget exists as a spreadsheet nobody owns, so nobody is held to it and nothing gets decided from it.
A raise, a refinancing or a sale is coming and you need the financial side of it carried by somebody who is not also running the company.
A chief financial officer is not a reporting function, which is the reason hiring more accounting rarely fixes the thing an owner is actually frustrated by.
The numbers arriving on time is a prerequisite. What an owner usually wants is the layer above it: somebody who looks at the month and says what it means, who knows the covenant position before the bank asks, who can defend a budget to the people who have to hit it, and who will say plainly that a price increase is worth more than the cost program everyone is arguing about. That work is judgement applied to numbers rather than the production of numbers, which is why it is bought as a standing commitment rather than as a deliverable with a delivery date.
What comes out of these engagements is a cadence and a set of owned responsibilities. The board meeting has a financial section prepared before the day, and the decisions that come out of it are written down and carried into the following month, so the same three questions stop being reopened every quarter. The lender relationship has somebody in it who knows the covenant definitions and the headroom, which changes the conversation from explaining a breach to preventing one. The budget has an owner who built it with the departments. And the thirteen week cash position is somebody's actual job, so a call that lands in week nine is visible in week two.
Where a raise, a refinancing or an exit is live, that becomes the third tier and the cadence moves to weekly, because those processes do not run on a monthly rhythm and an owner trying to carry one alongside running the business is the most common reason they go badly.
Nobody here is doing the bookkeeping, closing the month or reconciling the balance sheet, and a chief financial officer working from a close nobody has checked is making decisions on numbers that have not been tested. Where there is no reliable finance function underneath, our finance support engagements are what builds one, and the honest answer in that situation is usually to start there.
On a live raise the work is the model, the package, the diligence preparation and the answers prepared while the process runs. It never includes approaching investors, soliciting capital, placing securities or making introductions, and no fee here depends on a raise, a refinancing or a sale completing. TEOL is not a broker-dealer, a placement agent or a finder.
Monthly fees depend on annual revenue and the responsibilities you need covered.
| Engagement | Under $5M revenue | $5M to $25M revenue | $25M and above revenue |
|---|---|---|---|
| Board and Reporting, per month | $4,500 | $7,500 | $11,500 |
| Board, Budget and Capital, per month | $7,500 | $10,500 | $15,500 |
| Full CFO Engagement, per month | $9,999 | $13,500 | $19,999 |
Businesses above twenty five million in revenue are scoped individually. Fees are monthly, with a three month minimum and month to month after that.
From $4,500 per month
We attend the board meeting, review the month and check the reporting before it goes out.
From $7,500 per month
Board and reporting responsibilities extend to ownership of the budget, cash position and lender reporting.
From $9,999 per month
Everything above, plus one live workstream such as a raise, a refinancing or exit readiness. We prepare the model, the package and the answers, and you run the process.
Board and Reporting fits a business where the gap is the room. That usually means a board or an investor group that needs somebody able to own the financial conversation in it. The meeting is attended with the financial section prepared beforehand, the month is reviewed against plan with the decisions written down, lender and board reporting is reviewed before it leaves, and there is availability between sessions for the calls that cannot wait.
Board, Budget and Capital is for a business where things need owning. It adds the budget built with the departments and defended with the people who have to hit it, and the thirteen week cash position rolled weekly so a call in week nine is visible in week two. It handles the lender reporting, including the covenant position and the quarterly conversation, and works through the pricing, margin and capital allocation questions as they arise.
Full CFO Engagement applies when something is live. It adds one workstream carried through to its conclusion, with the cadence moving from monthly to weekly for as long as it runs. On a raise that is the model, the package, the diligence preparation and the answers prepared while the process runs. On a refinancing it is the credit package, the lender comparison and the questions answered on the analysis. On exit readiness it is the gap work run, the databook and the room built, and the process supported as it goes.
| Responsibility | Component | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| Board or owner meeting | Attendance and preparation | The meeting attended, with the financial section prepared beforehand and presented on the day |
| Monthly review | Numbers against plan | The month reviewed against plan, with the two or three decisions that follow written down and carried forward |
| Reporting review | Lender and board reporting | Reporting reviewed before it leaves, so nothing reaches a lender or a board unchecked |
| Availability | Between sessions | Reachable between sessions for the decisions that cannot wait for the next meeting |
| Standing agenda | Carried forward | A running agenda, so each month starts where the last one finished |
| Responsibility | Component | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| Everything in Board and Reporting | All items above | Carried in full |
| Budget | Ownership | The budget built by department, defended with the people who own each line, and tracked monthly |
| Cash | Thirteen week position | The rolling thirteen week cash position owned and rolled weekly, with the calls flagged before they land |
| Lender reporting | The ongoing reporting | The covenant position, the quarterly lender conversation, and the amendment request prepared where one is needed |
| Decisions | Pricing, margin and capital | Pricing, margin and capital allocation questions worked through as they arise |
| Responsibility | Component | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| Everything in Board, Budget and Capital | All items above | Carried in full |
| Live workstream | One at a time | One live workstream carried through to its conclusion, being a raise, a refinancing or exit readiness |
| Live workstream | If it is a raise | The model, the package and the answers prepared while the process runs, as preparation and support only with no investor approach and no solicitation |
| Live workstream | If it is a refinancing | The credit package, the lender comparison, and the questions answered on the analysis |
| Live workstream | If it is exit readiness | The gap work run, the databook and the room built, and the process supported as it goes |
| Cadence | Weekly while live | Cadence moves from monthly to weekly for as long as that workstream is running |
| Basis | What is excluded | No investor solicitation, no securities placement, no introductions, and no fee contingent on a raise, a refinancing or a sale completing |
The starting point is where the business actually is, which means the last twelve months of reporting, the budget if one exists, the debt agreements and their covenant definitions, the board materials and how decisions currently get made. You receive that review in writing.
The dates get fixed for the year ahead, covering board meetings, the monthly review, reporting deadlines and the lender calendar, and the standing agenda is opened.
The first board meeting, the first monthly review and the first reporting cycle are run, and the engagement is adjusted after them.
The cadence runs, the budget and cash position are owned, the lender relationship is held, and the decisions arising get worked through as they come up.
Every quarter the engagement itself is reviewed with you, covering whether the tier still matches what the business needs, which usually means moving up when something goes live and back down once it closes.
This sits above it. The team keeps producing the close and the reporting, and this engagement owns the decisions, the budget and the outside relationships. That is the cleanest version of this arrangement and the one that works fastest, because the numbers are already reliable.
Take the finance support engagements alongside this, or before it. A chief financial officer working from a close nobody has checked spends the first two months finding out the numbers were wrong, which is expensive at this rate and is exactly the work an associate does better and cheaper.
To start we need the last twelve months of management reporting, the budget where one exists, and the debt agreements with their covenant definitions. We also need the ownership structure or cap table and recent board materials. Tell us how the close currently runs and who runs it, and flag any live raise, refinancing or sale process with its timetable.
Audit, review and compilation engagements. Any opinion or assurance on financial statements. 409A valuations and certified appraisals. ESOP valuations. Fair value measurement under ASC 805 and ASC 820. Fairness opinions. Tax return preparation and tax opinions. Securities placement, investor solicitation, and any transaction-contingent or success fee.
TEOL Capital is not a broker-dealer, an investment adviser, a placement agent or a finder. Engagements are preparation and support work. TEOL does not place securities, solicit investors or make investor introductions, and takes no success, contingency or placement fee.
The fees published here are indicative, set against the scope described on each page, and a final quote is confirmed in writing before any engagement letter is issued. Nothing published here is an offer, and no engagement begins until a letter is signed by both sides. Work outside the stated scope is identified and quoted before it begins. Full payment or a 50% deposit on engagements under $10,000, and 50% at start with 50% at delivery above that. Turnaround is quoted on receipt of a complete information request and is a target rather than a term of the engagement. Fees are reviewed quarterly, and an engagement letter issued at a published fee holds that fee regardless of any later review. Work is prepared for the client named in the engagement letter and for that client's own use. Anyone else who receives it does so for information and cannot rely on it. Management accounts, consolidations and financial statements we prepare are built from the records management maintains and remain management's responsibility. We do not guarantee any particular outcome, including a sale, a financing, a valuation conclusion or a price. Our liability on any engagement is limited to the fees paid for that engagement.