How much does a part-time FD cost per month? A straight answer…
You want senior finance help, and one of the first things you need to know is what it costs. So you start looking, and almost every website is maddeningly coy about it. Lots of talk about value and partnership, no numbers. And when a price is hard to find, most people assume the worst and move on.
We would rather just tell you. This post explains how a part-time, Fractional FD is priced, what moves the number up or down, a realistic sense of the range, and, just as importantly, who it is not worth it for. No runaround.
How the pricing actually works
A Fractional FD is not a full-time salary, and it is not priced like one. The model is simple: you buy a set amount of a senior Finance Director’s time each month, usually a day or two, sometimes more, sometimes less. You get the experience and judgement of someone who has done the job for years, for the specific slice of time your business actually needs.
Pricing typically works one of two ways, and often a blend of both:
A day rate. You pay for an agreed number of days per month at a day rate, so the cost scales cleanly with how much support you need.
A monthly retainer. You agree a fixed monthly fee for a defined scope of work, so you know exactly what leaves your account each month with no surprises.
Either way, the principle is the same: you are paying for a fraction of a senior person, not a junior full-timer. That is the whole idea.
A realistic sense of the numbers
Here is where most firms go vague. We will not. Across the market, Fractional FD day rates in our region range quite widely, roughly
£700 to £1,500 a day, depending on the area, the experience of the FD, and how complex and hands-on the work is. For context, our own day rate sits at £900 to £950 a day, deliberately kept under £1,000. We are not the cheapest option and we are not trying to be, but we are not at the top of the range either, and you get more for it than a lone FD can offer (more on that below).
What that comes to each month depends on the cadence you choose. At our rate, the day a week we most often recommend works out at roughly £3,900 to £4,100 a month. A lighter two-days-a-month arrangement is around £1,800 to £1,900, and an intensive two-days-a-week engagement, for a business going through something big, more like £7,800 to £8,200. The cadence matters more than the headline day rate, so it is worth understanding what each rhythm actually buys you.
The cadence matters more than the number
How often your FD is in the business changes what you get from them, not just what you pay. The rhythm is the real decision:
Two days a month. This is a light-touch, oversight cadence, closer to a non-executive director role: board meeting attendance and high-level steer, with very little room for hands-on delivery. In our experience it does not work well for most SME clients. It only really suits a business that already has a solid, experienced internal finance team to actually do the work. Without that team, two days a month can be worse than frustrating: you get told what is wrong and what you should do, but there is no capacity to help you fix it, which just leaves a founder feeling like they are drowning while someone points at the water. More advice with no way to act on it is not what most owners need.
A day a week. This is where the real value tends to sit for a growing SME, and it is the cadence we most often recommend. A day a week means the FD keeps pace with the business as it develops. Nothing waits too long for their eye, decisions get a senior sounding board while they still matter, and problems are caught as they form rather than months later. It is the difference between an FD who is genuinely part of your week and one who parachutes in occasionally to react to whatever has already happened.
Two days a week or more. At the intensive end, two or more days a week suits a business going through something big: a funding round, an acquisition, a sale, or a period of rapid change where you need serious financial firepower alongside you almost constantly.
So the honest answer to “what will it cost me a month?” is really a question back: what cadence does your business need? Get that right and the number follows. What you will not get from us is a figure plucked from the air before we understand how your business actually runs.
Why our rate buys more than a lone Fractional FD
At £900 to £950 a day we sit a little above the cheapest independents, and there is a good reason for it: you are not just hiring one person, you are getting the weight of a team behind them. That matters more than it sounds.
A hive mind, not a lone operator. Your FD is backed by a group of experienced FDs who share knowledge behind the scenes, so when a question comes up, on the best software for your situation, how others have handled a similar problem, you get the benefit of many minds, not just one. A lone fractional FD only has their own experience to draw on.
Cover if life happens. If your FD is ever ill or unavailable, you are not left stranded. Our central team can step in and keep things moving. A sole trader FD simply cannot offer that, if they are off, so is your finance function.
The Gathering and central support. Being a Wainwright client brings connections, introductions, invitations to worthwhile events, and The Gathering, our exclusive client dinners. There is a central team, led by Dani, actively working to add value beyond the numbers.
Because we are a regional firm rather than a big national brand, we can add all of that while keeping the cost increase over a lone FD genuinely modest. What the FD earns, what the centre keeps to provide the support around them, and what you pay are all kept fair and proportionate.
That last point is worth dwelling on, because it is not how every network works. Some of the larger national providers charge noticeably more, we have seen day rates well north of £1,300 in Yorkshire, and higher again further south, while paying the actual FD doing your work only a fraction of it, sometimes little more than half, and keeping the rest for central overhead. You end up paying more, and the person in your business earns less, with a large slice disappearing into a head office you never see. We think that is the wrong way round. Our model is built so the FD is properly rewarded, the central support is real and worth paying for, and the client still gets fair value. Ask any provider how their fee is split. The answer tells you a lot.
Why there is no single fixed price (and why that is a good thing)
If a provider quotes you a flat price before asking a single question about your business, be wary. It usually means one of two things: they are giving you a number that has little to do with your actual needs, or they are planning to give you a generic service that ignores them.
The price of a Fractional FD genuinely depends on a handful of things: how many days a month you need, how complex your business is, what state your finances are in to begin with, your sector, and how hands-on the work needs to be. A good provider scopes those before quoting. The next piece in this series, on what actually affects the price, breaks those variables down in full.
The comparison that reframes the cost
A full-time Finance Director is a significant salary, plus employer’s National Insurance, pension, benefits, holiday, and the cost of recruiting them in the first place. For many growing SMEs that is both unaffordable and more FD than they need day to day.
A Fractional FD gives you the same seniority and judgement for the days you actually need, at a fraction of that total cost. You are buying the senior judgement, not the full-time overhead. For a business that needs a strong financial head but not forty hours of one a week, the maths is usually straightforward.
Who it is, and is not, worth it for
Honesty cuts both ways, so here is who a Fractional FD is not for, at least not yet:
If you mainly need the books kept accurate and up to date, that is a bookkeeper, and paying FD rates for it is a waste of your money.
If you just need your year-end accounts filed and your tax handled, that is your accountant, and you may not need anything more right now.
If you are pre-revenue or very early, senior finance input often is not the priority yet, and we will happily tell you so.
Where a Fractional FD does earn its keep is when you are growing, facing real decisions, or flying blind between year-ends, and you need senior financial judgement to steer by, but nowhere near a full-time hire. If that is you, the cost usually pays for itself in better decisions and fewer expensive mistakes.
What you should expect for the money
Whatever you pay, and whoever you choose, price is only fair if the person is genuinely qualified to do the job. Because “Fractional FD” is not a protected title, it is worth knowing what a proper one should bring. At a minimum, we would say look for someone who is:
A chartered accountant, properly qualified, with a current practising certificate.
Genuinely experienced in senior industry roles, with real strategic and commercial leadership, not just a technical or compliance background.
Battle-tested in the moments that matter: exits, acquisitions, and raising finance, so they have done it before when you need them to.
Properly insured, with professional indemnity and public liability cover in place.
If someone charging FD rates cannot tick those boxes, the price is not the thing to worry about. We will cover how to choose the right provider in more depth separately, but that is the short version: pay for someone who has genuinely done the job.
The bottom line
A part-time FD costs meaningfully less than a full-time one, scales with what you actually need, and should always be scoped to your business before anyone quotes you a firm number. If a provider will not talk openly about cost, that tells you something. We are happy to talk about it on the first call, plainly and without pressure.
For the detail on what moves the number, read what actually affects the price of a Fractional FD, and you can see how the service works on our Fractional FD service page.
We work with owner-founders and MDs across Yorkshire and the North East who want senior finance support that fits their business and their budget. The simplest way to find out what it would cost for you is to ask us.