As a company grows, its financial needs become more complex and accounting teams are stretched thin. While CFOs make high-level strategic decisions, there is another role that often operates behind the scenes, ensuring the company’s financial health.
The financial controller oversees an organisation’s day-to-day financial operations, serves as the CFO’s right hand, and secures the integrity of accounting data.
They ensure ledgers are accurate, financial statements are prepared on time, and internal controls are maintained. But without the right tools in place, it can be extremely difficult to manage these tasks effectively.
This article will dig into the role of a financial controller during the monthly close.
What is a Controller in Finance?
A financial controller—sometimes called the Chief Accounting Officer—is defined as a senior-level executive who leads an organisation’s accounting operations.
They often hold professional accounting qualifications (such as CPA or CMA), are detail-oriented, analytical, and have a knack for communicating with both C-level executives and entry-level accountants.
Not every finance professional will have the right mix of skills to become a financial controller, even if some of the day-to-day tasks seem straightforward enough. It is a complicated mix of accounting expertise, managerial capabilities, and collaboration.
Responsibilities of a Financial Controller
The role of a controller vary slightly from company to company, as there will be unique challenges and requirements based on industry, structure, and stakeholders.
But we’ve broken down what an average month looks like, week by week:
Week 1 Controller Responsibilities
What does a financial controller do in the first week? He/she focuses on the profit and loss (P&L) close and is responsible for preparing accurate financial statements.
Day 1: P&L Close – Revenue
A financial controller begins the week by focusing on revenue analysis. This involves scrutinising month-over-month (MoM) variances and comparing actual revenues to budgeted figures.
They assess the impact of any product or accounting changes—such as pricing adjustments or new stock-keeping units (SKUs)—on overall revenue. The goal is to compile accurate revenue data to present to stakeholders. Normally a controller has to manually do this exercise. But with Bunker, it takes only a few minutes. Bunker is a financial analytics tool that makes the lives of controllers easier.
With Bunker’s comprehensive MoM dashboard, a controller can easily segment needle-movers and build a package to present to the Financial Planning & Accounting (FP&A) representative.
Day 2: P&L Close – Cost of Goods Sold (COGS) & Bank Reconciliation
They then move into analysing COGS variances and comparing them to the budget. The controller determines the actual costs and examines the effects of any product changes on the COGS. Bunker provides complete visibility into COGS variances vs budget. Manually performing this task could be cumbersome and prone to error. If expenses seem unusually low, they can determine the need for accruals through Bunker’s gross margin comparison dashboard within minutes.
The controller also reconciles bank accounts and credit cards with the newly available statements, flagging any transactions missing from the general ledger or cash flow report.
Day 3: P&L Close – Operating Expenses (Opex), Prepaids, Accruals, Fixed Assets
Attention then shifts to recording prepaid amortisations, depreciation, and booking accruals. This ensures the P&L close is detailed properly and completed. At this point, accounts payable (AP) processing is usually stopped, and any subsequent bills are accrued.
Bunker allows you to assess opex trends and do a preliminary review of expense categories, flagging any accruals for late invoices.
Day 4: P&L Close – Comprehensive Review
The controller does a dedicated walkthrough of the P&L statement from revenue to net income. The controller compares the current month’s actuals with those from the prior month, assessing the percentage of revenue for each line item to identify root causes for variances.
A summary of insights is prepared for the CFO and senior leadership, including key metrics such as:
- Revenue
- Operating expenses
- Gross margin
- EBITDA
They will highlight significant factors influencing the financial outcomes. It could take hours to manually prepare these insights, but if a controller uses tools like Bunker, they can easily and automatically capture entity-specific nuance.
Day 5: Balance Sheet (BS) Close – AP, AR, Inventory
At the end of the first week, the controller moves on to reconciling high-transaction accounts like:
- Accounts payable: Identifying unapplied bill payments, bills outstanding for 90+ days, ensuring sub-ledger balances align with general ledger totals.
- Accounts receivable: Reviewing unapplied invoice payments and adjusting necessary reserves.
- Inventory: Confirm that SKU counts and unit costs are reasonable and ensure that no adjustments are needed for expiring or unsellable inventory.
Bunker’s vendor dashboards automate the compilation of this information, allowing the controller to direct any required action items.
Week 2 Controller Responsibilities
With many of the statements prepared, the second week focuses on analysis and review alongside the CFO.
Day 1: BS Close – Other Schedules
This week starts with specific GAAP compliance tasks. These include adjustments for straight-line rent and the amortisation of debt issuance costs. While these tasks are essential for compliance, they are not particularly insightful for assessing overall business performance.
Day 2: BS Close / Cash Flow – Holistic Review
On day two, the financial controller performs a flux analysis on balance sheet accounts to substantiate any material variances. They will identify significant cash flow movements and itemise cash burn where applicable.
With Bunker’s overview trend as the starting point, this process helps understand the shifts in financial position, from net income to cash change. Working capital reports can provide more detail on how cash is tied up.
Day 3: Soft Close and Initial Review
The middle of the second week usually involves a preliminary “soft close” of the financial statements. The CFO will conduct an initial review and generate a list of questions about the figures, and controllers will do a second pass to identify any missing transactions.
This is essentially double-checking the work from week one but with a more complete dataset. Consolidated P&L breakdowns in Bunker help determine whether balances are reasonable and flag any issues.
Day 4: Hard Close and Finalization
The hard close begins by finalising the previous work and factoring in any last-minute invoices or adjustments identified during the initial reviews. A deadline is set for all adjustments, and any new discoveries past this point are deferred to the next reporting period.
Bunker’s vendor dashboards provide a working follow-up list for AR and AP, while the P&L dashboard is available for a final high-level review.
Day 5: Communicating Key Variances
The final day of week two is dedicated to investigating, understanding, and explaining key financial variances to various stakeholders. The controller will send detailed financial reports to department heads and FP&A.
Bunker’s monthly report summarises key data from the General Ledger to give actionable insights for leadership, just days after your close.
Weeks 3 & 4 Controller Responsibilities
The first two days of week three are usually dedicated to finalising any remaining tasks from the hard close. This involves investigating outstanding questions, addressing follow-ups, and ensuring that all adjustments and reconciliations are completed satisfactorily.
As the focus shifts back to regular operations partway through the week, the financial controller engages in transactional processing for the month-to-date (MTD). This includes:
Conducting due diligence on investors
The first two days of week three are usually dedicated to finalising any remaining tasks from the hard close. This involves investigating outstanding questions, addressing follow-ups, and ensuring that all adjustments and reconciliations are completed satisfactorily.
As the focus shifts back to regular operations partway through the week, the financial controller engages in transactional processing for the month-to-date (MTD). This includes:
- Paying bills: Ensuring that AP is managed efficiently, and all outstanding bills are processed in a timely manner.
- Payroll: Processing payroll to ensure employees are paid accurately and on time.
- Bank reconciliations: Continuous reconciliation of bank accounts to spot discrepancies and maintain accurate cash flow records.
Bunker provides transaction-level visibility to controllers and helps spot any financial anomalies that can easily be corrected.
By the middle of week four, the controller begins preparing for the next financial close. They start by:
- Tracking P&L: Controllers monitor the P&L statement against the financial plan. This helps identify material variances early, so they can be investigated and addressed before close.
- Housekeeping: Cleaning up any pending transactions to ensure the accounts are accurate.
- Early AP: Managing accounts payable a few days ahead of month-end to ensure a clean cash reconciliation.
- Vendor follow-ups: Contacting vendors for any outstanding invoices to ensure expenses are accounted for.
- Customer follow-ups: Reaching out to customers to collect outstanding payments, improving cash flow and reducing AR workload.
The financial controller is critical during the transition between closing activities and routine business operations. They need to ensure reporting accuracy and daily operational efficiency, setting the stage for a smooth close the following month.
Final Thoughts
A company’s financial integrity relies on the effectiveness of its financial controller. They manage a wide range of responsibilities, from preparing statements to ensuring compliance.
But financial analytics platforms like Bunker can reduce manual workload and improve accuracy. By reducing tedious manual work and improving accounting data hygiene, financial controllers can achieve a timely, accurate close.
Bunker helps financial controllers provide unparalleled transparency into the company’s financial plumbing, helping make strategic decisions on how cash and other resources are used.
Consider booking a demo with Bunker and in just 30 minutes, you’ll see how the platform can open up complete financial visibility and speed up your monthly close.
