Waypoint — A product of Cairn Accounting
Your first step toward a fractional CFO. For $562, not $6,400.
The first hours of any CFO go to the same work: getting your numbers clear enough to make a real decision. Waypoint hands you that result every month — three reports you can actually read, signed by an accountant — for a fraction of the bill. Bring in a CFO for the big calls later, if you ever need one.
No card. No sales call. Your first report lands in about five minutes.
You came here looking for something
You did not come here to learn double-entry bookkeeping.
You came here because you have built something. A business. Real revenue. Real people. Real customers. And every year, around tax time, you look at the report your tax preparer hands you and think: I should understand this better.
Your gut tells you the business made money. Your gut tells you which months were good. Your gut is right — almost. Within about ten percent. The trouble is, for most businesses, ten percent is the whole margin. The difference between we had a great year and we worked a great year for nothing lives in that gap.
You came here to close the gap. That is what we built.
The way it's usually done
You get silence, or a binder in March.
There is somebody else doing your books. Your spouse. The office manager. A long-tenured admin who has been with you since the early days. An outside firm that charges $400 a month and disappears between tax seasons. They are loyal. They are doing their best. They are not a controller, and they were never asked to be.
What you get is usually one of two things. Either silence — a QuickBooks file you never open and a feeling that everything is probably fine. Or a year-end binder from the tax preparer, in March, that tells you what you already knew in your gut, eleven months too late to do anything about it.
What you want is the third thing — a monthly conversation about your numbers, the way a fractional CFO would have it with you, without the fractional CFO bill. It's the first step a CFO would take anyway, and for most owners your size, the only step you actually need. That is what we built.
How it works
Here is what happens every month, without you lifting a finger.
You are not buying software. You are buying the discipline of an accountant doing this work for you, every month, on schedule — so you never have to remember it's the 7th.
We read your books — quietly
Read access only. We never touch a thing inside QuickBooks. Your data does not move.
Your bookkeeper gets a friendly checklist
Items to review, accounts to reconcile, transactions that look unusual against the pattern of your business. Items addressed, never errors. Their name is on the work, and we're on call to them all week.
You get the 90-Day Money Map
One page. Where your cash is heading over the next ninety days, the biggest movers in and out, and the patterns worth watching. The forward-looking page no QuickBooks report has ever produced.
Your bookkeeper has the week to clean up
Anything that needs cleaning up gets handled — before any of it ever reaches your desk.
The Owner Dashboard lands
Last month's actuals, the items your bookkeeper resolved (named and credited to them), and a benchmark line: the national median for your industry, your number, and a plain-English read on whether you're doing well, on par, or a little behind. Signed by an accountant.
Month in Plain English arrives
A short letter, written the way a careful accountant would explain last month if they had time to sit down with you. What happened, what changed, what to watch. No charts. No jargon. The thing you read with your morning coffee.
It runs whether you're out of state, deep in the work, asleep, or in the hospital.
Your bookkeeper stays
They are your lieutenant. Not being replaced.
This may be the most important paragraph on this page. Your bookkeeper is not being replaced. Not being graded. Not being watched. We sit one layer above them, not in front of them. Their checklist arrives on the 7th — eight days before your dashboard does — and they have the full week to address anything before you see your numbers. Their name appears on your Owner Dashboard, credited for the items they resolved.
Most of the bookkeepers we work with come around to liking Waypoint more than the owner does. It gives them someone to call when something looks odd. It takes the pressure off them to be a controller they were never asked to be. It makes them look exactly as good as they are. We were built by people who learned bookkeeping the long way. We are on their side.
Don't pay CFO rates for the groundwork
The work a fractional CFO does first — for $562, not $6,400.
A fractional CFO bills $300 to $500 an hour, and the first hours of every month go to the same unglamorous groundwork: pulling your numbers together, finding where the cash went, and writing up what last month actually meant. That's the part you need every month — and it's the part we productized. Here is what that groundwork has caught for real owners, each one written into a real Month-in-Plain-English letter:
Card processing running at 3.2% when ACH would run 0.4%.
Sitting in checking when a money market would have paid four percent.
A service line quietly losing money that nobody had time to look at.
Quarterly payroll taxes underwithheld by a software default nobody had touched.
A rent figure above market that a single renegotiation brought down.
So why pay CFO rates for it? A bookkeeper-only relationship runs $300–$1,500 a month and includes no reports written for an owner. A fractional CFO retainer runs $5,000–$10,000. A BI dashboard runs $200–$2,000 and never sits with you to explain what it means. Waypoint delivers the groundwork on a fixed schedule for one rate — $562. Save the CFO for the fundraise, the sale, or the turnaround — and walk in with clean books and a year of clear reports already in hand.
From clients of Cairn Accounting
The firm behind Waypoint.
★★★★★ 5.0 on Google
Waypoint is built and signed by Cairn Accounting — the same team these owners have trusted with their books for years.
"Our experience with Andrew and Cairn Accounting has been great. They are very helpful and respond immediately. We are extremely happy we made the decision to have Cairn work with our company. The change came after 9 years with another company and we feel this has been a very positive step for us."
"Andrew and Rex have been amazing with my accounts. They are easy to reach and talk to with questions about my taxes and recommendations for my business expenses. They keep me on top of all the government-required tax filings. Knowing Cairn Accounting is helping me manage my business expenses is a relief. I definitely recommend working with them."
"I've worked with Cairn for years and I've had nothing but great experiences. Their entire team is knowledgeable, friendly, and always on the ball. Even though we're in different states, Cairn knocks it out of the park and handles all the heavy lifting. You're obviously reading this because you need a nudge, so here it is: go with these guys; you won't be sorry."
Is this you?
Waypoint is built for an owner who:
- Runs the books in QuickBooks Online.
- Has somebody else — a spouse, an office manager, a long-tenured admin, an outside firm — doing the bookkeeping.
- Wants to understand the numbers without learning the accounting.
If that's you, keep going. If you do your own books, we'll be a better fit the day you hire somebody — not before.
Plain about it
What we are not.
We are not your bookkeeper. We sit one layer above. The product breaks if you don't have one.
We are not your tax preparer. Your tax accountant handles your return. We make their March easier by handing them clean monthly books.
We are not software you log in to. The reports come to your inbox. No dashboard to learn, no login to remember.
We do not include cleanup in the monthly fee. If your books are behind, we scope it separately and quote a number before any monthly billing starts. You see the price before you commit.
The same work, itemized
What you'd pay a fractional CFO for the exact same reports.
We're not guessing at the number. Every Waypoint report replaces a specific piece of monthly CFO work. Here is that work, itemized at what a fractional CFO bills by the hour:
Hours are conservative monthly estimates. The rate assumes $400/hr — the midpoint of the typical $250–$500 fractional-CFO range. At that range, these same 16 hours run $4,000–$8,000 a month, which is exactly why fractional-CFO retainers are quoted at $5,000–$10,000.
What it costs
One tier. No upsell. No surprise bill.
Resolve the concern
Questions owners ask before they start.
What's the catch at $562?
None — it's a deliberate bet. We're not pretending to be a full fractional CFO at $562. We productized the one part of a CFO you need every month — the groundwork that makes your numbers clear — and we do it on a fixed monthly rhythm instead of an open-ended hourly retainer, so it scales. We price one tier, publish it plainly, and lock your founding rate for 36 months. The list price will rise later; yours won't. You're not the product, you're not being upsold, and there's no annual contract to trap you. Cancel by the 20th of any month and you walk with a folder of everything we made for you.
Will this replace my bookkeeper?
No. We sit one layer above your bookkeeper, not in front of them. Their checklist arrives on the 7th — eight days before your dashboard — and their name is credited on your Owner Dashboard for the items they resolved. The product breaks if you don't have a bookkeeper. Most of them end up liking Waypoint more than the owner does.
Is my QuickBooks data safe?
Yes. Your login happens with Intuit — we never see your password. The connection is read-only: we never touch, move, or change a thing inside QuickBooks. We read what we need to prepare your reports, and that's the end of it.
Do I have to talk to a salesperson?
No. No card, no call, no demo to schedule. You connect QuickBooks Online once and your first 90-Day Money Map arrives in your inbox in about five minutes. If you don't want to continue after three months, you do nothing and you're done.
What if my books are behind?
We'll tell you, scope the cleanup separately, and quote a number before any monthly billing starts. Cleanup is never buried in the monthly fee, and you'll always see the price before you commit.
What happens after the three months?
If Waypoint isn't worth $562 a month to you, you walk — no phone call required — and we send you a folder of everything we produced. If it is worth it, you do nothing. Monthly billing begins and the reports keep arriving.
You did not start this business to learn accounting.
You started it to build something. Take the first step a CFO would take anyway — for $562, not $6,400. Let us watch the books.
No card. No sales call. First report in about five minutes.