Pilot
Bookkeeping, tax, and fractional finance services built for startups and small businesses.
About Pilot
Pilot pairs bookkeeping software with finance professionals for startups and small businesses. It covers recurring bookkeeping, tax preparation support, and fractional CFO or COO work. Dashboards give operators a current view of expenses and cash flow. Essentials uses AI to categorize transactions, reconcile bank and credit-card accounts, and close cash-basis books each month. Core adds a US-based bookkeeper, more data connections, and cash or accrual accounting for companies that need management, lender, or investor reporting. Support is included in the product. Customer invoicing and bill payment are available as added services. Pricing scales with monthly expenses and business complexity, so teams should estimate the annual cost at their own transaction volume rather than rely on the entry price alone.
Best for
Best use cases
Closing cash-basis books from bank and credit-card activity
Combining payroll, accounts payable, inventory, and banking data for accrual reports
Planning cash flow, budgets, and financial models with fractional CFO support
Compare before choosing
Compare annual cost at your actual monthly expense volume
Check whether cash-basis Essentials or accrual-capable Core matches reporting needs
Confirm which invoicing, bill-pay, tax, CFO, or COO services carry added fees
Features
Monthly bookkeeping
Pilot uses bank and credit-card activity to categorize transactions, reconcile accounts, and complete a monthly cash-basis close. Small businesses can use the resulting books and standard chart of accounts for routine reporting, while the year-end package gives their tax preparer an organized handoff.
Accrual reporting
Core brings together bank, card, payroll, accounts-payable, and inventory records for cash or accrual bookkeeping. This gives startups and growing companies the detail needed for operating reviews and for reports requested by lenders, partners, or investors.
Finance leadership
Pilot fractional CFO support can track cash flow and burn rate, build budgets and financial models, and prepare investor-facing reports. It suits teams that need senior finance work but are not ready to hire and manage a complete internal finance department.
Pros
- The $99 monthly Essentials entry price gives small businesses a concrete starting point for routine cash-basis bookkeeping.
- Core supports cash or accrual accounting and connects more financial sources, which suits investor and lender reporting workflows.
- Plans include access to a finance expert, reducing the need to route every bookkeeping question to a separate adviser.
Cons
- Pricing scales with monthly expenses and business complexity, so growing companies may pay more than the advertised entry price.
- Essentials is limited to cash-basis bookkeeping, which may not fit companies that require accrual reporting.
- Invoicing and bill-payment assistance is an additional service, adding cost or sales coordination for teams that need those workflows.
Pricing Plans
Essentials
- Cash-basis bookkeeping from bank and credit-card data
- Standard chart of accounts
- Year-end package for a tax preparer
- AI answers for transactions, cash flow, and planning scenarios
- Support through in-app messaging
Core
- Everything in Essentials
- US-based bookkeeper who handles and reviews the books
- Cash or accrual-basis bookkeeping
- Connections for payroll, accounts payable, inventory, banks, and cards
* Pricing information is for reference only. Please refer to the latest announcement on Pilot's official website.