Guide
How to build a 13-week cash flow forecast from QuickBooks Online
Start from today's bank balance on the QuickBooks Online Balance Sheet. Place each open invoice from the A/R Aging Detail report in the week you expect the money, and each open bill from the A/P Aging Detail report on the date you plan to pay it. Add payroll, rent and other recurring payments, and loan repayments from the lender's schedule, on their own dates. Then roll the forecast forward every week.
Updated
Which QuickBooks Online reports do you need?
Four reports and two schedules. The Balance Sheet gives opening cash; the A/R Aging Detail lists every open invoice for receipts; the A/P Aging Detail lists every open bill for payments; the Payroll Summary and the Recurring transactions list give payroll, rent and other fixed costs; the lender's schedule gives loan repayments.
| Forecast line | QuickBooks Online source | What to take |
|---|---|---|
| Opening cash | Balance Sheet (Reports), as of the day before week 1 | The total of the bank accounts, once the bank feed is matched. On the Banking page, the Bank balance and the In QuickBooks figure should then agree, or differ only by payments and deposits that have not cleared. |
| Customer receipts | A/R Aging Detail (Reports, Who owes you) | Every open invoice, with its customer, due date, open balance and aging bucket. |
| Supplier payments | A/P Aging Detail (Reports, What you owe) | Every open bill, with its supplier, due date and open balance. |
| Payroll | Payroll Summary (Reports, Payroll), with QuickBooks Online Payroll; otherwise your payroll provider's register | Net pay and the employer's taxes, on each pay date. |
| Rent and other fixed costs | Recurring transactions (Settings, under Lists) | Each recurring bill or expense, its amount and its next date. |
| Loan repayments | None: QuickBooks Online keeps no loan schedule. Use the lender's, and check it against the loan account on the Balance Sheet. | Each repayment date and amount, principal and interest together. |
Free download
13-week cash flow forecast template
A blank forecast with live formulas (each week's closing cash opens the next, and a week below your minimum cash buffer turns red), an instructions sheet, and an example filled with illustrative figures.
Also on GitHub: ataskiai/management-report-templates
The workbook carries the same lines with the formulas built in: each week's closing cash opens the next, and a week below your minimum cash buffer turns red. Run both aging reports for the same day as the opening balance, the day before week 1, so that nothing is counted twice or missed.
How do you turn the A/R Aging Detail into weekly receipts?
Take each open invoice and put it in the week that customer usually pays, not the week it falls due. Customers who pay on time go in their due week; slow payers go later, by their usual delay. Leave out invoices you no longer expect to collect, and keep sales not yet invoiced on their own line.
- Start with the overdue buckets. Invoices in 1 - 30 and 31 - 60 are the ones to chase first; place each in the week the customer has promised, or in the week its usual delay points to.
- Then the current invoices. Use each customer's history, not the due date: a customer who pays a week late every month goes a week after its due date.
- Leave out the doubtful ones. Invoices in 91 and over stay out until the customer agrees a date. List them under the forecast so they are not forgotten.
- Add the sales you will invoice. Your usual weekly invoicing, shifted by your average collection time. That time is your days sales outstanding; the DSO calculator works it out from your receivables and revenue.
How do you forecast bills, payroll, rent and loan payments?
Each on its own date. Open bills from the A/P Aging Detail go on the day you plan to pay them, regular costs whose bills have not arrived yet at their usual level, payroll on each pay date with the employer taxes, rent and other fixed costs on their due dates, and loan repayments from the lender's schedule.
- Supplier bills: on the planned payment date, which may be after the due date if the supplier has agreed it. How long you take to pay, on average, is your days payable outstanding.
- Bills not received yet: regular supplier costs at their usual weekly level, from the week the first of them would fall due.
- Payroll: one line per pay date, with the employer's taxes. Paid every other week, some months have three pay dates, which a monthly forecast smooths over.
- Loans: principal and interest together, on the lender's dates. Only the interest reaches the profit and loss, but all of it leaves the bank.
Worked example: thirteen weeks for a services company
A services company invoices about $25,000 a week and runs QuickBooks Online. On the day before week 1 its bank accounts on the Balance Sheet total $40,000, and it wants to keep at least $30,000 in the bank.
Example · illustrative figures, not a real company
| A/R Aging Detail | Open balance |
|---|---|
| Current | $90,000 |
| 1 - 30 | $40,000 |
| 31 - 60 | $15,000 |
| 61 - 90 | $3,000 |
| 91 and over (left out) | $2,000 |
| Total | $150,000 |
| A/P Aging Detail | Open balance |
|---|---|
| Current | $30,000 |
| 1 - 30 | $12,000 |
| 31 - 60 | $4,000 |
| Total | $46,000 |
- Receipts, weeks 1 to 6: the open invoices, $148,000, each in the week its customer usually pays; the $2,000 over 90 days is left out.
- Receipts, weeks 7 to 13: new sales of $25,000 a week. The company's DSO is $150,000 of receivables / $325,000 of sales in the last 13 weeks x 91 days = 42.0 days, so a new invoice arrives as cash about six weeks later.
- Supplier bills: the open bills, $46,000, paid in weeks 1 to 4; new bills of $6,000 a week from week 5.
- Payroll: $24,000 every other week, employer taxes included. Rent and fixed costs: $9,000 on the 1st of each month. Loan: $3,200 a month, from the lender's schedule.
| Week | Opening cash | Receipts | Payroll | Rent and fixed | Supplier bills | Loan | Closing cash |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | $40,000 | $30,000 | – | $9,000 | $16,000 | – | $45,000 |
| 2 | $45,000 | $28,000 | $24,000 | – | $12,000 | – | $37,000 |
| 3 | $37,000 | $26,000 | – | – | $10,000 | $3,200 | $49,800 |
| 4 | $49,800 | $24,000 | $24,000 | – | $8,000 | – | $41,800 |
| 5 | $41,800 | $22,000 | – | $9,000 | $6,000 | – | $48,800 |
| 6 | $48,800 | $18,000 | $24,000 | – | $6,000 | – | $36,800 low point |
| 7 | $36,800 | $25,000 | – | – | $6,000 | $3,200 | $52,600 |
| 8 | $52,600 | $25,000 | $24,000 | – | $6,000 | – | $47,600 |
| 9 | $47,600 | $25,000 | – | $9,000 | $6,000 | – | $57,600 |
| 10 | $57,600 | $25,000 | $24,000 | – | $6,000 | – | $52,600 |
| 11 | $52,600 | $25,000 | – | – | $6,000 | $3,200 | $68,400 |
| 12 | $68,400 | $25,000 | $24,000 | – | $6,000 | – | $63,400 |
| 13 | $63,400 | $25,000 | – | – | $6,000 | – | $82,400 |
| Total, 13 weeks | $323,000 | $144,000 | $27,000 | $100,000 | $9,600 | +$42,400 | |
- $40,000 to $82,400 over the quarter, a rise of $42,400: on a monthly view the business is fine.
- Low point $36,800, in week 6. It is a payroll week in which the open invoices have run down and the new sales have not been paid yet. Against the $30,000 buffer, headroom is only $6,800.
- What to do about it: chase the 31 - 60 invoices before week 6, or move a supplier payment from week 6 to week 7, when the first new sales come in.
For comparison: the median days sales outstanding of small US public companies was 42.7 days (middle half 21.3 days to 69.4 days), across 591 companies, in Ataski's study of the fiscal 2025 annual reports (Form 10-K) that companies with revenue of $1 million to $250 million filed with the SEC. These are public companies, so read the figure as a reference point, not a target. Source: Ataski analysis of SEC Financial Statement Data Sets (FY2025 10-K filings).
How do you keep the forecast up to date?
Every week, run the A/R Aging Detail and the A/P Aging Detail again for the day before the new week 1, replace the week just ended with what actually came in and went out, and add a new week 13. Compare the new low point with your minimum buffer before deciding anything. The full routine, the mistakes that make a forecast wrong, and a plain-text version of the template are in the 13-week cash flow forecast guide.
The same QuickBooks Online reports also feed the month: the monthly management report from QuickBooks Online uses the Profit and Loss and the Balance Sheet beside the two aging reports.
Or have it written for you
Ataski's Financial Analyst builds a 13-week cash forecast from your accounting system every month, with its minimum balance and headroom, beside a calendar of the open invoices and bills falling due each week, as part of the monthly management report.
- Your ledger. QuickBooks Online and Xero; NetSuite, Sage Intacct, Zoho Books and Business Central in beta.
- Every month on the 1st. The report is refreshed on the 1st of every month for the month just ended, as a draft that waits for your approval.
- History from day one. The first connection reads the trailing 24 months, so the first report already compares each month with the same month last year.
- Cash, 13 weeks out. A weekly cash forecast beside the open invoices and bills falling due.
- A second reviewer. A second, independent AI reviewer reads every monthly narrative, and an AI explanation that cites a source outside your books is discarded, not published.
Plans start at $599/mo. The first month is free, and no card is needed to start it.
Questions
Should I use the A/R Aging Summary or the A/R Aging Detail?
The Detail. It lists each open invoice with its date, due date and open balance, so each one can go into its own week. The Summary shows only a total per customer for each aging bucket: enough to check the Detail's total, not to place receipts by week.
Which date should the aging reports be run for?
The day before week 1 of the forecast, the same day as the opening bank balance, so that no invoice or bill is counted twice or missed between the balance and the first week.
How do I treat invoices that are more than 90 days overdue?
Leave them out of the receipts until the customer agrees a payment date, and list them below the forecast so they are not forgotten. Counting them makes the forecast look safer than it is.
Can I build the forecast without QuickBooks Online Payroll?
Yes. Take the pay dates and amounts, with the employer's taxes, from your payroll provider's register instead of the Payroll Summary report, and enter each one on its pay date.
Does Ataski change anything in my QuickBooks company?
No. Intuit's accounting permission has no read-only version, so the access you approve is technically read and write, but Ataski only issues read requests. It never posts a journal entry, never edits a transaction and never closes your books.