13-Week Cash Forecast and Liquidity Alerts
Get a reconciled 13-week cash forecast, collection scenarios, and dated alerts before cash runs short.
Before & after
Same prompt, same agent — the only difference is the skill.
A cash flow forecast is a useful tool for understanding your financial runway. You should start by listing all your expected revenue and expenses for the next 13 weeks. Make sure to account for the timing of when revenue actually comes in and when expenses need to be paid. You should include things like payroll, rent, and other operating expenses. It's good to have a conservative estimate and a more optimistic estimate so you can plan for different scenarios. You might want to include a runway calculation showing how many weeks your cash will last. It's helpful to update this regularly as actual results come in. You could create a spreadsheet or use a financial tool to track this. Would you like help setting up the formulas or categories?
13-WEEK CASH FLOW MODEL ASSUMPTIONS Current cash: 180,000 Monthly payroll: 45,000 (6 employees at 7,500 bi-weekly) Burn rate: 52,000/month (payroll 45k + ops 7k) Revenue timing: 50% week-of-invoice, 50% at 30 days Conservative case: Revenue -15%, expenses +10% WEEK-BY-WEEK BRIDGE (Optimistic) Week 1: 180,000 + 18,000 collections - 7,500 payroll - 1,800 ops = 188,700 Week 2: 188,700 + 22,000 - 7,500 - 1,800 = 201,400 Week 3: 201,400 + 12,000 - 7,500 - 1,800 = 204,100 Week 4: 204,100 + 25,000 - 7,500 - 1,800 - 8,000 tax = 212,100 Continues through week 13... RUNWAY ANALYSIS Optimistic: Cash never below 100,000. Runway if revenue stops: 22+ weeks. Conservative: Week 8 dips to 68,000 (below threshold). Runway: 16 weeks if revenue stops. Worst case: Payroll delay or 30% revenue miss triggers 12-week alert. ALERT TRIGGERS Cash below 100,000: Reduce OpEx 20% OR accelerate collections Cash below 60,000: Cut discretionary spending, extend vendor terms Cash below 30,000: Prepare emergency fundraise or credit line SCENARIOS BUILT Base case: Current trends continue Upsell case: 3 contracts week 6 (adds 30k/month) Recession: 2 customers churn, revenue -35% NEXT STEPS Week 1: Lock Q4 contract with biggest customer (removes downside) Week 3: Collect outstanding 30-day invoices (2 customers owe 18k) Week 6: Assess if new OpEx hire is still needed (note: illustrative)
About this skill
“We're profitable, but can we cover payroll?” Monthly budgets hide the collection delays and payment dates that cause cash surprises. Build a 13-week direct cash forecast that shows when cash crosses your minimum, which assumptions drive the shortfall, and how much funding or payment rescheduling would actually help.
What it does
- Reconciles opening cash and separates unrestricted balances from restricted funds and undrawn credit.
- Schedules collections from invoice-level expectations and customer payment behavior.
- Places payroll, taxes, vendor payments, debt service, and capital spending in their expected settlement weeks.
- Calculates weekly cash balances, minimum-cash breaches, and the funding needed to maintain your floor.
- Tests upside, base, and downside collections for the next four weeks, carrying their effects through the remaining forecast.
- Rolls the model forward with actuals and explains timing differences versus lasting cash losses.
What you get
A dated 13-week cash bridge, four-week collection scenarios, a liquidity readout, and prioritized actions tied to specific weeks and dollar amounts. Missing inputs are labeled, so an illustrative model cannot be mistaken for a bank-reconciled forecast.
Best for
Founders, controllers, treasury teams, and finance leaders managing payroll coverage, uneven collections, lender reporting, or a tightening cash buffer.
SKILL.md preview
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name: 13-week-cash-forecast-and-liquidity-alerts
description: >-
Builds and maintains a direct-method 13-week cash forecast from reconciled bank balances, invoice collections, payment calendars, and financing movements. Calculates minimum-cash breaches and funding needs, tests four-week collection scenarios, and explains weekly forecast errors. Use when the user says "build a 13-week cash forecast", "can we cover payroll", "my cash forecast keeps missing collections", "when will we fall below our cash minimum", "roll our cash forecast forward", "the lender wants a weekly cash bridge", or "we look profitable but keep running out of cash".
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