Best Prompts13-Week Cash Flow Forecast
Build the rolling weekly cash forecast operators actually run on: opening balance, timed inflows and outflows, and the week you run short.
Build a 13-week cash flow forecast. Cash on hand today: [AMOUNT, and which accounts] Any restricted or committed cash: [AMOUNT AND WHAT IT IS FOR] Expected inflows: - Receivables outstanding: [CUSTOMER, AMOUNT, INVOICE DATE, TERMS, and how reliably each pays] - Recurring revenue: [AMOUNT, BILLING DATE, CHURN ASSUMPTION] - New sales expected: [AMOUNT AND WHEN, and how confident] - Other: [LOANS, GRANTS, TAX REFUNDS, WITH DATES] Expected outflows: - Payroll: [AMOUNT AND PAY DATES] - Rent, software, insurance, loan payments: [AMOUNT AND DUE DATES] - Vendors: [AMOUNT, TERMS, TYPICAL PAY DATE] - Taxes: [AMOUNTS AND DUE DATES] - One-off spending planned: [WHAT, HOW MUCH, WHEN] Produce: 1. **The forecast table**: 13 weekly columns. Rows for opening balance, each inflow category, each outflow category, net change, and closing balance. Every item lands in the week the cash actually moves, not the week it was earned or incurred. 2. **The floor**: the lowest closing balance across the 13 weeks, which week it occurs, and how it compares to the minimum operating cash I need. If any week goes negative, name it in the first line of your answer. 3. **Three scenarios**: base, plus a downside where the largest receivable pays 30 days late and expected new sales come in at half, plus an upside. Give the closing balance and floor week for each. 4. **Sensitivity**: rank the five inputs whose variation moves the floor the most. This tells me what to actually watch. 5. **Levers**, ordered by how fast they act and how much they cost: collections to chase, payments to reschedule, spending to defer, financing to arrange. For each, the cash it frees and the week it lands. 6. **Assumptions register**: every assumption you made, with the number attached, so I can correct them. Rules: use only my figures and show the arithmetic per week. Never invent an amount, a payment date, or a payment probability I did not give you; where the forecast needs one, name the missing input instead. Do not smooth outflows across weeks, since lumpiness is the entire reason this forecast exists. Where I gave a range or an uncertainty, use the conservative end and say that you did.
How to use
Weekly granularity is not fussiness. A business can be profitable on a monthly P&L and still miss payroll in week three, because payroll and rent land on specific days and receivables do not. Rebuild this every Monday with actuals replacing forecast, which is what makes it a rolling forecast rather than a document. Verify the arithmetic in the table by hand; the structure is the value here and the sums are the part to check.
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