📎 This article includes 1 downloadable practice file ↓
In this article
Profit tells you how the business did; cash tells you whether it can pay salaries next Friday. A 13-week forecast (one quarter, week by week) is the standard tool.
Running balance
=Opening + SCAN(0, Receipts - Payments, LAMBDA(acc, net, acc + net))One formula, 13 closing balances. Then the questions that matter:
| Question | Formula | Practice data |
|---|---|---|
| Lowest balance | =MIN(balances) |
₹4,10,000 |
| First week below the ₹5 lakh buffer | =XMATCH(TRUE, balances < Buffer) |
Week 9 |
| Funding needed | =MAX(0, Buffer - MIN(balances)) |
₹90,000 |
Week 9 carries a quarterly tax payment. Knowing it in October means arranging a small overdraft or timing a collection, instead of a crisis.
Practice
Download the workbook below. Type your formula in the yellow column; the Check column turns green when it matches Excel’s own answer, and the Answers sheet has a working formula for every task. Tax rates and limits in the examples are for practice; verify current rules before real use.
Test formulas dynamically in our web formula laboratory or download the companion Excel workbook.
📎 Practice files for this article
- 📗Practice workbookOpening balance, buffer and 13 weeks of receipts and payments, 6 tasks.⬇ XLSX · 14 KB
Free to use for learning. Files with macros (.bas) are plain text — import them with Alt+F11 → File → Import File, and always test on a copy.
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