A yearly forecast is a story. A 13-week cash sheet is a decision. Opening cash, receipts you can date, payroll you cannot move, and the week you hit zero. US year-one establishment closure of 22.1% (BLS) is the backdrop when that sheet is fiction — it is not the source of the thirteen-week horizon.

13Working cash horizonAFP working horizon for weekly cash
4Payroll cadenceLabeled example on the worked Mashhad sheet
45Worked collections delayLabeled example for rial invoices, not a BLS statistic
Cited figures used in this edition

Open with cash, not with revenue

Start with bank cash you can spend this week. Accrued revenue that has not arrived is a memo, not a row. If a customer invoice is 45 days out, it belongs in week seven, not week one.

Reconcile the opening number to bank accounts and subtract restricted or inaccessible balances. A booked deposit that cannot fund payroll is not operating cash, and mixing it in postpones the visible shortage without changing it.

Forecast Cash as Weeks, Not as a Yearly Hope
Weekly cash uses to date

Date the receipts

Every inflow needs a name, an amount, and a week. If you cannot name the person who will send it, delete the row. BLS Business Employment Dynamics puts US year-one closure at 22.1% — backdrop for forecasts that kept those rows, not a source for the horizon.

Use the customer’s observed payment behavior, not the invoice due date, and keep disputed invoices outside the base case. A signed contract proves a claim; it does not prove which Friday the bank balance changes.

Forecast Cash as Weeks, Not as a Yearly Hope
  • Payroll8 count
  • Vendors5 count
  • Tax/fees2 count
  • Discretionary1 count

AFP 13-week cash (2026-08). Typical weekly cash uses a founder should date on an AFP 13-week sheet, not a census.

Worked 13 weeks in Mashhad

Opening cash 800 million rial. Two clinic invoices of 200 million each, historically paid on day 45. Payroll 120 million every fourth week. The sheet says you are fine in week two and tight in week eight. That is the meeting. The rial figures are a labeled example — ChartMogul’s cash-versus-revenue identity on an AFP 13-week horizon — not BLS statistics.

Run a second case with one clinic paying two weeks later than its history. Do not call the difference a forecast error: it is the downside case that determines whether discretionary vendors pause before payroll is exposed.

Write the kill date

The week cash hits the minimum you will still pay people is the kill or raise date. Put it on the same page. A forecast without that date is decoration. Carta runway calendars date someone else’s US raise, not a receipt on this sheet.

Define the minimum and the action in advance: freeze hiring, stop a channel, renegotiate a vendor, or begin an orderly wind-down. “Raise money” is not an action row unless a dated term sheet and closing conditions exist.

What a P&L hides

A profitable month with 60-day receivables can still bounce payroll. Forecast cash. Report profit second. OpenView SaaS cash notes treat payback as timing, not as a ratio that excuses an empty Friday.

The reverse also matters: an annual prepayment can make cash look strong while future delivery remains costly. Keep the profit view to expose whether today’s cash belongs economically to work the company still owes.

Frequently asked questions

Why 13 weeks?

The Association for Financial Professionals (AFP) treats thirteen weeks as a working cash horizon: one quarter of weekly decisions. Long enough to see a slip, short enough to update every Friday.

Do I include a hoped-for raise?

Only if a term sheet has a date. Otherwise keep it off the sheet and on a memo.

How does Iran change the model?

Collections delay and payment fees move receipts right and shrink them. Model both.

Is 22.1% an Iranian number?

No. It is BLS US establishment closure. Use it as a reminder that dishonest cash sheets fail early.

Answers to the questions this topic usually leaves hanging.

How we sourced this

Every statistic in Forecast Cash as Weeks, Not as a Yearly Hope is attributed. Where a number is an estimate rather than a census, the note says so.

  1. AFP 13-week cashWorking horizon for weekly cash decisions.
  2. ChartMogul metrics glossaryRevenue versus cash identities; labeled Mashhad example.
  3. BLS Business Employment DynamicsUS year-one closure backdrop only — not the 13-week or 45-day figures.
  4. Carta runway contextUS raise calendars used only as a warning.
  5. OpenView SaaS cash notesPayback versus cash timing.

Primary sources used for this edition.

The bottom line

Open Friday’s sheet from bank cash, not from last month’s revenue slide.

If you want the adjacent decisions after Forecast Cash as Weeks, Not as a Yearly Hope, start with Unit economics, Funding rounds, Why startups fail, CAC.