How to Master the Art of Cash Flow Forecasting

TRANSCRIPT

Kevin Schneider: [00:00:00] The response time- you hit on a pet peeve of mine, and I'm sure every professional has a pet peeve or so in their industry, but deadline time, like right now, it's deadline time for taxes- September, October. There's no more extensions, people. There's no more. You got six months extension from March and April.

We got a brick wall coming up and you're either going to hit that brick wall or we're going to have to get you. That's our goal is to get these returns filed, and the number of clients that are unresponsive to us- we're like, penalties are coming. This is coming. You're not my only client.

If you give me your stuff on October 1st and you're due October 15th, I'm not doing it in 15 days. I can't get it through my quality control process. We can't do it. We've been communicating this for months, and then, they'll raise a hand, 'Oh here's my tax stuff.' --And it's just facepalm- 'Guys, you got to help yourself.'

And that is one of my biggest pet peeves- just from a project management standpoint, from your accountant, from hitting deadlines, [00:01:00] making sure you have accurate data, our job is to keep you in compliance, keep you out of trouble with the IRS, keep you out of trouble with the banks. If you need financials, timely financial statements, but you got to help us.

And so that's always one of kind of my biggest pet peeves is just unresponsiveness or just- 'I'll get to it later....' --No! Get to it now, please!

Mel Latu: Unresponsiveness will cost you money all along your business, whether it be on missing deadlines, tax related, or you waiting so long to respond to the months of questions and warnings and requests for information. Now, we're out of time. So, you're either going to get hit with a emergency fee now- I've got to stop all the people in my pipeline that we're on time to try to help meet your deadline...

that's going to cost you money- or you miss the deadline and it's going to miss you on some tax credit. So, unresponsiveness, delayed follow up to your accounting team, whatever that looks like for your organization will always cost you money in the end. So, clean as you go. Do it as you spend it, send it- is my [00:02:00] favorite thing to say. As you're spending the money, send a note to your accountant and let them know what it was for.

Don't wait till the end, clean as you go. I use it at home.

I use it in warehousing and we use it in accounting- clean as you go.

Kevin Schneider: It does, and these concepts aren't just for business owners. I know there might be some people out here who are just W2 employees and they don't have a need for a traditional accountant or bookkeeper, cashflow management, but your personal finances have the same kind of foundation of being diligent with a budget, being diligent with your spending, your income forecasting, and forecasting could look as simple as- if I'm receiving my paycheck this week and I got my mortgage due in two weeks, but I know my credit card bills do... just basic forecasting of your personal financial picture- these are good principles to lean on. And also longer forecasting- you can forecast in the future- Hey, I got a 10 year old child. They're going to go to college in eight years, I hope, and so, what do I need today to get them there? And so, forecasting happens all the [00:03:00] time, and it's just a matter of how accurate are you going to be?

How serious are you going to take it personally? But for the business owner out there, it's very important to get a hold on this, and get a hold on it early, so there's less cleanup, but that you can make good decisions.

Mike Pine: Let me tell you about a worst case scenario that I just got to start experiencing this morning with a great guy, great businessman, great entrepreneur, and I've even recommended to a lot of entrepreneurs that are starting new business, that are cash light. We know all businesses that do fail, 90% something percent of them fail due to running out of cash.

So, I've told them it's okay to skimp on accounting fees and on professional services to get your business up and running to make sure you're making money because you're not making money, you're not going to be taxed anyways,

but this guy took it to a whole different level and he was so focused on getting a business up and running, and now it is big time up and running.

Starting in Starting in 2016, he decided to ignore taxes and bookkeeping. And he grew pretty [00:04:00] rapidly, and then, he was going to starting to get his tax returns filed right in the beginning of 2020 before COVID hit, and then COVID hit and it took 100%, 120% of his effort to keep his business up and running through the COVID shutdowns.

So, his taxes and bookkeeping got pushed back again and again. Now, it's 2023. He hasn't filed tax returns since 2016, and he's at huge risk with the IRS, and he made money in one of those years and not filing a return when you make money is a way to go to jail.

You don't go to jail for not paying the IRS, you go to jail for not filing tax returns, and he reached out to text us, an d you got to get those years filed, especially a couple years that have big gains, which unfortunately, are in the middle, not in 2016, not in 2023. It's not like we can just go file a 2019 return,

because we got to get everything caught up from 2016. Now, he is driven to get stuff filed. He's meeting with bookkeepers. They are doing their best, but he is not sleeping because he is [00:05:00] freaked out and spending every bit of effort he can to try to get eight years worth of data to the bookkeepers, then to the tax people, and then to the tax attorney, to hopefully

keep him out of jail, which I think we will keep him out of jail. If he would have just reasonably started with a foundation, like Mel mentioned, if there were some books, reasonable books up to this point, we could quickly file a return. It might not be 100% accurate, but at least he'd have a return filed.

But, the poor guy... and thank God his business is doing well because now he can afford representation, but it's the stress I saw in this guy's face when I met with him this morning- the weight, his shoulders are literally pushed down. The guy is carrying so much weight and responsibility and burden right now, and fear. That's a perfect example of when you end up paying the piper for not focusing on things you might consider mundane,

and what I'm excited about though, is after we get this guy caught up, he's also making money as [00:06:00] businesses, but his margins aren't as good as they should be,

and I think, once he finally gets real time, contemporaneous books and get someone to walk them through how to use that to manage his business, I think the rest of this decade is going to be his time.

But that was an example. It's hard to see someone that freaked out and that stressed because no books, no taxes.

Mel Latu: No taxes. And I think too, good books is peace of mind. No matter what your business is doing, it's still peace of mind that, you know what your business is doing and you're ready for tax season. So, that peace of mind... and like you just said, now that he's going to have good books to manage his business and be intentional instead of lucky, it sounds like he's been very lucky, when you move from

luck to intentional, the things you can do with your business- it's amazing, and it's just the discipline of good books, clean as you go, reconcile and repeat. Like reconcile, review, repeat- you can change your destiny. Your business will turn into something you never knew it was going to be.

Kevin Schneider: Yeah. [00:07:00] That's got to be scary though. I couldn't imagine going... what is that? Seven years, without even touching a tax return or financial statement? Does he owe tax in those years?

Mike Pine: For one of the years in the middle. Yes. So that's the one...

Kevin Schneider: We need to file, because you're going to have late filing penalties, late payment penalties, interest to date. He's going to pay 2 X the amount of tax he owed in fees and penalties.

Mike Pine: Yeah, but worse than that is if you don't file a return when you owe money, the IRS, especially if it's a lot of taxes that you owe, the IRS tends to say this person's trying to defraud the government and not report that they have income, and suddenly, instead of a miscalculation or an underpayment of tax, it's a felony to not file a tax return. It is not a felony to be laid on tax. So, especially when it gets... I can't remember what the threshold is... I think it's $75,000 or $100,000... whatever... it becomes a serious felony.

Mel Latu: It's definitely scary.

Mike Pine: It's going to be really nice to see that guy's shoulders lifted up and a smile on his face when we've got [00:08:00] it all figured out.

Now, I get a lot of questions from people that are starting businesses. They're not ready to hire a bookkeeper yet. They're not ready to hire us because there's nothing for us to help them save taxes on yet. They ask, 'I'm pretty good in Excel...' I can't tell you how many clients tell me that and I can't read their Excel statements, but.. --'I'm pretty good in Excel.

Can I just track all my stuff in Excel? Or do I need accounting software?' --And I always recommend some kind of accounting software. And then they ask- I got Quicken, which... I hate seeing Quicken books. QuickBooks are good. Quicken is different. But they like Quicken or Mint because it's super easy;

it's hard for us to use. But what do you recommend? What are some of the applications you recommend, and why do you recommend those applications?

Mel Latu: I stand wholeheartedly behind QuickBooks Online, and that is so untraditional. You can line up 10 accountants and we will all probably disagree, but I choose QuickBooks Online for a few reasons. One, it's cloud- it's cloud based, so that's great. [00:09:00] Two, you can get the very affordable subscription starting out.

They change their prices all the time. That's America, but get the very basic when you're very basic and starting out, and if you have someone show you how to set them up and then how to do the very basics, they're also very user friendly, as long as you know there are mistakes that happen because you're not an accountant.

So, if you go try to add a chart of account... this happens all the time, where the expense you just had was an asset, but you set it as an expense, or you set it up as a bank because you just don't know those different options. But QuickBooks Online is user friendly and it can be expanded on as you grow.

You can upgrade your subscription, you can add classes, you can start doing more and more, but it has the basic level that you need and it's affordable, and it's the most universally trained. So, if you're looking to change, when you're ready to outsource, the likelihood that you find someone that is some level of QuickBooks Online trained is higher than looking for Sage or [00:10:00] Quicken or other, in my opinion, dated softwares, so QuickBooks- I do expect some kind of shout out for how much I shout out to you guys, need some kind of kickback from QuickBooks.

Mike Pine: Yeah, Good luck..

Kevin Schneider: Yeah.

Mike Pine: It doesn't work that way. They just keep raising...

But it

Mel Latu: can

be very affordable to get started. No one likes a subscription, but we're talking $30 to $50 a month for you to invest in your business from Day 1 and to always have your books ready.

Kevin Schneider: And trying to budget,

on that same note, when people come to Mike and I like- 'How much does my tax return cost?' --We're like- ' Anywhere between here and here. I have no clue until I see your data.' but we have an idea, we have a general sense given us... we've seen these situations over and over and over...

so, I can get in the ballpark with my bids, but everything is hourly, so I could be under, I could be over at the end of the day. That's what drives the invoice. So, how does an accountant typically charge? And let's say someone is a sole practitioner or sole proprietor, and they are wanting some [00:11:00] outsourced accounting help, cashflow management, what do the costs look like?

Mel Latu: So, to make it affordable and custom fit to your business, what we like to do is we base everything transactionally and complexity. How many bank accounts are we working with? How many credit cards? What does the volume of transactions look like? And then, we're going to give you something affordable that is in translation to the labor we're going to do.

B.O.S.S. works in flat rates. So, we believe in small, cash-flowable monthly rates to where we clean as we go, you can afford very small, first of the month, it will always be this fixed rate until you grow. We grow with you. As your company doubles in volume and doubles in revenue and transactions and more work for us to do, that's when we have a discussion about changing your rates,

but my firm does it based on transactions and the structure of your finances. How many accounts are we working with? How many entities do you have, et cetera? But it can be [00:12:00] very affordable if you, get in ground level\, I guess is what I'm saying. You don't want to try to engage with an accountant on a quarterly basis,

in my opinion- I think that's too much time has passed. There are a lot of firms that do monthly and quarterly things... we like to do every single week, and as we're going through the month, it will be more affordable and efficient for me and for you.

Mike Pine: What about, again, for a cash strapped person just starting business? I guess what I'm trying to get is an alternative... someone who really doesn't have the money to pay you or us or any other CPA bookkeeper to get really started and do full service, if they go ahead and get that self start or that cheap QuickBooks Online, do you think they're better off paying a couple hundred bucks for a consult on training on how to get their stuff and their foundation established correctly?

Or can they just wing it until they make some money in a year or two to get someone else to come in and clean it up? What are your thoughts, now?

Mel Latu: Great question. I would definitely say, spend a couple hundred dollars [00:13:00] investment, get your foundation set up correctly and get that expert knowledge for you to carry on from that moment until you need more help. Trying to figure it out or YouTube University is going to cost you money later, I promise you, because

honestly, a lot of the growth of my company has been fixing books. Our profitability is not in maintaining your books. It's getting all of you cleaned up and that time it takes to turn it around. So, invest in the very beginning, just like you would in your insurance or your license or certificates you need for what you do.

Investing that couple hundred bucks for your financial foundation will be the best thing you do for the startup of your business. And look for firms- if you're part of chamber of commerce and networking groups, pay attention to see if they have speakers talking over these financials subjects. You might be able to go to a luncheon and someone's talking about how to manage your QuickBooks, or maybe you'll go to a [00:14:00] luncheon or a leadership class where people are in your class that do that, and you can just ask questions. I would really say invest in the startup and then lean in on your peers and ask the questions.

Don't be embarrassed to talk about what you don't know about bookkeeping because no one is going to think that makes you less of a business person because that's not what you're selling. That's what I'm selling. So, it's okay if you don't know. Ask and get some help.

Mike Pine: Sage advice.

Kevin Schneider: Absolutely.

Think of the average person that you would run into in an elevator, that makes $350,000 a year, has got some really small startups on the side that they're hoping to go somewhere. What would you tell them in an elevator speech?

Mel Latu: I would ask, 'Do you know what your minimal revenue you need to make per month is? Do you know your minimal expenses? I like to start with- Do you know these things, and if you don't, let's have a discussion how I can help you. No, those numbers,

Would be a place to [00:15:00] start. Do you have QuickBooks set up?

When's the last time you looked at a P & L or balance sheet? Do you know the difference? My elevator speech usually turns into- I have such a passion for accounting and it's not because I love accounting again. Operationally driven, I want intuitive data to where you've got something you can use as a tool.

So we, the team as well, always wanting to ask a little bit more to understand so that we can help guide. We want to teach. We want to grow your company with you.

Mike Pine: a great one.

Cashflow is a beautiful thing when you have it, when it's positive cashflow, but cashflow 101 again- a lot of, probably most, business owners know what a profit and loss statement is.

They know what a balance sheet is. A lot less know what a cashflow statement is, and going through accounting school, we learned how to do cashflow statements. It was one of the hardest things for me to hit. I remember studying for the CPA exam- one of the potential large problem sets you might get was to put together a cash flow statement from scratch and I could not get one right during the entire time I was practicing and [00:16:00] studying for the exam and then I got one on the exam and somehow through God's divine grace, it balanced.

It was the first time, and last time, I've ever done a cash flow statement by hand in person, but those cash flow statements are also complicated. They're not very user friendly, even for a CPA like me, who's not focused on the financial accounting. How can cashflow help a normal, non-financial guru manage their business?

What are some things that they could get started with and what are their training wheels in cashflow that could really make a difference?

Mel Latu: Sure. Cash flow. It's a game changer. If we had enough time, I'd give you personal testimonies for days because cash flow is implemented in my home, and everything we do- before we buy a new car, before we sign a kid up for a sport, before we take a vacation, we're plugging the numbers in cash flow.

Can we make it happen? Choose your destiny, right? If you see that it's going to take another 10 grand of revenue to get that goal you want, then now you got your goal. [00:17:00] Between now and then, if I want that, I need to go make 10 more grand. So, how we have transitioned that concept into an easier way-

like you said, it can be very complicated, it doesn't have to be. It could be as simple as- when are your bills due? How does your revenue come in? Build it out on a weekly basis, because a lot of us get in the trap of, 'Oh I've got 50 grand coming in this month and I got 40 grand going out. We are golden!'

-- Unfortunately, that's not how the bills hit in a weekly calendar, 13 week forecast, right? Payroll's got to be run today so that it direct deposits in two days, but we don't get a deposit for two days. How do you do that? So, we have turned cash flow into a working budget and reconciliation process where we go, and I think Kevin mentioned earlier, traditionally, we're 13 weeks out.

But if you're planning something, right now, I've got some clients we are talking about next summer because there are things going on next summer. So, we just [00:18:00] outline all your planned costs because you should know the minimal you've got to make every month. You know what that is- your rent, your overhead, your payroll, you should know those numbers,

and if you don't, after this episode, get a piece of paper and write those down because that's what you should be building around. You need to know- I have to make at least this, and these are the dates that they are due every month. I have to make sure I have this available balance in my bank on these times.

And then, you can see your gaps when you do that, and I'll tell you, when we start cashflow and a business owner sees all the red, they freak out. Guess what? That red is there, whether you like it or not. You're welcome for the crystal ball. Now, let's make a plan to turn it black, and how we do that is we start plugging in what you think your minimal revenue coming in is. We'll plug that in, and now, you have a sales goal. Now, if you have a sales team, you're like, 'Oh man! We've got six weeks of runway, and then we have a big red roadblock. The next six weeks, sales team,

there's a $500 bonus if everybody brings in an extra [00:19:00] whatever- you get to really use it as a tool to drive the team versus waiting until you can't pay the bill, or you can't process Payroll, or the investor that you thought was going to come in is no longer coming in. It gives you the opportunity to see the future and pivot before it happens.

And we make it very simple. Anyone can do it. I would love for you to hire us to do it for you, but it starts out with you sitting down, figuring out all of your expenses and the dates they're going out, and when is your revenue coming in and finding your gap.

Mike Pine: Your passion on this topic is absolutely palpable. I love it. I absolutely love it.

Mel Latu: Guys! It's changed my personal life. Just to drop a little personal- I am definitely grown up, but feel like I did not grow up until I lost my mother in 2016, and a lot of that was because I didn't have to... even as an adult, I didn't really have to worry about planning finances because if I messed up, it was always a phone call, even in my thirties. And so, that little [00:20:00] life change of me having to change some stuff in my personal life and be a better planner, and then seeing all these business owners that would come in to a turnaround consultant, begging to be saved, and all they had to do was be a better steward of their money, and plan it ahead of time.

They would be okay. They were taking out lines of credit they should have never taken out because if they would have cashflowed, they couldn't afford it. So, not only am I passionate because it worked in my personal life, but it's how I've grown my business, and I'm about to finish Year 4 in B.O.S.S. and we were 400% growth.

The growth is not luck. It's intentional because we're planning. We're direct marketing. We know our margins. I know exactly where my profitability happens. I can be affordable to a business owner because I know what I must make, and that lets me have room to negotiate with the industry.

So, I'm super passionate because I know it works. It will change your life. It will change your business.

Kevin Schneider: We, Mike and I, retain Mel for our own firm. We practice what we preach and we are tax accountants. We [00:21:00] utilize her expertise in the realm of cashflow and we have an internal accountant here, and I want him and Mel to be just best buds and figure out

the business trajectory, cashflow, and all that, and then, they can handle all the accounting cashflow projections and present it to Mike and I. We can make good decisions. So, this is stuff we're putting in practice.

Mike Pine: We have our own accountant here who's a great accountant, but he's focused on getting our financials right. He's great at it, but the kind of person that we need him to be is not this forward thinking, cashflow forecasting person. Not all accountants, even if they're really good accountants are equal,

and it's important to figure out what you need and find the right person. There's hidden money in that, and find the right skill sets that you need at the times that you need them. Not all bookkeepers, also, are created equal. We've worked with a lot of bookkeepers, a lot of really good bookkeepers, but I haven't seen one as passionate as Mel about cashflow [00:22:00] forecasting,

and getting her cashflow forecasting, it's made a big difference in our lives, and I thank God that we found you.

So, thank you, Mel.

Can you give an example of not just in your business, which you did give a great example with your business... but give one or two actual examples of someone who just got a few pointers from your cashflow stuff, and what difference it made?

Mel Latu: I can tell you about I have one of my very first clients is a metal fabrication company. They make anything you could think of, you could dream up, in metal, and to grow the company, they need really expensive machinery. I'm talking three-quarter of a million dollars for a laser,

and you're sitting in there in the trade industry. So, they get deposits, but then they've got to front the cost of all the material and all the things. They're always behind on cashflow. So, once we implemented cashflow planning, not only did we change profitability per job, so they changed their pricing, but they also are looking at what they were paying for everything.

As this transition happened [00:23:00] and we started doing cashflow, the language in the executive team of that company was, ' Hold on. We got to check cashflow. Did we put it in cashflow?' --Everything becomes, the language is cashflow. It becomes your core tool before you make any business decisions,

like, we're not doing anything until we plug it in cashflow. So, as we're working with them, it took us about 14 months, but through this evolution of 14 months, we got them good enough books and planning to get a loan to buy a three-quarter of a million dollar laser, not only get qualified to buy it, but make sure they can afford it because that kind of loan comes with a hefty payment.

Then the next thing was, 'Oh, no! Now, we're out of room. Maybe we should buy some property.' --This whole discussion, we were able to weigh all the options and plug them in our cashflow to see- Does buying makes sense? Does expanding this building? Can we afford to expand the building? And that client has not only

increased their revenue, they have this new asset in their building. They've expanded the building to a whole another two bays,[00:24:00] and they've gone from a team of 4 to a team of 10 people, and every one of those changes in their company, they'd be throwing a 'Hail Mary! I hope I can cover it.

I hope we can get it.' -- But we were intentional, and they could make the decision with confidence knowing, 'Okay. If we buy this, we can afford it. If we hire them, we can pay them.' -- And they now do cashflow themselves. We just do basic bookkeeping behind the scenes because we've empowered them as a team, and that's one thing our firm does too.

Organically, if you outgrow us, that's fantastic! We have done our job that we have gotten you to a place to where you're cashflowing, and you're making those decisions. We're just behind the scenes doing your books. So, there- I'm so proud of what they've done just with cashflow planning and the discipline.

Mike Pine: You said 14 months, a turnaround like that?

Mel Latu: 14 months.

Mike Pine: So, 14 months- a business is obviously operating much better with much more profit on the horizon potentially. What has it actually done in the last 14 months? An actual profit. Are they [00:25:00] taking money home that they weren't taking before?

Mel Latu: Oh, yeah. So, not only are they both- it's a married couple, so they both take a salary, but they also have been able to afford an office manager to take some pressure off the wife, because it's a husband-wife team. So, they can't work full-on in a business and also someone at home...

who's at home. So, it gave them a paycheck, but it also let them hire support where they have a quality of life, and they can go home, and they have a whole team running that new multimillion dollar operation for them.

Mike Pine: So, hidden money in cashflow, hidden peace in cashflow, hidden efficiency in cashflow, hidden profitability in cashflow. Nice.

Kevin Schneider: Very nice. Yeah. That's a good story. I like that. I want to just talk about success stories all day.

Mel Latu: So, for just a personal success story, guys, B.O.S.S. started out, like I said, 2 weeks before quarantine. So, my client was 1, my revenue was $1500 dollars a month- not looking too good for my homestead. This is the official Year 3 and we [00:26:00] are going to hit three quarters of a million dollars,

and I don't mind sharing that number- might not be huge to a lot of people, it is huge to us, and my goal was to have $15,000 a month and be a sole prop and chill at my house and have a quality of life. Now, I have a team of five. We have an office. We get to serve our community. We have a giving budget.

So, we get to make sure that part of our revenue is going back into our community, and we get to lead the office and do servant leadership work. All things that were not in the scope, but got to be plugged in the scope by cashflow planning.

Kevin Schneider: You can give more when you make more. It's pretty hard to give when you yourself are trying to put food on your table. So, cashflow management actually benefits other people, other charities, your community, and you could be a lot more generous with cash. It's amazing.

Mel Latu: I love how with cashflow, so you can implement different levels of your company, and what you're doing with your business that you didn't even know was in the plan. Like, I love a giving budget. If I already know that these [00:27:00] things every year, every month, I want to be part of- and I don't want to wait to be asked, 'Hey, can you sponsor this?'

--And wonder if I have the money, I'm going to plan for it, and I can't wait. And every year we're going to sponsor this, and we're going to do this, and it's a bill to us. It's already planned. We're going to do it. So, if you're blessing the Kingdom through your business, you cannot go wrong.

Kevin Schneider: Nope. That's right. That's right. Mel, thank you so much for being here with us today. And I want to just keep chatting about success stories, but we have to go serve clients, that's what we get to do, but thank you so much for being here.

If someone wanted to get in contact with you, and we might have listeners all over the country, being a podcast, you're not just restricted to your geographic location. You can serve people remotely, and how would one get ahold of you?

Mel Latu: Absolutely. We do serve clients all over the US, and the easiest way to get in touch with us would be our website. There's an intake form out there.

You can learn a little bit about us and that is www.bossyour.business

Kevin Schneider: www.bossyour.business. All right. So, if y'all have any [00:28:00] questions about what Mel does or any of this kind of piqued your interest and you want to get to know this particular function of your business more, the accounting cashflow, if you want to get to know that a little bit more and get some more information, please go to her website www.bossyour.business and go through that consultation link.

Tremendous Mel. Thank you so much.

Mike Pine: There you have it. The Cashflow Queen on Hidden Money.

Kevin Schneider: There she is, in the flesh.

Mel Latu: Thanks guys.

Kevin Schneider: Thank you.

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