Keeping an eye on your cash flow is essential for making good business decisions. And a cash flow statement is one of the key documents that lenders and investors take into account when assessing the general health of a company. For your business to be viable, it must generate enough income (receipts) to cover outgoings (payments). To track this, you need a system to accurately monitor the flow of money in and out.
Sales proceeds, investments, operational costs, taxes, debt repayments … most businesses have multiple revenue and expenditure streams. This makes it difficult to centralize information. Data is often processed by different departments, resulting in communication delays and a lack of standardization.
Even if you have an in-house accounting team, collating receipts and payment data is often still a manual task. Financial management software can help, especially when you want to create smart reports and visualizations. But these programs come with a hefty price tag. Worst of all, the time-consuming task of sourcing and combining data from across the company can remain a problem.
Every business has unique financial management processes. Nonetheless, there’s one thing that every company in the world has in common: spreadsheets. Thanks to the power of the cloud, you can use a cash flow template to create your own automated system that works just like a piece of custom software — entirely in spreadsheets.
Why use Google Sheets for cash flow management?
- Flexible: No matter what kind of business you run, Google Sheets allows you to build a tailor-made system. You can adapt it as needs change, without any new software.
- Accessible: You and your coworkers can access, share and work with all of your financial data from any corner of the world. All you need is an internet connection.
- Compatible with everything: Every other piece of software in the world integrates with Google Sheets. As a result, you can easily pull together income and expenses data from multiple departments simultaneously.
- Easy to use: There’s no need to onboard your team as they’ll already be working with spreadsheets on a daily basis. Maintenance is easy and there’s no need for IT support.
How to get started
Sheetgo’s template is a Google Sheets file for automated cash flow monitoring. It can be used by companies of any size, in any sector. The template gives managers a way to collect receipts and payments data automatically from multiple colleagues or departments.
What you get with this template:
When you get a copy of the Sheetgo Cash flow template, a Google Sheets files is saved to your Google Drive. This spreadsheet contains the following tabs: Instructions, Payments, Receipts, Monthly Cash Flow Chart, Cash Flow Analysis, Payment Analysis, and Receipt Analysis.
How to start using the template
Click here to get a copy of Sheetgo’s Cash Flow Template.
How to use the cash flow template
Step 1: Enter the settings for your cash flow monitor
In the Cash Flow Instructions tab, enter the start date for the time period you want to analyze and your starting balance.
Step 2: Start entering data
The Payments and Receipts worksheets are provided with sample data, to show you how the template works. You can simply delete or overwrite this data and start logging entries in your spreadsheet.
Step 3: Check out the automated reports
Once you start entering data into the Payments and the Receipts tabs, the template automatically generates reports in the Payment Analysis and the Receipt Analysis tabs.
The Monthly Cash Flow Chart contains an automated dashboard. Data flows into this file directly from the other tabs. Here you’ll get an overview of all the financial activities.
An all-in-one financial management solution
If you’re looking for an automated system to control your finances, check out our spreadsheet-based solution to automate your financial management and track all your business transactions.
