What is a cash flow forecast (and why should I bother)?
Cash flow is the movement of money in and out of your business (see the
glossary page for more detail). If you run out of
cash, your business goes bankrupt - even if it's profitable.
A cash flow forecast captures your expectations, ideas and assumptions and translates
them into some performance indicators and a model that shows you how much cash your
business will have in the bank each month - and how much profit you will make.
A forecast is a bit like a map. You might be able to get-by without it, if you've done
it all successfully before a few times. But most of us haven't - and those that have
know that it's smart to narrow the odds. And running through some scenarios with
Finanscapes is cheaper than striding out into the dark with your fingers crossed!
Doesn't Accounting Software Do This?
Accounting software has leapt forward in the last few years and is now fantastic for
book-keeping and measuring historic performance. But it's poor at forecasting and the
future view. You need a specialist tool that's trusted by Universities, Enterprise
Agencies and Accountants...
How do I know if Finanscapes is any good?
We're trusted by universities, enterprise agencies and accountants. But don't take their
word for it, try it yourself. You get 3 days of unrestricted access to try it out. By
then you'll have learnt enough about your business to realise how what a difference
Finanscapes makes, and be wondering why anyone would try to hack together a
spreadsheet.
How does the trial work if I don't have to register?
You can try out finanscapes for free without registering - just click on free trial.
We'll automatically create an anonymous account for you, and tie it to your computer.
After a while we'll ask you to register so we can save your plan securely where only you
can access it.
I don't set a username or password so how does the login process work?
If we asked you for a username and password, chances are you'd give us the same one you
use for other websites - or even your bank. That's not very secure - so instead we use a
secure token that's given to us by one of your existing account providers like Google or
LinkedIn. It's more secure, means one less login for you to remember and means there's
one less site out there you're putting your password into.
Can you access my login account on other websites?
Certainly not - and even before the provider gives us your unique ID token you have to
agree, on their site, to them giving it to us. You'll see there that we only get access
to your email address and publicly available information (such as your tweets available
on the public Twitter website).
We use this login mechanism (called OAuth) specifically to protect your security.
Simple, Easy and Painless?
Absolutely. And we do it without trudging you through a series of restrictive "next",
"next", "next", "finish" steps. It's up to you to build and update your forecast however
you prefer, and in return we'll show you the things you need to know in the clearest way
possible - visually.
How secure are my plans?
We use industry-strength encryption to ensure you interact privately with our servers,
preventing eavesdroping or malicious modification. Our database servers are secured
behind two separate firewalls and hosted in a secure data-centre. Your plans are
secure.
You own the data you enter. We perform aggregated-analysis across all of the plans
stored in Finanscapes, but it's totally anonymous. Email our
data controller if you
would like your details and all un-published plans to be permanently removed from our
systems.
How long do you retain my data?
We retain your plans for three years after you cease being our customer. At that point
any non-published plans are automatically deleted.
If you do not register, we automatically delete your plans within a few months - so
please be sure to register in order to retain your work.
Why can't I delete a plan I've published?
Published plans are retained and accessible indefinitely. This is necessary as they may
have been used to justify a decision by a lenders or investor at any point, and we must
allow them to revisit the data they used to make that decision.