What the sponsor and the lenders will ask for
- A 13-week cash forecast, updated weekly, from real bank balances.
- Covenant compliance: leverage, interest cover and liquidity ratios, with headroom and an early warning when the forecast says it will tighten.
- Consolidated statements across every entity and currency, reconciled with the cash.
- A monthly board pack built from the same numbers, so nobody argues about which version is right.
- Scenarios: what happens to cash and covenants if sales fall, a customer pays late or a refinancing slips.
Why time to value is the first criterion
The value-creation plan starts at closing. A tool that needs six months of implementation delivers its first forecast when the first lender reporting date has already passed. Look for direct ledger connections, bank feeds through open banking and a trial on your own data in the first week.
Questions to ask
- Can we see our own consolidated cash position, from our own banks, within days?
- Are covenants computed from the statements, or typed in a separate sheet?
- Does the cash forecast reconcile with the P&L and the balance sheet?
- Is pricing per entity? Add-on acquisitions will add entities.
Where K-φ fits
K-φ produces the P&L, balance sheet and indirect cash flow from a general-ledger import, consolidates entities, monitors covenants with breach alerts and builds board packs from the same numbers. Its Cash workspace adds bank feeds, invoices, the Cash worksheet and a forecast where each closed month replaces the assumption with the actual. Entities and currencies are unlimited in one plan at $999 per month for the whole group, so add-on acquisitions do not change the price. There is a free trial on your own data.