BUILT EXCLUSIVELY FOR THE CONSTRUCTION SUBCONTRACTOR INDUSTRY
The 13 week cashflow construction subcontractors actually need
A free 13-week cashflow forecast built specifically for JCT and NEC subcontractors. Application cycles, retentions, CIS and reverse charge VAT, all modelled the way your contracts actually work.
THE CHALLENGE
Paid in 60 days. Payroll on Friday.
Construction subcontracting has a cashflow problem baked into the contract terms. A generic cashflow forecasting template can't see it coming, because the squeeze isn't in your P&L. It's in your payment mechanisms.
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Weekly wages, monthly certificates
Labour gets paid every Friday. Your money arrives 30 to 60 days after the valuation date, once a month, if the certificate lands on time. That mismatch is the whole game, and most forecasts are too coarse to show it.
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Applied isn't certified
You apply for £200k and the QS certifies £184k. Undercertification and pay-less notices are a fact of life, but most models assume applications convert in full. Then the shortfall shows up in your bank balance instead of your forecast.
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Retention you can't touch
3% - 5% comes off every certificate. Half comes back at practical completion, the other half a year or more later, and only if someone chases it. That's real working capital sitting in someone else's bank account.
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CIS eating your receipts
Without gross payment status, 20% comes off the labour element of every payment before it reaches you. You get it back eventually, through offset, but "eventually" doesn't pay Friday's wages.
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Reverse charge VAT
You charge no VAT to main contractors but still pay it on materials and plant. Most subbies are now repayment traders and don't realise the refund is a cash inflow worth planning around.
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The mobilisation trap
Every new contract win is cash-negative for the first 4 to 8 weeks. Labour and materials go out before the first certificate pays. I've seen winning work sink a subcontractor faster than losing it.
THE SOLUTION
A 13-week cash flow forecast that speaks JCT and NEC
We've built a 13 week cash flow construction model designed around how subcontractors actually get paid. It works contract by contract: every job carries its own payment calendar, retention terms, certification behaviour and CIS treatment, and the weekly forecast builds itself from there. No per-project spreadsheet tabs, no formulas to rewrite when you win a job. You see exactly which week the squeeze hits, and how bad, before it happens.
WHAT'S INSIDE THE MODEL
Inside the 13 week cash flow construction model
1️⃣
Contract register
One row per live contract: retention %, application day, payment terms, undercertification assumption, PC and defects dates. Every calculation downstream reads from it.
2️⃣
Application schedule
Enter your gross application and the model does the rest: expected certification haircut, retention deducted, CIS deducted, and the week your cash actually lands.
3️⃣
Retention ledger
Both moieties tracked per contract, PC release and defects release, with expected dates, slippage assumptions and chase notes. Retention stops being a number you forgot about.
4️⃣
Weekly direct cost schedule
Labour, materials, plant hire and sub-subcontractors phased week by week, per contract. This is where the Friday wage bill meets reality.
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CIS, both directions
A gross/net toggle handles deductions from your receipts, the offset recovery, and the CIS you withhold from your own subbies (due to HMRC on the 22nd).
6️⃣
Reverse charge VAT
VAT repayments modelled as the inflows they are, so your refund cycle works for you instead of surprising you.
7️⃣
Sensitivity dials
Push every certificate back a week, or slip retention releases by a month, and watch what it does to your low point. Stress-testing liquidity takes seconds, not an afternoon.
8️⃣
Mobilisation visibility
New contract wins show their cash drag before the first certificate pays, so you can fund the ramp-up deliberately instead of discovering it.
9️⃣