Blog · Territory, capacity and quota planning
Compare public-agency cash receipts and payments by fund against the cash budget. Build a weekly review that separates spending authority, grant timing and cash available for each purpose.
Cash flow management in public sector agencies compares dated receipts and payments by fund so finance can see which obligations can be paid when due. Keep spending authority, cash timing and permitted use as separate checks. A positive combined bank balance can conceal a shortage in the fund responsible for the next payment.
An approved budget answers whether spending is authorized. A cash schedule answers whether money will be available on the payment date. A fund or grant restriction answers which money can support the payment.
For federal agencies, GAO distinguishes appropriations, obligations and outlays: appropriations provide budget authority, obligations create a payment commitment, and outlays disburse cash. State and local agencies have their own legal frameworks, so retain the definitions and approvals supplied by the agency's finance office. Do not interpret an unused appropriation as a bank balance.
This review is an operational schedule built from existing records. The broader cash flow forecast explains how to extend receipts and payments over time; here the extra requirement is keeping each fund's constraints visible.
Start at a reconciled date and use the same cutoff for all files. Bring the treasury cash allocation by fund, receipt register, payment register, payroll calendar, grant claim schedule and approved budget export. Bank activity supports the reconciliation; the fund ledger supplies ownership of pooled cash.
Give every movement a transaction ID, fund, program, cash date, receipt or payment direction, amount, status and source reference. Add the grant or appropriation identifier where applicable. Keep forecast dates separate from posting dates so a delayed claim does not disappear into the wrong week.
Use positive amounts in the receipt and payment columns. Label transfers explicitly. A transfer between two agency funds changes their individual balances but creates no external receipt for the agency as a whole.
Translate the budget into a dated cash plan before comparing it with bank movements. An accrual expense budget includes items with different payment dates; comparing it directly with weekly cash payments confuses timing with overspending. Budget staff should still perform their separate appropriation and commitment checks.
Closing fund cash = Opening fund cash + Cash receipts - Cash payments
Cash payment variance = Actual payments - Planned payments
Consider an illustrative US municipal agency for the week ending October 16, 2026. Opening balances are reconciled fund allocations. All amounts below are whole dollars, with no rounding.
| Fund | Opening cash (USD) | Planned receipts (USD) | Actual receipts (USD) | Planned payments (USD) | Actual payments (USD) | Closing cash (USD) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| General operations | 180,000 | 250,000 | 240,000 | 250,000 | 270,000 | 150,000 |
| Transit grant | 90,000 | 100,000 | 40,000 | 100,000 | 110,000 | 20,000 |
| Restricted capital | 120,000 | 0 | 0 | 30,000 | 30,000 | 90,000 |
| Total | 390,000 | 350,000 | 280,000 | 380,000 | 410,000 | 260,000 |
With these columns in A:G and the first fund in row 2, closing cash in G2 is:
=B2+D2-F2
Fill down through row 4. Payment variance in a separate column is =F2-E2. General operations paid $20,000 more than planned; transit paid $10,000 more; capital matched plan. These are cash timing variances until staff establish whether an underlying budget or scope change also occurred.
For a detailed register named Movements, with fund in A, date in B, receipts in C and payments in D, put the selected fund in J2 and the week's start and end dates in K2:L2:
=SUMIFS(Movements!C:C,Movements!A:A,J2,Movements!B:B,">="&K2,Movements!B:B,"<"&L2+1)
=SUMIFS(Movements!D:D,Movements!A:A,J2,Movements!B:B,">="&K2,Movements!B:B,"<"&L2+1)
The exclusive upper boundary also includes records with a time on the final date. Review excluded and undated rows before accepting the totals.
The movement identity is $390,000 + $280,000 - $410,000 = $260,000. The fund closings also sum to $150,000 + $20,000 + $90,000 = $260,000. Match that total to reconciled treasury cash, accounting for outstanding items consistently.
Planned closing cash was $390,000 + $350,000 - $380,000 = $360,000. Actual closing cash is $100,000 lower: receipts were $70,000 lower and payments were $30,000 higher. The bridge is therefore -$70,000 - $30,000 = -$100,000.
General receipts explain $10,000 of the receipt gap; transit receipts explain $60,000. Send those differences to the collection and grant owners with source references. Do not explain the entire movement as overspending when most of the closing gap comes from receipts.
Transit now has $20,000. If its next payment is $60,000 and no eligible receipt arrives first, that fund reaches -$40,000. The agency's combined $260,000 does not resolve the fund constraint by itself.
For federal awards, payment rules depend on recipient type and payment method. 2 CFR 200.305 distinguishes state arrangements from other recipients and connects qualifying advances to immediate cash needs. Use the actual award terms and claim status; an award amount is not a deposit schedule.
The grant owner should confirm claim timing, while treasury and budget staff evaluate permitted actions. Carry a transfer only after the required authority is confirmed. The 13-week cash flow layout can hold the dated schedule, and a cash flow management system provides the broader review process.
Bring a sample of your own fund cash allocation, receipt and payment schedules, and cash budget in a file or Google Sheet. Covirage maps the columns, its tools compute and check the fund balances and variances, and the external AI model explains the result with every figure traced to its rows. Create a free Covirage account and bring a sample of your own export.
See FP&A reporting for the supporting reporting approach.
No. An appropriation provides spending authority under its applicable conditions. It does not establish when receipts will reach a bank account. A cash schedule tests payment timing, while the agency's budget controls test whether spending is authorized. Both checks are needed.
Funds may share a bank account under the agency's arrangements, but that does not make their balances interchangeable. Preserve the fund allocation in the cash schedule. Any transfer or temporary borrowing needs the applicable authority and approvals before it enters the operating case.
Use the expected deposit date supported by the claim's status and the award's payment terms. Keep the claim amount, submission date and responsible owner alongside it. Show a later-receipt case where a reimbursement is uncertain rather than treating the award date as the cash date.