What is Accounts Receivable?
Accounts Receivable (A/R) is defined as payments owed to a company by its customers for products and/or services already delivered to them – i.e. an “IOU” from customers who paid on credit.
What is the Definition of Accounts Receivable (A/R)?
Under accrual accounting, the accounts receivable line item, often abbreviated as “A/R”, refers to payments not yet received by customers that paid using credit rather than cash.
Conceptually, accounts receivable represents a company’s total outstanding (unpaid) customer invoices.
Given the fact that the customer has not yet paid the company, the question becomes: “Is accounts receivable an asset or a liability?”
Since the unmet payment obligation represents a future economic benefit to the company, the accounts receivables line item is categorized as a current asset on the balance sheet, i.e. the company anticipates to receive the owed payment in cash soon.
However, as part of the revenue recognition policy established under accrual accounting standards, the amount charged to the customer is recognized as revenue once the customer is billed, irrespective of the fact that the cash still remains under the possession of the customer.
Whether cash payment was received or not, revenue is still recognized on the income statement and the amount to be paid by the customer can be found on the accounts receivable line item.
Accounts Receivable Formula (A/R)
For purposes of forecasting accounts receivable in a financial model, the standard modeling convention is to tie A/R to revenue, since the relationship between the two are closely linked.
More specifically, the days sales outstanding (DSO) metric is used in the majority of financial models to project A/R. DSO measures the number of days on average it takes for a company to collect cash from customers that paid on credit.
The formula for days sales outstanding (DSO) is calculated as follows.
To properly forecast A/R, it’s recommended to follow historical patterns and how DSO has trended in the past couple of years, or to just take an average if there appear to be no significant shifts.
Then, the projected accounts receivable balance can be determined using the following formula.
- Increasing DSO → If the days sales outstanding (DSO) of a company have been increasing over time, that implies the company’s collection efforts require improvement, as more A/R means more cash is tied up in operations.
- Decreasing DSO → But if DSO declines, that implies the company’s collection efforts are improving, which has a positive impact on the cash flows of the company.
How to Interpret Accounts Receivable?
If a company’s accounts receivable balance increases, more revenue must have been earned with payment in the form of credit, so more cash payments must be collected in the future.
On the other hand, if a company’s A/R balance declines, the invoices billed to customers that paid on credit were completed and the money was received in cash.
To reiterate, the relationship between accounts receivable and free cash flow (FCF) is as follows:
- Increase in A/R → The company’s sales are increasingly paid with credit as the form of payment instead of cash.
- Decrease in A/R → The company has successfully retrieved cash payments for credit purchases.
With that said, an increase in accounts receivable represents a reduction in cash on the cash flow statement, whereas a decrease reflects an increase in cash.
On the cash flow statement (CFS), the starting line item is net income, which is then adjusted for non-cash add-backs and changes in working capital in the cash from operations (CFO) section.
Since an increase in A/R signifies that more customers paid on credit during the given period, it is shown as a cash outflow (i.e. “use” of cash) – which causes a company’s ending cash balance and free cash flow (FCF) to decline.
While the revenue has technically been earned under accrual accounting, the customers have delayed paying in cash, so the amount sits as accounts receivables on the balance sheet.
What is the Difference Between Accounts Receivable vs. Accounts Payable?
- Accounts Receivable (AR): Current asset recorded on the balance sheet that captures the outstanding cash payments still owed from customers, i.e. the money owed from customers that paid using credit.
- Accounts Payable (AP): Current liability recognized on the balance sheet that reflects the cash payments that the company owes to suppliers and vendors, i.e. the company paid using credit as the form of payment.
Accounts Receivable Example: Amazon Balance Sheet (AMZN)
The screenshot below is from the latest 10-K filing by Amazon (AMZN) for fiscal year ending 2021.
Amazon.com, Inc. 10-K Filing, 2022 (Source: AMZN 10-K)
Accounts Receivable Calculator (A/R)
We’ll now move to a modeling exercise, which you can access by filling out the form below.
1. Historical Days Sales Outstanding Calculation (DSO)
In our illustrative example, we’ll assume we have a company with $250 million in revenue in Year 0.
Moreover, at the beginning of Year 0, the accounts receivable balance is $40 million but the change in A/R is assumed to be an increase of $10 million, so the ending A/R balance is $50 million in Year 0.
For Year 0, we can calculate the days sales outstanding (DSO) with the following formula:
- DSO, Year 0 = $50m ÷ $250m x 365 = 73 Days
2. Accounts Receivable Calculation Example (A/R)
As for the projection period from Year 1 to Year 5, the following assumptions will be used:
- Revenue Step Function = Increase by $20m per Year
- DSO Step Function = Increase by $5m per Year
Now, we’ll extend the assumptions until we reach a revenue balance of $350 million by the end of Year 5 and a DSO of 98 days.
Starting from Year 0, the accounts receivable balance expands from $50 million to $94 million in Year 5, as captured in our roll-forward.
The change in A/R is represented on the cash flow statement, where the ending balance in the accounts receivable (A/R) roll-forward schedule flows in as the ending balance on the current period balance sheet.
Since the DSO is increasing, the net cash impact is negative, and the company would likely need to consider making adjustments and identify the source of the growing accounts receivable balance, i.e. the collection issues.
