Fiscal Year

What is Fiscal Year?

A fiscal year is the 12-month period a business uses for financial reporting, budgeting, and tax filing. While many businesses use the calendar year (January through December), others choose a different 12-month period aligned with their business cycle.

Retailers often use a fiscal year ending January 31 to capture the full holiday season in one reporting period. Schools and government contractors may align fiscal years with contract or academic calendars.

Choosing a fiscal year affects when taxes are due, how annual financial performance is measured, and when budget cycles reset. A company with a March 31 fiscal year end files taxes on a different schedule than a calendar-year company. Quarterly comparisons must account for fiscal year differences when benchmarking. Fiscal year planning connects to budget versus actual tracking. Align your cash forecast periods with the fiscal calendar your board and tax advisor use to avoid mixed-period decisions. Mixed calendars create false variance when comparing budget to actual across teams.

Why it matters

Misaligning cash planning with fiscal year boundaries creates confusion. A retailer planning cash monthly while reporting annually on a January fiscal year end may miss the seasonal patterns that define their business.

Example

How RunwayCal helps

Common mistakes

• 1Mixing calendar year and fiscal year data in comparisons
• 2Not aligning cash planning cycles with fiscal reporting periods
• 3Forgetting that tax deadlines follow fiscal year, not calendar year