Profit and loss report  ·  July 2026  ·  prepared 18 August 2026

Performance and outturn

Seven months of actuals, August billed, September scheduled. On the basis that carries stock and WIP and charges the payroll the books have not posted, with corporation tax and the group payment shown separately.

Present as slides  ›13 slides  ·  July 2026
1The year so far

Read these as a period rather than one month at a time. Turnover and gross profit are exactly as reported and no month is restated; overheads carry the Employers NI and depreciation the books have not posted, charged to the months that should have had them, so the seven month result is the same figure the outlook starts from. January carries the stock and WIP journals, so its margin is not comparable with anything. June and July are each other: June billed the work and the cost of doing it landed in July, which is why one shows 44.3 per cent and the other a negative margin, and why the two together run an ordinary 25.9 per cent.

MonthTurnoverGross profitMarginOverheadsResult
Do not read June as a good cost month
Where the monthly bar comes from The shape of the year

Turnover by quarter against the average quarter, across the two complete years. January to March is weak on volume and on margin in every year on record, and it is weak by design: the service book went to The Good Heating Co, so this is a pure installation business and the winter trough is permanent. These four numbers are the weights: the year's overhead requirement is split between the quarters in proportion to them, then divided across each quarter's three months. That is the pale bar in the chart below.

Gross profit against a seasonally weighted bar

What the month needs Earned, cleared it Earned, short of it Negative month Expected, not yet reported Carries journals, not comparable
Why the bar is not flat
A flat monthly target would mark this business down every January and reward it every August for the same effort. The bar spreads the year's overhead requirement across the quarters in proportion to the seasonal index, so a month is measured against what that month can reasonably carry.
2Against the prior years

The prior year books carry systematic posting gaps and are a directional gauge, not an audit baseline. The one restatement that matters is Russell's wage, which no prior year carries and which understates them by £35,430 a year.

BasisTurnoverGross profitMarginOverheadsResult
3Where the year lands

Four versions of the same result Seven months to 31 July

The third rung is the basis everything below uses. Stock and WIP are in it, because deferring the cost of materials bought but not used is how a month is matched properly, and the Employers NI and depreciation the books have not posted are charged against it. Corporation tax and the group payment sit at the fourth rung and are not inside any figure that follows.

Rolling the start point forwardTurnoverGross profitOverheadsResult
What September actually says
4The only part still open

Fourth quarterTurnoverGross profitOverheadsQ4 resultFull year
How much Q4 can actually change
The margin every line converts through
Why the actuals are left exactly as reported
Billing timingTurnoverCost its billing justifiesCost bookedDifferenceMargin
5Against last year

QuarterTurnover 2025Turnover 2026ChangeResult 2025Result 2026Change
The full year on each basis20262025Change
Which basis to quote
6How far the forecast can go

Worth stating plainly so the numbers above are read for what they are.

This business books short and installs quickly on a three week lead time, so there is no order book stretching months ahead. August is billed because the work is done or in hand, and September is scheduled because it sits inside that window. December is not forecastable in the same way, which is why the fourth quarter is shown as a range off its own history rather than as a number.

That range is narrow enough not to matter much. Two complete years is a thin base for a worst and a best, and it should be said plainly, but every fourth quarter on record lands close to the turnover the quarter needs to pay for itself, so the spread it produces is small against a year that is already three quarters decided.

What is worth challenging is the September mix rather than the arithmetic. The free days in the month are assumed to come in richer than the work already booked, and if they come in at the booked rate instead, September is a break even month rather than a contributing one.