Days Sales Outstanding – DSO Definition

Days sales outstanding (DSO) is a measure of the average number of days that it takes a company to collect payment after a sale has been made. DSO is often determined on a monthly, quarterly or annual basis, and can be calculated by dividing the amount of accounts receivable during a given period by the total value of credit sales during the same period, and multiplying the result by the number of days in the period measured.

Days sales outstanding is an element of the cash conversion cycle and is often referred to as days receivables or average collection period.

Due to the high importance of cash in running a business, it is in a company's best interest to collect on its outstanding account receivables as quickly as possible. While companies can most often expect with relative certainty that they will, in fact, receive outstanding receivables, because of the time value of money principle, money that a company spends time waiting to receive is money lost. By quickly turning sales into cash, a company has a chance to put the cash to use again more quickly.

A high DSO number shows that a company is selling its product to customers on credit and taking longer to collect money. This may lead to cash flow problems because of the long duration between the time of a sale and the time the company receives payment. A low DSO value means that it takes a company fewer days to collect its accounts receivable. In effect, the ability to determine the average length of time that a company’s outstanding balances are carried in receivables can in some cases tell a great deal about the nature of the company’s cash flow.

It is important to remember that the formula for calculating DSO only accounts for credit sales. While cash sales may be considered to have a DSO of 0, they are not factored into DSO calculations because they represent no time between a sale and the company’s receipt of payment. If they were factored into the calculation, they would decrease the DSO, and companies with a high proportion of cash sales would have lower DSOs than those with a high proportion of credit sales.

• Days sales outstanding (DSO) is a measure of the average number of days that it takes a company to collect payment after a sale has been made.
• DSO indicates the amount of sales a company has made during a specific time period, how quickly customers are paying, if the company’s collections department is working well, if the company is maintaining customer satisfaction, or if credit is being given to customers that are not creditworthy.
• Generally speaking, a DSO under 45 days is considered low; however, what qualifies as a high or low DSO may often vary depending on business type and structure.

Days sales outstanding has a wide variety of applications. It can indicate the amount of sales a company has made during a specific time period; how quickly customers are paying; if the company’s collections department is working well; if the company is maintaining customer satisfaction; or if credit is being given to customers that are not creditworthy.

While looking at an individual DSO value for a company can provide a good benchmark for quickly assessing a company’s cash flow, trends in DSO are much more useful than an individual DSO value. If a company’s DSO is increasing, it may indicate a few things. It may be that customers are taking more time to pay their expenses, suggesting either that customer satisfaction is declining, that salespeople within the company are offering longer terms of payment to drive increased sales, or that the company is allowing customers with poor credit to make purchases on credit.

Additionally, too sharp of an increase in DSO can cause a company serious cash flow problems. If a company is accustomed to paying its expenses at a certain rate on the basis of consistent payments on its accounts receivable, a sharp rise in DSO can disrupt this flow and force the company to make drastic changes.

Generally, when looking at a given company’s cash flow, it is helpful to track that company’s DSO over time to determine if its DSO is trending in any particular direction or if there are any patterns in the company’s cash flow history. DSO may often vary on a monthly basis, particularly if the company is affected by seasonality. If a company has a volatile DSO, this may be cause for concern, but if a company’s DSO dips during a particular season each year, this is often less of a reason to worry.

As a hypothetical example, suppose that during the month of July, Company A made a total of $500,000 in credit sales and had $350,000 in accounts receivable. There are 31 days in July, so Company A’s DSO for July can be calculated as:

• ($350,000 / $500,000) x 31 = 0.7 x 31 = 21.7 days

With a DSO of 21.7, Company A has a short average turnaround in converting its receivables into cash. Generally speaking, a DSO under 45 days is considered low; however, what qualifies as a high or low DSO may often vary depending on business type and structure.

Like any metric attempting to gauge the efficiency of a business, days sales outstanding comes with a set of limitations that are important for any investor to consider before using it.

Most simply, when using DSO to compare the cash flows of multiple companies, one should compare companies within the same industry, ideally when they have similar business models and revenue numbers as well. As mentioned above, companies of different size often have very different capital structures, which can greatly influence DSO calculations, and the same is often true of companies in different industries.

DSO is not particularly useful in comparing companies with significant differences in the proportion of sales that are credit, as determining the DSO of a company with a low proportion of credit sales does not indicate much about that company’s cash flow. Comparing such companies with those that have a high proportion of credit sales also does not usually indicate much importance.

Furthermore, DSO is not a perfect indicator of a company’s accounts receivable efficiency, as fluctuating sales volumes can affect DSO, with any increase in sales frequently lowering the DSO value. Delinquent Days Sales Outstanding (DDSO) is a good alternative for credit collection assessment for use alongside DSO. Like any metric measuring a company’s performance, DSO should not be considered alone, but instead should be used with other metrics as well.