QoE workbench
A Quality of Earnings your investor will trust and your lender can check line by line.
Build the earnings bridge period by period, with a category, evidence and a support status on every adjustment, then lock it. The locked number is the one every other module uses.
Why it matters
Buyers need confidence that the earnings they are paying for are real, recurring and sustainable. A Quality of Earnings analysis separates one-time events, owner perks and accounting anomalies from the true economic earnings of the business. It protects you from overpaying on inflated earnings, gives the seller's numbers credibility when they are documented, surfaces concentration and aggressive accounting early, and backs every price adjustment you ask for with data.
A CPA engagement for this typically costs $25,000 to $75,000 per deal. Acquiror AI gives you the workbench on every deal you screen, on every plan.
What you do in it
- Create a period. FY2022, FY2023, FY2024, LTM, with reported EBITDA and SDE from the statements.
- Add adjustments. One signed amount per adjustment: positive is an add-back, negative a deduction. Each carries a category (non-recurring, owner-related, and the rest), a metric (EBITDA or SDE), a recurrence (one-time, ongoing or run-rate) and a confidence level.
- Attach evidence. Notes, general-ledger references and links to invoices or payroll records sit on the adjustment, not in a side file.
- Review. Mark adjustments Ready for Discussion. The support status says whether the evidence is sufficient. Approve or reject each one.
- Lock the period. Locking makes the adjusted EBITDA the authoritative figure for Valuation, Financing and the memo.
Scope
A workbench for your own analysis, documented adjustment by adjustment. The output is your Quality of Earnings with its evidence. A CPA-signed report is a separate engagement, and its findings come in as evidence (see the FAQ).
Since 1 October 2026, on an SBA 7(a) acquisition at a Business Purchase Price of $3 million or more, which excludes any owner-occupied real estate, the lender must obtain its own Quality of Earnings, with a cash proof, and use its earnings in the coverage test (SOP 50 10 8.1). The cash proof, which reconciles bank data to the statements and the tax return, belongs to the QoE firm; the workbench is where you build and lock the figure that report will be checked against, so it confirms your number instead of replacing it.
How it connects
Valuation, Comparable Valuation, Financing and Investment Memo stay closed until a period is locked. Valuation's market approach reads the locked EBITDA or SDE. The Normalized Income Statement and Balance Sheet carry the same adjustment-and-evidence pattern line by line.
What comes out of it
- Adjusted EBITDA and adjusted SDE per period, with the full bridge.
- An evidence appendix in the investment memo: numbered source documents and GL references behind every approved adjustment.
- A memo QoE section that lists adjustments in three groups, approved, run-rate and excluded, so a reader can reconcile it to the seller's add-back schedule line by line.
- A narrative that uses the approved add-back amounts only. Draft lines never reach the memo.
Questions
Can I bring my own CPA's QoE?
Yes. Enter the periods and the adjustments they found, attach their workpapers as evidence, and lock. You get the bridge in the memo and the same figure in the financing model.
Who can lock?
Admins and Editors build and lock; the QoE Reviewer permission adds a cross-deal review queue for the person whose job is to sign off; Auditors can read and export but never change a figure.
Does the AI decide the add-backs?
No. It extracts the reported figures and can suggest where to look. Every adjustment is created, evidenced and approved by a person.
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