<prompt> Human: I have a business which is turning over 650,000 PA after 2.5 years. My costs are high and the profit margins are very low. Im not really paying myself and have 4.5 staff who are all on around 70k PA. To setup the business I went into debit - currently 27k in CC from 33. I have 11k cash and am paying most of my bills on time. Ive been chipping away at the credit card debt but when I have slow clients to pay it builds up again. and Im struggling to maintain any progress. Any ideas?  <response>: Are you running a business or a charity?The purpose of a business is to make profits.But, even more importantly, businesses go bust even if profitable if they dont look after cash flow.Your cash flow sounds like it is on the thin edge of disaster.Make a plan and a cash flow budget.You need to cut costs or boost margins, or both, and you need to get more cash in.Look at your terms of trade. Try to get paid faster by your customers and pay slower to your suppliers.Check your bad debts and try to collect them.Dont grow until you have more cash. Growth eats cash.Out of that 650k turnover, how much is losing money or very low margin. If you fire those customers or cut those products or services can you cut the costs of supplying them faster than you cut the margins.Get your margins up.Manage your cash flow intensively.11k cash in the business and 27k of CC debt on a 650k revenue business is a disaster just waiting to happen.Start making changes now! 