QoE & Add-back Checker
Paste an adjusted-EBITDA bridge. The checker categorises each add-back, applies the rule a decent QoE provider would apply, and tells you what's likely to come back out of the pro forma.
The eight categories
- Owner comp normalisation — accepted, but only to a market rate. Don't just delete the salary.
- Personal expenses run through the business — accepted, with documentation.
- One-time legal/settlement/restructuring — accepted if genuinely non-recurring. "One-time" five years in a row is recurring.
- COVID / pandemic / event-driven — accepted carefully. Don't add back foregone revenue without proof of permanence; don't normalise upward and downward selectively.
- Foregone revenue / pro-forma growth — usually rejected. Adjusted EBITDA reflects what happened, not what could have.
- Run-rate price increases / not-yet-realised cost cuts — usually rejected unless the action is taken and the savings are demonstrable.
- Stock-based comp — controversial. Sponsors often add back; QoEs note it. We flag it.
- Capitalisable software / ERP / R&D — accepted as add-back if the project is bounded and definitively complete.