Software Second Look: Xero

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Xero is designed to support small businesses and their advisors and to help them grow and thrive. Xero’s online accounting serves as the foundation upon which businesses can build a complete solution connecting their banks, their accountant, payment services, and third-party apps, so everything is securely available on any device at any time from anywhere.

Businesses can configure the Xero platform to suit them, from working with customers to managing their staff, from connecting with advisors to working smarter via specialized tools and apps designed especially for their type of business. Xero is designed to help small businesses become more successful, so they grow into larger businesses.

The Perfect Feature Set

One of the ways Xero provides avenues for small business success is via increased efficiency, and that efficiency comes through the software itself. Xero is powered by automation and machine learning designed to reduce the time businesses must spend in invoicing, reconciling transactions, and paying suppliers. Xero transforms the way that small businesses work changing chores that previously took hours into tasks that take minutes.

For example, Xero’s Bank feeds connect directly to your bank so transactions flow automatically into your financial records each business day. The vast majority of these transactions can be automatically coded to your accounting based upon artificial intelligence and established rules.

It takes only moments to confirm transactions needing special attention, like a first-time charge. This simplification means that your money-in and money-out always match your bank reconciliation, no more long nights of trying to figure out why you aren’t in balance with the bank.

And just what about all those receipts and expenses you have a hard time keeping track of? With the integration of Hubdoc, you can eliminate data entry, it simplifies the import and conversion of your bills, receipts, and monthly statements into fully categorized accounting data within your Xero records. When you are on the go, Hubdoc is there with you, the mobile app will record any expense, and make certain that every receipt you use to loose is now in your books as a deductible expense.

Speaking of Hubdoc, learn more about boosting your efficiency with Xero and Hubdoc in our webinar, "Getting to Know Hubdoc" on September 22 at 2:00 p.m. Eastern Time. You can register here.

But controlling your expenses or money-out is just one side of the business, Xero is also there for you when it comes to helping you get paid and get paid faster. You will send professional quotes far more quickly than before because everything is integrated, your customer information, your inventory, costs, purchasing, and jobs underway.

It’s easy then to turn those quotes instantly accepted from your clients online into invoices with a payment link built right into the invoice so you can get paid right away. Because Xero integrates seamlessly with Stripe, PayPal and GoCardless you can accept debit and credit card payments on your invoices which makes getting paid fast and seamless.

You can find more details about the 'core' features of Xero here.

What about Projects/Job Tracking?

You say, “Murph, that all sounds good for some of my small business clients that are in the service industry or retail sales, but what about my heavy-duty clients?”

Well, since the first time I looked at Xero they have enhanced features that work for larger ‘small businesses’, or maybe I should say more complex small businesses. A lot of businesses are ‘project-oriented’ and that’s where Xero Projects comes into play. Xero Projects helps businesses drive profitability by tracking time and costs on every job.

With support for unlimited projects, businesses that charge clients on a time-basis can see all their work in progress, monitor project budgets, and costs, and invoice for their time as well as their related costs and expenses. But Xero Projects goes further than just ‘tracking’, it also provides actionable financial insights so business owners can make informed decisions to complete more profitable projects.

And if Xero Projects still isn’t up to the demands of the business model for your client, then Xero can offer you ‘Workflow Max’ which is an even more comprehensive project management solution that provides sophisticated quoting features typically only found in 3rd-party solutions, built-in time time-tracking, invoicing that matches perfectly to the quotation and even further refined job management features.

What I am telling you is that Xero has a wide variety of options when it comes to the level of project management because they understand that ‘one size’ doesn’t fit all.

What about Payroll?

I know that some of you are wondering about Payroll because when we first looked at Xero, they were just starting to offer their own payroll and they didn’t have it available in all states.  But back in the middle of 2018, Xero decided they would ‘partner’ with Gusto to bring full-service payroll to Xero users in all 50 states within the United States. By the beginning of 2019, those ‘Xero payroll’ users were transitioned, and new customers had already been on-boarding to the Gusto experience.

Via the Gusto integration, Xero’s payroll of today gives businesses an easy-to-use full-service payroll functionality to manage their needs all reported in the Xero accounting ledger. Xero marketing claims that “Small businesses spend 75 percent less time managing employee payroll than before they started using Gusto integrated with Xero”. Since Insightful Accountant has previously given Gusto a First Look and found them to be a comprehensive and streamlined payroll application, I’m fairly confident that Xero’s claim of time savings is accurate (although I have no way of measuring that).

Want to know more about how Gusto works with Xero? Find out here.

Going Anywhere with Xero

You already know that Xero is ‘cloud-based’ and so you can access it anywhere you have a browser that can connect with the internet, but some of you are probably wondering about a ‘mobile app’ because you live on your phone or tablet when it comes to work. Of course, Xero has an app.

The Xero accounting mobile app allows users to manage their business while on the go whether they use an iPhone or Android device. For example, a business owner can reconcile his bank account over morning coffee with the family, so he starts his day knowing exactly where he stands and how his business is performing. Maybe his wife, who is ‘VP of Everything’ will take the time during breakfast to Email some invoices, or upload some received bills and receipts for purchases via Hubdoc, or maybe even process tomorrow’s payroll.

In short, the Xero mobile app helps business owners and managers stay on top of their daily tasks while they’re out and about while also helping them make the most of their spare moments and giving them more free time away from the workplace.

We can’t cover it all

Even an Insightful Accountant Second Look can’t cover every feature or function of any software, and certainly, I have hardly even touched on all the core features of Xero. There is so much more like Security, and Multi-currency, and their Expense app, and Dashboard, and Reporting capabilities, and well… you get the idea, we have just touched the surface of Xero.

You can learn a lot more about Xero by visiting their US website. But the best way to experience Xero is to use it, and you can do that with a ‘Free trial’. Even if you have previously looked at Xero yourself, I encourage you to take the time to give it your own ‘Second Look’ again, because it has evolved over the past few years.

If you are looking for Xero outside of the United States then I am going to send you to this Xero website. I like this site the best because even though you will land on the 'South Africa Region' as noted in the upper right corner, you can then choose the region you wish to go to using the drop-down. Select from various countries, or the 'Global' version.

Back in the U.S., if you are an Accountant, Bookkeeper, or a Business Consultant who is interested in offering Xero to your clients, then you need to check out the Xero Partner Program which you can learn more about that by reading our Insightful Accountant Advisor Alliance feature on Xero.

Learn more about boosting your efficiency with Xero and Hubdoc in our webinar, "Getting to Know Hubdoc" on September 22 at 2:00 p.m. Eastern Time. You can register here.