Xero is a fantastic business tool that helps you stay up to date with what is happening in your business. Xero’s features help you spend less time in the office. You can make Xero even more powerful with tradie job management apps.
Stay up to date
Xero keeps you up to date with what is happening in your business. Bank feeds automatically import transactions from your bank account or credit card directly into Xero. This helps you know your bank or credit card balance.
When you enter your supplier invoices or receipts into Xero, you can easily run reports to tell you what you have spent, who you still need to pay and when you need to pay them. Stop using your inbox as a filing system by saving a copy of supplier invoices and receipts to the individual transactions.
Increase your bank balance by getting paid by customers as quickly as possible. Convert quotes to invoices with a single click in Xero. If you have an online payment service setup such as Stripe, when the invoice is emailed to a customer there is a ‘pay now’ button. Customers can pay your invoice using their debit card, credit card or digital wallet such as Apple Pay and Google Pay. You receive the cash in your bank account two days after payment is made. If customers have not paid by your due date, you can setup automatic email reminders in Xero to remind customers to pay their outstanding invoices with you.
Spend less time in the office
Run your business on the go with your phone or tablet. Login to your Xero app on your phone to view your overall cash balance, monthly cash in and out, your outstanding invoices and outstanding bills. Use the app to take a photo of invoices or receipts on your phone to enter them into Xero.
Create online quotes in Xero on your phone or in your office. Save time by coping or editing previous quotes and using contact, inventory or pricing information you have previously saved. Send your customers an email to an online quote. They can review your quote and accept or decline your quote with a single click.
Xero payroll can save you time in managing your employees. When new employees join your business, you can lodge a tax file number declaration electronically via Xero rather than completing a paper form and sending it to the Australian Taxation Office. Once setup, Xero can accurately calculate each employee’s annual leave and personal/carer’s (sick) leave balance. The leave balances are updated after each pay run.
Xero payroll also has a timesheet feature where you can track the number of hours worked per pay period by your employees. Xero Me is phone app that allows employees to
- View past pay slips
- Enter timesheets
- Check leave balances
- View upcoming leave requests in the leave calendar
- Request, edit or delete leave requests, and
- Owners or managers can approve or reject leave requests & timesheets
The Xero Me features will reduce admin time in managing your employees and processing payroll.
When you are processing your payroll, you can either enter the hours or if you are using the timesheet option, the hours will be entered automatically for each employee in the pay run.
Xero calculates the employee’s gross earnings based on the type of hours worked such as ordinary hours or overtime and the applicable hourly rate. Xero will also calculate the employee’s income tax withholding and superannuation contribution. Rather than transfer each employee’s net pay in multiple online bank transfers, you can save time by using Xero’s batch payment feature.
Xero’s automatic superannuation payments remove the hassle of making multiple payments to different employee superannuation funds.
Xero saves you time by backing up your business information and automatically making updates to their software, so you are always on the latest version. When personal income tax rates or superannuation contribution rates change, Xero updates these rates, so you are always using the correct rate.
Keep your Xero data safe
Xero is cloud based software and they encrypt your business information. This means it is safe, secure, and available when you need it. You control who has access to your Xero data. Protect your business information with a strong password and either an authenticator app or Face ID on your phone.
Ditch the paper diary
When you are starting your business, a paper diary to schedule jobs, reminders, and estimate jobs is ok. When you grow your business and your team, you can extend Xero with specialist tradie job management apps. These apps assist with quotes, timesheets, job scheduling, GPS vehicle tracking & invoicing and they integrate or ‘talk’ to Xero. These apps give you greater control and help reduce the chaos and overwhelm in your business.
Some of our favourite tradie job management apps are Nextminute, Fergus, Servicem8 and Tradify.