We’re really excited to share that in the weeks ahead, we’re rolling out new functionality in the Xero Me mobile app that will let employees record their start, end and unpaid break times. This new feature will help you keep accurate payroll records and save time on manual processes such as chasing timesheets or reviewing information before doing payruns in Xero. It also helps with your record- keeping requirements as an Australian employer under the Fair Work Act 2009.
Making employee management easy
This new Xero Me feature is fast, easy to use and seamlessly connected with Xero Payroll. You’ll not only have visibility of the start, end and unpaid break times entered by employees, but you’ll also be able to easily view any employee notes added to time entries, for easy communication.
Please note: there are no changes to the approval workflow for team manager roles processing timesheets for payruns on web or mobile.
Here’s a handy infographic that you can share with your employees, to help them enter their start, end and break times in Xero Me.
You can download the infographic here.
Xero Me is included with every Xero Payroll subscription and is designed to make employee management easier for small businesses. It allows your employees to access payslips, submit and manage timesheets, leave requests and claim expenses – all in one place.
Empowering your employees to self-serve these critical people tasks means less manual work for you, while helping to support a faster pay run. We’re working on some other exciting features for Xero Me and will keep you updated. As always, we’ll continue listening to the product ideas you’d like to see in Xero.
We’re renaming My Payroll to Xero Me
In the weeks ahead, we will also be changing the name of My Payroll to Xero Me. My Payroll is the web-based version of the Xero Me app, so it makes sense to make sure they’re aligned, as we continue to enhance the functionality of our employee self-service tools and give you more time back to spend on your people.
These are exciting changes and really show how much we’re focused on supporting small businesses in Australia. But really, it’s just the beginning. As always, we look forward to hearing what you think about the new functionality in Xero Me, and hope you and your employees love it as much as we do.
I saw a notice pop up when I went into Xero but didn’t have time right then to read it – thought it told me this was available. I am a payroll admin user – how can I tell when this is rolled out?
Where will it be shown as available?
Been waiting on this since 2014 and now it seems to be so close yet frustratingly still so far because I can’t determine if it has been released on my account as yet.
Hi Kerrie, we are rolling out this functionality in phases. We started to roll it out in Australia from 18 July first by making it available to payroll admins, then to employees the week starting 25 July so if you haven’t go access to it yet – you should very shortly. If you still haven’t got access to the functionality in the next day or two, please raise a ticket with our support team so we can investigate. Thanks!
hi,
i too at this stage have not got the function
Hi Karen, can you please raise a ticket with our support team so that we can take a look into this for you. Thanks!
Hi,
With Xero Me, can employees enter Job numbers (cost centres) against the hours worked – for costing purposes
cheers
Brendan
Hi Brendan, payroll admins can assign timesheet tracking categories when approving all timesheets. However, the new start and end timesheets do not allow employees to assign tracking categories when submitting time – however, they can allocate their job numbers through the notes functionality in timesheets. Your comment has also been shared with our product team.
Without the employee being able to choose a tracking category it means an extra step for payroll admin and defeats the purpose. I was exited about it initially but it falls short. I would rather see the ability to enter the comments and the tracking option included in the start stop time option then it would be really useful. You need to back this up with the ability to get the info out of the caged reports. Ie ability to have the option to report start stop times, comments and tracking fields.
Hi Gerry, thanks so much for sharing your feedback with us – your suggestion has been passed on to our product teams who are working on this functionality. Thanks again!
Can you also look into the possibility that the timesheets link to invoice creation for each client (categories) when assigning tracking categories is allowed?
I was also excited about this new function, however it really needs the ability to to choose a tracking category
Thanks for your feedback, Cheryl.
You mention the employee can make notes on their added time entries. Can you please provide some further information on how the employee can add any notes to their timesheet. Thank you.
Hi Lucy, can you please raise a ticket with our support team so we can give you a hand with adding notes. Thanks so much!
Can this functionality please be added to the Web access not just app version?
While this is a good feature It seems clunky for employees. It would be easier to just have 1 button that says start shift or end shift and same for breaks when opening the app. Something to consider for future. I am a payroll manager been using these sorts of apps for a while and the less employees have to do the better. Just a suggestion.
Thanks so much for your suggestion, Rhonda – which has been shared with the rest of the team.
How do you set up the start and finish times my guys seem to still only enter the whole hours there is no lines for start and finish
Hi Emma, thanks for the comment. Here’s a helpful article explaining how to add, edit and delete timesheets in Xero Me (formerly My Payroll). You can also find other related articles about timesheets that may also help. If you are still having trouble getting set up, please raise a ticket with our support team so that we can give you a hand. Thanks!
Love the idea, however our employees do a standard 40 hour week – 7.6 hours of ordinary pay and 0.4 hours paid at time and a half per day. When the employee enters their start, finish and break times into the app, there is no option to change the rate of pay. Is there an option for me to set up rules in the background so that any hours over 7.6 per day are moved to overtime? The only option that I can currently see is me (as the approver) having to manually adjust the timesheet once it has been submitted. Thanks 🙂
Hi Tarryn, thanks so much for your question. We recommend you having a quick chat with our support team so we can give you a hand here. Here’s how to raise a support ticket with us. Thanks!
10th August and still no access to the new Xero Me functionality for both payroll admin and employees – I have raised a ticket with your support team today and hopefully they will get back to me this week
Is it possible for employees to enter deploy shifts? So if someone works 8-11am and then 4-7pm on the same day for example?
Hi Elissa, we recommend you having a quick chat with one of our experts, who’ll be able to give you a hand. Here’s how you can get in touch with them -> https://central.xero.com/s/article/Get-help-from-Xero-Support Thanks!
Is this going to be available in NZ? I would love this function
Hi Sara, thanks for you comment. This functionality is currently just being rolled out in Australia but we will announce when this functionality becomes available in other regions.
Hi. Will this new functionality give employers the ability to create a roster/schedule in Xero for their employees for upcoming pay periods? Thanks
Can the start and finish time function be added to the web access and not just the xero me app.
It would be great if we could use the timesheets to record hours in line with Fairwork Australia but not have the timesheet impact on the individual’s pay. For example, a team member worked 1 hour less than their ordinary hours and their pay template was updated to reflect this.
Having an option to just record hours vs a timesheet for the purposes of pay would be awesome.
Great work on the new features 🙂
Is it possible to set this as the default timesheet options rather than having all employees needing to change the setting from ‘Total hours worked’?
Seems abit useless without the tracking category functionality turned on. Back to the old timesheet for us ?
Argh I was so excited about this feature until I tested it and realised that we can’t input tracking categories. Our employees go to multiple jobs each day so one note is not enough, this is completely useless to us without this feature 🙁
Is there a function to set up automated reminders to employees to complete their timesheets?
Great feature, but would like this option to be available in the web interface, as opposed to just the app.
How do we see the start and finish times when approving timesheets in Xero?
Any idea when this will be rolled out to the UK?
Can you please advise when this will be available in NZ
Thanks for reaching out! We encourage you to raise a case in Xero Central so the team can look into this for you.
We are new to using the Payroll function and we would like to start using the Xero Me app so that the employees can submit their own timesheets. When I go in and tray and enter my timesheet I can add start time and finish time and a break but then how do I enter another Start and Finish time for work not unpaid for the same day? I do split shifts so work 9:30 – 1:00 then have a break from 1:00-4:00 then work again from 4:00 – 7:00 but I can’t enter the 2nd work time in
Hi Kirsty, thanks for your message. If you get in touch with our support team they will be able to help answer your specific query: https://central.xero.com/s/article/Get-help-from-Xero-Support
Hi, how do you go about adding in overnight shifts (i.e. start one day, end the next). At present, I can’t find a way?
Hi Damien, if this Xero Central article doesn’t answer your question, please feel free to raise a case and one of our team will be able to answer your question – thank you.
I’d like to suggest a feature that would allow us to change over to using Xero Me for timesheets – A “kiosk” that staff enter their real-time start and finish times. Clock in, clock out that records the time of each entry. Having a lot of staff to manage, it either leaves too much faith in staff honor or too cumbersome to follow up each staff member’s declared times.
All other paid timesheet management programs have this feature.