Xero Blog

There’s no doubt that automation is the key to efficiency when it comes to managing your finances, and those of your clients. Over the past month, we’ve released a number of features that reduce those time-consuming manual tasks – like sending emails to customers, managing duplicate transactions and tracking your time on projects – so you can focus on the things that matter.

The past few months have been challenging and taught us a lot about collaborating in remote environments. We know we do our best work when we stay #human and connected to customers and partners, so we’re proud to bring you these new features as we discover new ways to work together and strive to make Xero simple, seamless and smart.

This is a guest blog written by Kylie Parker, Xero partner and Director at Lotus Accountants I’ve been an accountant through the global financial crisis and the implementation of GST. Put those two things together and multiply them by ten, and that’s what it’s been like these past three months.

If you’re in the UK construction industry, using the Construction Industry Scheme (CIS), Xero can help reduce the administrative burden and paperwork.  We’ve just made some improvements, which mean you can now: Run a CIS audit report for ease of checking and greater insight into monthly return numbers Verify subcontractors from within Xero Calculate CIS deductions automatically when sending invoices using the Xero accounting app and desktop Run a CIS audit report The new CIS audit report lets you quickly see how the figures in your monthly return are made up.

We’re excited to announce that Document Packs are now live in Xero HQ, and just in time for the end of the financial year. As part of Xero HQ, Document Packs will give you an easy way to share documents with your clients, and includes the ability to add e-signatures through Xero Sign powered by Adobe Sign.

We know time is a luxury for small business owners and advisors, so we’re pleased to have released a number of new features in May that will save you time and give you better visibility of your business performance.

To help small businesses manage their cash flow during COVID-19, we’ve extended our short-term cash flow pilot to Xero customers with business edition plans until 31 August 2020. It represents the next wave of innovation for Xero – moving from real-time data to predicting the future.

Solving customer problems in simple and beautiful ways has always been an important part of what we do at Xero. During COVID-19, this focus has become more important than ever. As our teams are the ones who know our customers best, we thought we’d challenge them to deliver quick wins for our customers, to help their business survive today and thrive tomorrow.

E-invoicing has been touted as a way for small businesses to simplify their bookkeeping, by providing a fast, secure and more efficient way to send and receive invoices. However, wide-spread adoption will rely on governments and big business leading the way.