2012 Review of Xero Online Accounting

Xero includes support for foreign currency transactions in the large service plan, and has localized versions of the product for the U.S, the U.K., New Zealand, and a generic global edition.

There is no upper limit on the number of people who can have simultaneous access to a company in Xero, however, only one user can have the role of the Practice Manager for an accounting firm at a time. Xero does not charge companies or partner accounting firms a fee for adding additional users to a company.

Day-to-Day Operations

The automated import and classification of transactions using Yodlee data feeds allows users to create rules for payments and cash receipts which use bank information to automate the classification of transactions. Xero does not natively support tracking of inventory stock, although a number of third party solutions are available to meet user needs for inventory and point of sale transactions.

Xero has limited customer relationship management tools, although the company has available interfaces for most CRM and contact management tools.

Management Features

Xero offers a partner program for accounting and bookkeeping professionals, and Partners have the ability to access all of their clients from a single page within the application. Staff logins are centrally controlled from the practice administrator’s login on the Xero website, and there are five different user security profiles which can be used to limit application access to each client company.

Integration/Import/Export

The Company has an active developer program, and integrations are available for a wide range of business needs, including CRM, e-Commerce, Inventory, Payroll, Point of Sale, and Time Tracking. Although many customer relationship management systems are supported (including Salesforce.com, Microsoft Dynamics CRM, ACT!, and SugarCRM), there are no U.S. payroll services listed in the add-on directory.

Help/Support

Xero has a strong help center with guides, frequently asked questions, video tutorials, and online training classes. The new company setup process is guided, and uses interview questions to create the required data.

The Company embeds accountant partners in the support cycle, with the option to list the Firm’s contact information on the Help drop-down menu, as well as a bolded “Ask my accountant” menu option which creates a message to the accountant. While telephone support is not provided, around the clock e-mail support is available, and is included with the monthly subscription cost. The Support menu also allows users to create a support ticket, which is assigned a ticket number

Summary & Pricing

Pricing for Xero is based on the features needed, and not the number of users. The Small plan, which is suitable for only the smallest organizations, allows subscribers to send five invoices, receive five bills, and reconcile up to 20 bank statement lines for $19 per month. Most businesses will start with the Medium plan, which allows unlimited invoicing and bank reconciliation for $29 per month. Businesses who work with multiple currencies will need the Large plan, which is $39 per month. Discounts are available for multiple organizations as well as members of the Xero Accountant Partner Program. A personal financial management tool, Xero Personal, is available for $34 per year.