Connecting Streamtime to Xero is a quick and simple process. This integration allows you to copy your expenses, purchase orders and invoices to Xero, meaning that you can get back to work knowing that your finances are in order. If you've got multiple Xero companies, you can connect more than one — for those specific instructions, head here.

To setup the connection between Streamtime and Xero, just head to Profile & Settings > Integrations. 

Find the Xero tile and click Connect.

You'll then be redirected (via horseback 🏇)  to Xero to enter your log in details. You'll then be redirected again (this time via magic carpet ✨ ) back to your Streamtime. 
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Once you've connected, you'll see a connection tile under the heading, Your accounting package connections. Click Edit Connection on the tile to assign branches, invoicing number sequence and account code defaults.

Invoice numbering system

Your connection will automatically take the invoice numbering sequence of your home branch. You can continue with this, or create a new sequence. You're also able to view and edit the next number in the sequence from here.

Assigning branches

Select the branches you want to associate with this connection. Once saved, any invoices, purchase orders and expenses will be sent to this connection.

Default Account Codes

When creating invoices and purchase orders from the selected branches, you can assign default account codes for revenue and expenses here. If you want to set up specific account codes for different line items, you can do so from your Master Settings.

The Streamtime-Xero integration allows you to copy your Streamtime expenses, purchase orders and invoices across to Xero, to make sure that your accountant is across your third-party costs.

When copied across to Xero:

In order to copy an expense to Xero as a bill, just click 'Send to Xero' within the expense modal.

Note that the status of your expense will also send. A Draft Expense will arrive in Xero as a Draft Bill. An Approved Expense will arrive in Xero as Awaiting Approval Bill. Don't worry about the confusing names, we'll explain why in a minute.

Your expense will be marked with a blue Xero stamp. Clicking this will take you directly to the expense in Xero.

Once the expense lives in both Streamtime and Xero, you can change the status and refresh both ways — to a degree. Draft and Approved Expenses in Streamtime can be edited, with changes sent to Xero. However, if the corresponding Bill to an Expense in Xero gets moved into Awaiting Payment, you won't be able to send changes to Xero on that Bill anymore. Once the Bill in Xero has been paid, Streamtime will pull back the Paid status via webhooks and update the status accordingly.

Purchase Orders give you the opportunity to take further measures to ensure that it'll arrive in Xero with the correct account codes and tax rates assigned. Edit the Xero account codes and tax rates for line items on a purchase order simply by hovering over the line item and selecting from the dropdown options. For Purchase Orders, you can select from the Expense or Liabilities account codes.

Once your PO is ready for Xero, just hit Copy to Xero to send it across.

Your PO will be marked with a blue Xero stamp. Clicking this will take you directly to the PO in Xero.

Again, the status of the Purchase Order will also send. A Draft Purchase Order will arrive in Xero as a Draft Purchase Order (yay). An Approved Purchase Order will arrive in Xero as Awaiting Approval Purchase Order. We'll get to the confusing names, I promise... or you can skip to that part now.

Similar to Expenses, the Purchase Order status will send to Xero alongside the changes. You can edit Draft or Approved Purchase Orders in Streamtime, though once they've been sent to Xero, you cannot revert the Xero Purchase Order to Draft. If you revert the Streamtime PO to Draft, the best practice would be to Approve the PO, and then send your changes over, so your statuses are in sync.

Again, once a Purchase Order is Marked as Billed in Xero, you can refresh the status of that PO via the 'Refresh from Xero' option in the 3-dot menu, and the Streamtime status will refresh as Paid. At this stage, Streamtime cannot automatically update the Xero status at this stage due to limitations with the Xero API. You'll have to refresh them manually yourself.

This section of the article focuses on how to take advantage of the Xero integration when it comes to invoicing. Check out Invoicing in Streamtime if you'd like to learn more about invoicing in Streamtime in general.

Similarly to purchase orders, you are able to assign specific Xero revenue codes and tax rates to individual line items on invoices. So long as you have your integration setup, you're able to just select from your Xero options provided in the dropdowns which appear on the line items.

Once your invoice is ready, just click Copy to Xero to send it across.

👉 If your invoice hasn't been sent to your client when copying it across to Xero, it will arrive in Xero as a Draft invoice. Once you have sent it through Streamtime, or mark it as sent, however, press 'Send changes to Xero' to move the invoice into Awaiting Payment.

👉 If your invoice has already been sent to your client when copying it across to Xero, it will arrive in Xero as an Awaiting Payment invoice.

Your invoice will be marked with a blue Xero stamp. Clicking this will take you directly to the invoice in Xero.

We've hooked up with Xero webhooks, so updates made to your invoice status, paid date, or amount paid within Xero will push back to the related invoice in Streamtime.

This section of the article focuses on how to take advantage of the Xero integration when it comes to credit notes. Check out How to create a credit note if you'd like to learn more about the credit note process in Streamtime in general.

As above, you are able to specify Xero revenue codes and tax rates to individual line items. Credit notes are invoice types, so you can create credit notes directly from invoices themselves if you need to revert an entire invoice.

Credit notes and invoices are linked, so when you apply credit to pay an invoice, both Streamtime and Xero will update. We recommend sending your credit note to Xero as soon as it's ready, before using it to apply credit to an invoice, as this will avoid potential errors when you want to use it to apply credit later.

What happens if one of either the invoice or credit note is already in Xero, and the other isn't?

Streamtime will send the other document to Xero when recording the payment, so that both systems will be linked.

If either the credit note or invoice has a payment recorded already, you may need to send them individually to Xero first, and select a payment account for the prior payments during this process. After both are in Xero, you will be able to apply credit from the credit note to the invoice.
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Items & Expenses form the basis of your Jobs, Quotes and Invoices, and can be linked with your accounts codes when using Xero. 

If you have Xero linked to Streamtime and would like to assign these items to your chart of accounts general ledger account codes / nominal codes, then you can do this by selecting the account code from the drop down menu (this code must first exist in the Xero Chart of Accounts).

Every time you create an expense/PO/invoice from a job that has contained one of these linked items, the correct account code will flow into Xero. This allows you to produce accurate reporting on cost centres inside Xero.

Good question. It goes to context. When you're in Xero, Approved Bills and Purchase Orders are things that are completely signed off and ready to roll. That means you don't edit the figures, or line items. So for Bills in Awaiting Payment, or an Approved Purchase Orders in Xero, you simply can't edit them.

When you're in Streamtime, an Approved Expense or PO simply means you have decided to log this cost to the job — it's a different context. Sometimes after they've been Approved in Streamtime, you want to edit the numbers. If we sent the Streamtime Approved Expenses or Purchase Orders through as Approved in Xero, that would disable changes in Streamtime being able to copy to Xero, which wouldn't be the best for our customers' workflow.

A similar terminology change occurs when a Purchase Order is marked as Billed in Xero. The closest status in Streamtime to denote the same thing is Paid (essentially, the supplier is paid) — so that's the status we assign to the Streamtime PO. Lastly, once a Bill gets paid in Xero, the Paid status comes back for the corresponding Expense in Streamtime. Phew.

VOILA! Couldn't be easier.... But if you have any issues, just let us know using the Help chat, or by sending an email to help@streamtime.net.