Welcome to the Fit Small Business Xero
training course. In this lesson we're
going to cover how to import customer
invoices in Xero. To follow along with me,
log into your Xero account now or click
the link below this video for a free
30-day trial of Xero. You can also click
this link to access our full Xero course
and other helpful resources. Let's get
started. If you are converting from
another accounting software to Xero, then
you will most likely have unpaid
customer invoices. It is very important
for you to create these open invoices in
Xero for a couple of reasons.
First you need to ensure that you track
money that is owed to you, this is also
known as accounts receivable. Also, when
your customer does send in their payment,
you need to have an invoice to apply the
payment to. It is much easier to import
customer invoices into Xero as opposed
to manually entering them one by one.
In this lesson, we will walk through each
step of how to import customer invoices
into Xero. So from the Xero dashboard
let's go ahead and navigate to accounts
and select sales. In this screen we'll go
ahead and click on the import button and
there are basically three steps outlined
here for importing your invoices.
The first step is to download the invoice
template file. So you will click on this
link and download that template and save
it to your computer. And then step two is
actually copying your invoice
information into the template. So that
could be, if you already have the
information in another Excel spreadsheet,
copy that information over into this
template. Or you may have to manually
enter the information into the template.
So we'll go ahead and jump over to the
excel template and discuss how the
information should be entered in that
template. This is the import template
that should have downloaded to your
computer. At a minimum we must complete
the fields that are marked in red with
an asterisk. So for example
Contact Name, Invoice Number, Invoice Date,
etcetera, these columns are required fields
for the import. However, I do recommend
that you provide as much detailed
information as possible in the other
columns so that you don't have to go
back and complete any missing
information manually later on. In the
Contact Name field you want to enter
your customer's name, or the bill to name,
in this column. Email Address: enter the
email address of your contact person at
this company. In the next several columns
you want to enter the bill to address in
each of these. Be sure to follow the
example and separate the street address,
city, state, and zip into separate columns
as indicated here. If the customer
contact already exists in Xero then you
can leave these fields blank unless you
want to update this information. In the
invoice number field, you want to enter
the invoice number for each invoice. This
is a required field and it should be a
unique number, so make sure that it is so
that you do not duplicate the invoice
number or the import will not work.
Reference: you want to enter any
additional information related to the
sale in this field. You can use a
combination of letters and numbers. Both
the Invoice Date and the Due Date are
required fields. Be sure to use the
format that we have here where you've
got two digits for the month, two digits
for the day, and four digits for the year.
Inventory Item Code: you want to enter
the inventory item code for the product
or service that was sold. If you have not
set up inventory items, Xero will create
item codes that do not already exist.
I recommend that you set up your inventory
item codes prior to importing customer
invoices if possible. Please note, if more
than one product or service was sold,
then you will need to enter each product
or service on a separate line with the
rest of the required fields. Description:
provide the details
of the services and/or products that
were sold. Quantity is a required field.
Enter the quantity here for any products
that you sold or enter a quantity of one
for services that were sold. Please note
that the services this can represent the
number of hours if applicable. If you do
not sell products and you charge a flat
fee for services as I mentioned, go ahead
and just enter the number one in this
field but do not leave it blank. Unit
Amount: you want to enter the sales price
per unit for each product or service
sold. Please note this is a required
field. For services this can represent
the rate per hour or a flat fee. For
products this will be the price per unit.
There is no need to include any dollar
signs in this column. Discount: enter any
discounts that appear on an invoice.
Please note, do not include the percent
sign in this column. Account Code: enter
the account code from the chart of
accounts that this sale should be
categorized to. Please note that this is
a required field. If you have not set up
account codes, you must do that first
before importing customer invoices into
Xero. You can click here to access this
lesson now. For the Taxes Type column,
you want to enter the sales tax rate
that should be applied to the invoice.
Please note this is a required field in
Xero, so if there is no sales tax rate
enter tax on sales 0% in this column.
If you have not set up sales tax rates in
Xero I recommend that you do so prior to
importing customer invoices. You can
access the sales tax lesson here.
Tracking Options: you want to complete
these fields only if you have setup
tracking categories to track sales by
call center, department, or location.
Otherwise you can leave these fields
blank. For the Currency column, if you
track sales in multiple currencies
then you want to enter the three-digit
code for the foreign currency the
invoice is in if it is not your native
currency. Please note, if you have not set
up the multiple currency feature you
need to do this first before importing
customer invoices in a foreign currency.
You can click here to access this lesson.
And finally Branding Theme: if you set up
a custom branding theme or template for
invoices, you want to enter the name of
the theme in this field. Otherwise,
leave it blank and Xero will use the
standard branding theme. Before we
proceed with the import, I want to share
some tips with you to ensure that we
have a successful import. Tip Number One:
to import a credit note or credit memo,
you want to enter them in the invoice
template with a negative unit price. Tip
Number Two: do not make any changes or
rearrange the header row or the import
will not work. Tip Number Three: you can
delete any columns that are not required.
But I recommend that you leave them
since there is no harm in doing so.
Tip Number Four: if your file contains data
in the quantity, unit amount, or tax type
columns, you must leave the total and
total amount columns empty. Xero will
make the calculations for you. Tip
Number Five: if you have already setup
customer contacts in Xero, be sure to
enter the name of the customer contact
exactly as it appears in Xero in the
customer contacts column. Otherwise, Xero
will assume it is a new contact and set
it up accordingly. Tip Number Six: as you
have already setup the customer contact
in Xero with the address, then there is
no need to complete the P.O. address
fields unless you would like to make
changes. Any information entered in these
fields will override what you have
currently set up in Xero. And the final
Tip Number Seven: for invoices with more
than 1 line item, each line item must
include the same invoice number and
currency for multi currency invoices.
Now the next step in
the process is to go ahead and click on
the Browse button to locate our import
template that we just created. Once you
have selected your import file, you
should see it here to the right of the
browse button. Make sure it's got the
.csv extension at the end. Now before
proceeding with the import, there are a
couple of questions that we need to
answer to assist Xero in handling contact
address details and sales tax. So the
first question here is would you like to
update contact details. So as we just
discussed, if you have already set up the
customer contact in Xero there is no
need to include address details in this
template unless you want to update the
information that was previously entered
during the setup. So for this option,
we'll go ahead and say 'no, ignore address
details.' And then the second question is
the unit amount field tax inclusive or
exclusive. If you include tax in the unit
amount column of the template, then
select tax inclusive. If you did not
include tax in this column, then you
would select tax exclusive. In our sales
tax lesson we discussed how to track, pay,
and report sales tax. You can click here
to access this lesson. After you have
indicated your response to these
questions, you are ready to proceed with
the next step of the import. When you click
the import button and it will take us to
the final review and confirmation of
what information will be imported into
Xero. So we'll go ahead and click that
now. So in this screen, we have a chance
to review and confirm the import that
will take place once we click this green
complete import button. So in this top
section here we have the total number of
invoices that will be imported. So for
this example, that total is 3. We've also
got an error message here that says 3
invoices have errors and will not
be imported. And notice below the reason
for these invoices that will not be
imported is that the invoice number
is not unique. Obviously those must be
fixed before those invoices can be
imported. So that is definitely something
where if you receive an error like this,
you want to go back and fix it before
you proceed. In the inventory section
Xero provides information about the
inventory items that we have included in
the template. In our example we have used
existing inventory item codes, but we
provided a little bit of a different or
unique description on our invoices which
is acceptable. So you'll notice that zero
will go ahead and import these items,
but this is sort of just a heads up that
Xero is giving us in terms of the
information that is going to be included.
One other thing to note back up here at
the top is that all invoices will import
in a draft status. This simply means that
the invoices will have to be approved
after they have been imported. You can
give certain users permission to approve
invoices. We will discuss this in more
detail in our lesson on How to Invite
Users. Click here to access this lesson.
And as I mentioned you would go ahead
and click the go back button, fix your
errors, get back to this point where
you're happy with the information and
then at that point and only when you're
happy you want to click complete import.
Once you click complete import, Xero will
provide you with a message that
invoices have been successfully imported
into Xero. That wraps up the lesson on
how to import customer invoices into
Xero. To access our full Xero course or
any of the other lessons in this series
click this link. You can also find a link
below this video for a free 30-day trial
of Xero.
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