Invoices and receipts to Xero: Documents in, bills and expenses in Xero.
Connect Xero once, then send invoices and receipts straight to it. A supplier invoice becomes a draft Bill, a receipt becomes Spend Money, and a credit note becomes a draft Credit Note, each with the original file attached. Prefer a file? Export a bill-import CSV with every line item instead.
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- Sent straight to Xero
- Original file attached
- Coded by supplier
Export documents
Every document you have converted.
Record purchases as
Applies to the whole export. Original invoice and receipt types stay unchanged.
Format
Excel carries both levels as two sheets, so the choice below only sets which columns each gets.
Level
One row per document
Forty receipts become forty rows.
One row per line item
Each line carries its document's date and vendor, so it pivots.
A receipt image is evidence, not an accounting entry.
A PDF invoice or receipt has the information Xero needs, but not as a record. Re-keying suppliers, dates and amounts makes the month close slower and creates another opportunity for a number to change along the way, and the file still has to be attached afterwards. Bankflow reads the document, checks that its figures add up, and creates the record in Xero with the document behind it.
How it works
From document to Xero record
- 01
Add the invoices and receipts
Upload them, forward them by email, or photograph them on your phone. Review the supplier, dates, totals, tax and line items beside the original.
- 02
Connect Xero once
Choose Send to Xero on any document and sign in on Xero's own page. Each client workspace connects its own organisation.
- 03
Pick the accounts and send
Choose the expense account, and for receipts the account they were paid from. A supplier you've sent before is already set to the account its last document went to. Each document reports what it became in Xero.
- 04
Or export a file with every line
A sent record carries one line for the document's total. When you want each line item on the bill, export a bill-import CSV instead and import it in Xero. Paid purchases can also go as a CSV for SaasAnt’s Xero Spend Money importer, which needs its own account.
What reaches Xero
The record and its paperwork
Supplier, number, dates, currency and total, with the original file attached, so the figure in Xero has the document behind it.
Coded the way you coded it last
The expense account is remembered per supplier, per company. The first send to a client takes a few choices; the ones after take one click.
Never sent twice
A document already in that organisation is reported as there, and a copy of one, forwarded and uploaded, is caught before it becomes a second bill.
Drafts to approve
Bills and credit notes arrive in Xero as drafts, for you to approve there. Nothing is paid or approved by Bankflow.
What each document becomes in Xero
| Document | In Xero |
|---|---|
| Supplier invoice | A draft Bill, owed to the supplier. |
| Receipt | Spend Money, paid from the bank or card account you choose. |
| Supplier's credit note | A draft Credit Note, waiting to be applied to a bill. |
| Bill-import CSV | Each line's description, quantity, unit amount and tax, imported by you. |
Sent records carry one line for the document's total, tax-inclusive, with tax worked out from the account's own rate. A document in a currency the organisation doesn't hold is refused before anything is written.
FAQ
Common questions
Does Bankflow post bills directly into Xero?
Yes. Send to Xero creates the draft bill or the Spend Money transaction through Xero's own API and attaches the original file. Nothing changes in Xero unless you send it, or a workflow you set up does.
Can I send receipts to Xero, or only bills?
Both, together. An invoice becomes a draft Bill and a receipt becomes Spend Money, paid from the account you pick. A supplier's credit note becomes a draft Credit Note.
How is the expense account chosen?
You pick it in the send dialog, per document if you like. Each supplier is then remembered with the account it was last sent to, in that company, and offered again next time. A bill-import CSV uses the document's category as its account mapping instead.
What stops a bill being entered twice?
Bankflow records what each document became. Sending it to the same company again is skipped, and a second copy of the same bill, the same file, or the same supplier and number, is flagged and held back unless you choose to send it.
Do the bill's line items reach the ledger?
A sent record has one line for the total, so the figure in Xero matches the paper. For every line item on the bill, export the bill-import CSV and import it in Xero.
Does a paid invoice have to become a receipt?
No. Document type and accounting treatment are separate. If the purchase already exists as a bill or expense in your accounting app, match its payment there rather than create a duplicate.
Guides
How to Automate Bookkeeping Using Bank Statement Data
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What Is a Credit Note? And How to Record One
What a credit note is, how it differs from a debit note and a refund, what it does to your books and tax, and how to record one in QuickBooks or Xero.
How Accountants Can Save 10+ Hours a Week with Statement Automation
How accounting teams can replace repetitive statement entry with a consistent extraction, review, reconciliation, and export workflow.
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Stop re-keying documents into Xero.
Add a week of invoices and receipts, check their amounts, and send them to Xero with the files attached.