Xero is truly an incredible product. Not because it is a bookkeeping program that makes you coffee, does your tax returns or magically improves your cashflow, but because of the way in which it integrates with other complimentary products known as ‘add-ons’ to automate business processes. 

What is an add-on I hear you ask? Basically, an add-on is a third party program that integrates directly into XERO in order to provide a business owner with a variety of functions. These functions are varied in their capabilities and their reason for existence, but the premise is that they save businesses time and money by automating processes that are not otherwise automated.

Currently, there are over 350 add-ons in the market, all of which perform various functions, have different pricing levels and suit a huge range of different industries. Here is a summary of our current favourites:

Receipt Bank for Xero

My favourite Xero add-on of the moment, is this fabulous tool for automating your accounts payable. Receipt bank is a tool to extract data from scanned or photographed invoices and receipts, in order to create expense reports, track your upcoming accounts payable or publish the information direct to XERO without the need for data entry.

I use the receipt scanning system to record and extract the information internally for our three separate businesses. In simple terms, I pile multiple receipts into the scanner all together, log into receipt bank and upload these into the inbox section, than I leave receipt bank to do its job. Receipt bank then: Read more