Enter your idea

Hello in response to "our team is interested in better understanding this idea" I am available to discuss the concept of this and why it holds significant importance for proper reporting, record keeping and control.

Best regards

Basically Xero we would like as in sage a posting date (data invoice physically entered on system) so we can see if we received the invoice in a different month to the invoice date.
This enable's us to accurately report our accounts.

This response from Xero is a total waste of time - the ideas 'being worked on' have absolutely no bearing on this issue and show a total misunderstanding of what is being asked for here. The issue is always that the product and tech team have no accounting understanding and those using the system and giving feedback which truly matters on a day to day basis to them are being ignored for aesthetic and ux changes which we don't actually need.

For the sake of giving the product team more info it is a very simple concept - there should be the option to add two date fields on any invoice in the system, the change would be a relatively simple one. There is of course a document date on all bills and sales invoices, which is the date which xero currently uses. This is the invoice date, the VAT date and is the first and standard date to be recorded, so far so good...

What the community are then asking for is a way for xero to record a second date which allows them to change the effective period for reporting on the document. For example, you may receive an invoice in January with a Jan date on it for VAT and document purposes. But the content on the invoice may very clearly relate to either February (billed in advance) or December (billed in arrears). Currently as there is no functionality to add an effective period so that we can report that cost into a different period. Instead senior users have to accrue and defer costs using journals every month so that when they run their management accounts the costs appear in the right places and not simply controlled by the date the paperwork was generated by the third party.

My suggestion would be to implement a simple 'effective date' to all documents, which defaults to the document date automatically as standard. But if that could be editable by users for new documents, this field could be applied on reports to move costs to the right period. For example almost all users would have their P&L and Balance sheets generate using the 'effective date' as a tick box option and so they would save significant time and effort every month when generating their accounts.

If effective dates could be applied at line level within a bill or invoice that would likely be amazing too (allowing users to record quarterly invoices for example split out to be effective over the 3 months). But I am realistic that this would likely be a request too far.

The product team should take a basic tour of other accounting software functionality to review 'effective periods' as this is a standard function in all accounting software and xero is an outlier for not having something which allows us to adapt the reporting period for costs at the document level.

When working with bulk repeating invoices for schools or rent invoices, it is important to ensure that all ad hoc items for a particular month is captured. When the drafting date of invoices is a few days prior to the invoice date, it may give enough time to ensure that everything is correct before approval and sending. This is a crucial feature for task planning in a practice as well as the debtor function of a larger business.

I get a lot of invoices which are either coming in the month after the product/service was supplied or which are invoiced in advance. To ensure the value is posted to correct month need to create a lot of manual journals and to reconcile balance sheet account balances. This really needs to be fixed and is usual for accounting systems.
Of course if an invoice can be split to several months even better (eg for rent biled quarterly in advance) but I recognise that may be pushing things. It may however be useful to take into account when designing this functionality.

This idea was flagged about two years back. Totally surprised that Xero haven't implemented it so far, given that it's a basic requirement and available in most of other accounting software in the market.

Completely agree, needs updating asap!

Is it possible to have a selection area for the posting period for invoices getting posted to Xero? At the moment, the period is automatically selected based on the invoice date. it would be great if the posting period could be selected in the draft section before posting it.

Critical feature for an accounting system. Not having the ability to record an invoice process date is preventing me from migrating other businesses to Xero because we can not close out a month without changing dates on future invoices that may be received late.

Basic and Essential for accrual accounting. The lack of this creates multiple issues around reporting and creates uncertainty around the competency of the financial function when the numbers you report on a monthly basis, ends up changing each month due to late invoicing from suppliers.

Agreed - Absolutely basic requirement thats blatantly missing

As finance method of posting bills required 2 date field. One for document date and other for Transactions date. Sometime transactions date and document dates are varied due to late submission/reaching the bills to finance team. For example. A bill issued date 15th Aug 2023, due to late reaching to Finance Dept. Period of Aug 2023 were closed. Also Aug 2023 VAT filed. The late reaching Aug 2023 bill contains an input VAT, unable to claim since Aug 2023 filed. If we could have transactions date field at least we can post the bill during Sep 2023 with document date of Aug 2023. Period closing will be considered transaction date. Can you please implement these method.

With accrual accounting we need to account for expenses in the period they were incurred, not invoiced.
This seems to be a fundamental requirement missing from Xero.
It would be great to hear from the Xero team about whether there is a workaround or a plan to release this feature.

This is a basic requirement - not sure really why it hasn't been required from day one.

I rasied an accrual with a reversing journal in the month of July to be reversed out in August , the invoice for July was received in September but dated July , why does Xero not allow me to process the invoice in September with the invoice dated July ? this is simple accrual basis of accounting , my prior months reporting and aging is affected , cant do a month to month trend anaylysis without this being fixed.

I second this.

I need both the bill/AR invoice date and the posted/transaction date.

If we received an invoice dated, for example, 1st June 2023 but the invoice is received after 30th June 2023. I have already closed and reported that period, therefore I would like to post the bill into the current period using a posted date, 1 July 2023, but still be able to record and report the correct bill date as shown on the AR invoice/bill.

Dear Xero Team

I have been using Xero for a year but because Xero does not have a posting date for my invoices, every month end closing, i will have to do manual journal entries for all my sales. Its getting too much for me! This is a basic essential every accounting system must have. ... pls get this up ....if not i will have to look at other alternatives!

Agree - this is absolutely essential

Run reports by date the bills were entered into (posting date) XERO.

We are running various reports but have no way of knowing which invoices may have been added after the report was run.
Critical need for us,

Hi,

For bills and invoices, can we have a 3rd date field please? The 3 dates will be for:

1. Bill/Invoice Date
2. Due Date
3. Period Date

This way, when a period is closed, the bill or invoice date will not need to be change to fit into the open period.

Thanks,
Mary