Enter your idea

It's been over a year since Xero has provided any feedback or status on this critical issue. It's hard to believe this requires "long running" and "multiple phases" to discover an adequate user role structure - this has been widely addressed in multiple systems over several decades and the principles are fairly basic in nature, especially for a straight-forward platform like Xero.
Why not layout a scheme of what you have so far and allow this thread to comment? You have some 400 engaged and experienced partners willing to push this along.
Get going Xero.

It is ridiculous that on the "Read Only" profile, one cannot uncheck the "sales and Purchases", "Bank account and Balances" and "Reports" check boxes. I have a client that need to give the credit department access to view only debtors' invoices, but then they have access to confidential financial reports and bank statements. This is the one area where Xero is way behind, and it seems that there is little understanding of what the client requirements are.

This is one of the areas where Xero is lightyears behind QBO and Sage. really needs urgent attention. It was announced last year at the Xero Roadshow that there is changes coming to user access - another year has come and gone.

can we get some feedback?

The "Read only" access should be more flexible. Currently, this option allows the users to view everything from Sales, Purchases, Bank account balances and the reports. While this option is good for auditors, on the other hand it gives too much information to the other users. The person managing the users should have the option to limit the viewing rights to a particular area such as Sales Invoices only.

As the system is at the moment, to give access to Sales invoices only, I would need to give the users a right to Sales Invoice where they can issue, amend, delete/void invoices and also send them to clients. This way it is very dangerous as a user may issue an incorrect invoice by applying and incorrect rate of VAT, may change/edit existing invoices, etc.

I sincerely hope that there will be more flexibility to the "read only" feature or maybe addition of new features where Sales invoices / Customer balances can be viewed in a Read only mode by users without having the right to view Purchases invoices, bank accounts and reports as well.

Hi Kelly

We really need an update on progress for this. The lack of options for users means that businesses are either in breach of GDPR (data protection issues), which is a serious matter, or senior staff are having to perform tasks that should be completed by more junior staff.

I've seen a prototype of possible options, which looked great, but that was getting on for 2 years ago now. I really can't believe that your programmers are this inept & inefficient at updating software. Other providers have this as standard, so clearly it's possible.

There are various versions of this "idea", overall the votes are into the thousands, so clearly it is something that Xero customers need & want urgently.

Please get your programmers on the case so this can be implemented ASAP & in the meantime give us an update on the situation as it stands now.

The lack of updates on any of these "ideas" is rude, frustrating & makes us as customers realise that Xero doesn't care about their customers.

I hope that Xero can action this soon.
My client has a sales team that need access Products & Services. With Invoice only access, they can add new products during invoice entry but not edit existing products.. so near yet so far.

It is really quite a big drawback for me for an amazing accounting platform such as Xero to not give the administrator access to narrowly defined user permissions. I had a rule with my clients on Sage - once an invoice is sent out to a customer, if you need to make changes do a credit note. It's something so silly, but I LOVED that I could tick that they can't edit invoices after it was sent out.

I love Xero and what it can do. But I really feel Sage was better in terms of giving people access to different areas and things in the accounting software and also with helping you set the permissions in a way that supports your internal processing controls.

Please, Xero, when will this be available?

Our firm have moved on at this point, no longer recommending Xero to clients who are more than just single owner company's. Bright Books offers much more in terms of levels of access to different modules for different staff. It also integrates with our practice software since Bright bought out the suite of softwares.They are now the market leader in my opinion in Ireland.

Never forget the AGM!

If you are a shareholder, you can bring up your concerns under General Business
OR
If you can get enough shareholders/shares, you can propose an Agenda Item of "no confidence in the Product Development Team and Directors in managing user requests. This is a non-bonding resolution however the Directors have to respond. I have used this in the past and they do not like it!

I did this some time ago in my own name and it got the attention of the Directors.

Ridiculous that this hasn't been actioned by Xero yet.

The current set up puts so much limitation and risk on businesses.

This is crucial to operations and finance and just goes to show that xero have very little understanding of such things and obviously do not care at all about their customers and the system they are providing.

Jerry - I would suggest you move.

This has been asked for for ages, however, XERO consistently ignores this and other suggestions by users. Frankly, it is insulting the and belittling they way they handle these things.

Good luck with the new software

Regards

Chris

I haven't read through all the comments, but I recently moved all our clients to Xero and this is one of the only things (that and not being able to do Supplier Recons on Xero) that they have with the software so far. I get that it's a tricky thing to do. But that's literally the only place where I'd say Sage has a leg up. I could edit permissions and roles for days for every type of scenario by ticking/unticking each ledger/accounting area.

In most setups people have a debtors and a creditors department and then an accountant or someone else processing the bank etc. I need my one client to be able to do budget reports and cashflows, but I don't necessarily want her to see the other reports before I'm done checking and processing on my side.
They also need their Debtors Clerk to have access to the Aged Receivables report and the Creditors Clerk to the Aged Payables. They have to check these reports every other day, but we can't give them access to Standard as they aren't allowed to see the bank accounts. And for someone constantly needing to send it to them is a big hassle. Could you just move the Aged Receivables and the Aged Payables Reports to the Business: Invoices & Business: Bills to pay drop-down menu/tab?

Is there an update in regards to this yet? As i would like an admin officer to join our team however, there are details i do not wish them to see and this is limiting my business a lot. Seriously looking at changing over accounting systems if cant be sorted promptly.

When are we going to get an update on the research and engagement that took place last year. This is becoming a real limitation for our business.

User permission should be based on the menu options available. It doesn't make any sense that we need to give access to bank statement information to all users that might need to have access to the following features:
- products and services
- invoice templates
- chart of accounts
- tracking categories
and so on.

We do not have a payroll grouping function with our company bank account so accessing bank statement means having access to payroll information even though the user doesn't have access to the payroll function. Non sense.

It would be extremely essential to get user restrictions to the level of Invoicing certain customers - for instance a Customer Manager being able to raise invoices in Xero only for his/her customer portfolio not being able to see all the invoices. "Customer group" related limitations might work.

While there are only 344+ votes. There is a whole conversation of 6000+ complaints on this front. Perhaps you should email a voting poll to all users and you will find the 1000's of issues with user roles.

Is there any news on this being prioritised? We are in jeopardy of losing two clients because we cannot give the staff narrow enough access to the accounting platform. Surely this is a basic thing for Xero to get right. Difficult to beleive only 300+ votes.

Xero needs to prioritise this. They are leagues behind when it comes to user role customisation options. If MYOB, Sage, etc. can do it, why can't Xero?

Please up the priority on this one. The permissions need to be MUCH more granular. I need team members to be able to access particular reports, but, as someone else has commented, it's all or nothing. And - and this is more crucial - they can see bank accounts which means they can see what everyone is paid! Not good for staff outside of certain members of the finance team!