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I just advised a client to switch from QB to Xero. They have come across this issue also. Now they want to switch back to QB. Please advise when this can be cahnged.

Last response from Xero was in 2024, please provide everyone with an update on this basic feature being added.
Or at least the option to create a template and include a date column.

It's standard in Quickbooks Online, and i thought it would be a standard thing for businesses that provide services.
We may do installations on specific vehicles on different dates and need to advise our clients on when the job was done, there may be multiple vehicles and dates on an invoice.
I can see that this has been requested for years.
Sorry that we converted from Quickbooks, just assumed this would be included.

I have had to transfer from Quickbooks at the request of our new account and not have the date the work was carried out on the invoice when we are a service based business is really annoying!

Agreed. I've been with Xero for 5 years or so, recommending it over other options since the very beginning. Even getting my clients to switch to Xero from QBO, but...
PLEASE do this!!

With QBO being more expensive, yet less user friendly, Xero could reach many more clients by adding this feature. Bring the underdog energy and beat the big corporate bully!

With other programs, I ran reports based on line items and their dates. Having the date is critical to match with clients' customer POs. Listing it in the description does not provide the same reports my clients want.

Xero, you're making us look bad! (And yourselves...) This is about money. Tracking money, reconciling time and money, etc. Having service dates in a separate space is more efficient. Isn't that the entire goal?

I need for this to happen. I am a services company and would like the ability to sort Time Entries that I pull in from Project Billings in date order. This assists me in reconciling my time to some of the contractors i work for and assists the customer in understanding the timeline that tasks were completed by.

Service date option. A start & End Date for service providers

quickbooks has date columns!

I can't actually believe you don't have date columns for the work performed...I have had customers quizzing me on this when I have forgotten to add in the description

Omg can you guys please just do this already! Would have been a way beter feature to roll out now instead of the new contact pop up box that gets in the way when setting up rules!

Date of services provided

Most people in the building industry bill on a daily rate. This is an embarrassing oversite. Ill be looking elsewhere for software that works for me

Being able to isolate individual dates from service descriptions is a critical part of the invoicing I need to provide my customers. To not have the facility to do is an appalling weakness in Xero.
I've only recently signed up with Xero and have spent hours trying to work around this, only to have just found this feed. I'm shocked at Xero's negligence in not addressing this vital component.

I just started using Xero. Any update on adding this column???

This is absolutely critical for our business and I cannot believe that it's not available. This is now the nail in the coffin for us using Xero.

I’m a Chartered Accountant and registered Tax Practitioner based in South Africa, and I run a small accounting and tax practice. I’m also a Xero Partner and recommend Xero to most of my clients across different industries.

However, I’ve recently run into some limitations with invoice customisation that are making it difficult to use Xero for certain professional service industries, particularly legal and medical clients.

Legal professionals

Many legal advocates and attorneys require more detailed billing formats. In particular:

• A Date column for each invoice line item (e.g. 22 Feb 2026 – Appearance in Court)
• A separate “Matter” or “Case Reference” field on the invoice (e.g. Joe Soap vs SARS)
• The Matter field to be distinct from the existing Reference field

Currently the only workaround is to manually type this information into descriptions, which isn’t ideal for proper legal billing.

Medical professionals

For healthcare practitioners such as biokineticists, invoices often need to include medical aid details for claim processing.

Ideally Xero would allow:

• Custom contact fields such as Medical Aid Name, Medical Aid Number, and Medical Aid Plan
• The ability to map those contact fields directly to invoice templates
• Control over which of those fields appear on invoices

At the moment this requires third-party integrations, which many small practices prefer to avoid.

I’d love to see more flexibility in invoice templates and contact field mapping, as this would make Xero far more suitable for professional service firms.

Is anyone else encountering similar limitations? And does anyone know if improvements like this are on the roadmap?

Thanks!

Agree with Karl Orbell:
"essential on monthly/periodic billing for service industries, as the date delivered is a key piece of information. Including it in the description is completely inappropriate and breaks searchability, as it needs to be accessible via the API or exports as an absolutely key data field of the invoice line."

Many invoices span multiple days of services. I would like a date column in the item invoice fields.

Add "Service Date" column for invoices

I'll reiterate what many others have said here. It is really difficult to recommend Xero to a client when it doesn't have some basic functionality that is available in other products