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I wonder which bank people are using who are having issues? I would agree that it is important to have this feature in xero, however I have managed to get around it.

I spoke to my bank (lloyds commercial banking) they helped me set up a template that works so I simply download bank payment file from xero (I have to delete a couple of lines from the bottom of the file but your banking support team will advise you on this - not all will have to do that) and it imports in fine, it literally takes seconds, and paying people is now the quickest part of my job!

Ideally xero will update this feature, but if they don't it may be worth taking matters into your own hands with your bank - as I have just read on here someone will have to manually pay 140 people and that is going to take an extremely long time, I would under no circumstances be doing that!

Good luck, I hope you can get something sorted!

I am soon going to have 140 employees to have to pay individually and we desperately need a fix on this to save time

Please do this, it would speed up pay runs having a CSV bank file rather than having to manually prepare one each month

Please (please please please) allow users to download bank files in the .csv format.

It does not make any sense to not have this option.

I have used numerous Payroll packages and I am currently working for a Payroll Bureau - I can not understand why a basic report such as a BACS file can not be downloaded to Excel or other formats in Xero, we have to send this report to all 50+ clients for every payroll we run. Hence I will not be recommending switching to Xero until these basic issues are rectified.

the BACS and faster payment templates in Payroll are not compatible with Bank Uploads, after long conversations with both the Bank & Xero support it appears that Xero have amended templates for general payments but not payroll making the product... in my opinion, inferior. If Xero only wishes to target very small employers then that's fine and I am a big fan! However surely it is only a small adjustment needed to take it to the next level??

Add the option to download payroll BACS files in other formats than the Standard 18 format. The current option is a problem where a bank does not accept the Standard 18 format and employees have to be paid using an alternative method.

I'd recommend recording a macro in excel and just downloading > uploading a csv file into your bank. It doesn't take long and it's a huge time saver, worth the small investment in time if your bank allows csv uploads.

You can open the downloaded .txt file in excel and then run your macro. to covert it into the right format.

Ive already logged this. Even if its set up the same way as paying bills (i.e. the program must be there). thats good for me.
This should be an easy fix.... Come on Xero.

I have today been told by Xero support that "It doesn’t look like downloading payroll files in other formats has been raised as a product idea yet. Xero Product Ideas is where our customers can share and support ideas for change."

So you can imagine my surprise and disbelief! I am happy to see that I am not the only person to find this a failing but disappointed to read it has not been resolved since first raised!

With this and the lack of summary reports I am not sure we will be changing over Payroll yet!

I have been on a support chat and they didn't acknowledge this was already flagged for development. It is exactly our problem too.

Thanks everyone for your comments and support on this one. It's been over a year since I raised it and still nothing :(

Please can you respond to us on this Xero?

So far we know that Xero Payroll's current batch payment file doesn't work on:

Santander
RBS
Barclays.net
Metrobank
Revolut Business
Danske Bank

The Xero bill payments file is not much better but is a CSV so it is easily manipulated.

The best solution would be for Xero to know the bank requirements, and for the user to select the bank it is required for when they download.

But for now, knowing if any progress can be expected would be a good start.

Its a fundamental failing at present of Xero payroll. I could never recommend XERO payroll until this element is resolved. Can anyone in Xero advise if this is on the roadmap for the near future.

At the moment Xero only produce standard 18 format files for paying employees electronically. There is very minimal banks that accept this kind of format. I I think it would be of great use if we could upload a template file to Xero of the format our bank accepts and it then produces this type of file for us.

Please please please can we have another option ! its craziness that no bank supports standard 18 format and there has not been any update in a year !

It would be a good idea to be able to download the payroll bank file in something other than standard 18 format
Our bank doesnt support standard 18 format so I assume other people must be in the same boat ?

Please can we have this option....

Still no upgrade to include this idea :(

Yes yes yes!! Every month I have to retype all the payment amounts. What I need is the bank payment file download options from the main part of Xero to be available in the payroll section.