Xero Workpapers gets a tune-up

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Preparing workpapers in Xero just got easier, and 2019 promises more fine tuning so it’s a smooth ride to the finish line at tax time. Xero Workpapers gets heavy use at the busiest times of the year, so we expect these tweaks to help compliance tasks run sweetly.

Faster approval for partners with just one button

It can be irritatingly time-consuming to open and approve each and every workpaper if there are a large number for your client. Now there’s no need go into each individual workpaper to approve a pack. If a staff member is assigned as a ‘partner’ on a workpaper pack, they have a streamlined and time-saving option to approve all workpapers and associated workpaper lines with just a single approval button.

Speedy trial balance import

Often the trial balance is imported multiple times in the course of producing the work for the client. It can be cumbersome and frustrating to have to navigate away from what you’re currently doing to see when data was last imported and to re-import data.

So we’ve added a new Import button in the workpaper list and individual views to save time and effort when re-importing. You can now also see the date when the trial balance was last imported, which lets you check how up-to-date and accurate the trial balance is at any point in time.

Enhancing workpapers with hyperlinking

Typically other documents – sometimes a large number of them – need to be attached to a workpaper as supporting evidence. Now, there’s no need to put on the brakes while you download a web file to your computer and then upload it to the workpaper pack. Xero’s made it cruisy by adding the option of pasting in a link to any document that’s stored on the web, whether it’s a PDF in Dropbox, a Google Doc, or a Microsoft Excel 365 spreadsheet. This also gives you the power and flexibility to add custom workpapers and calculation sheets from different sources to a pack.

Checks against prior period balances

It hasn’t been all that easy to see the balance of a particular account for the last financial year. But now, the prior period balances flow through to the main screen of the workpapers pack so you can see them at a glance and sanity check the numbers for the following workpapers:

Bank reconciliation

Accounts receivable

Other current assets

Inventory

Fixed assets

Non-current assets

Accounts payable

Other current liabilities

Non-current liabilities

Loans

Investments

Shareholders’ current accounts

Equity, capital, accumulations

Intangibles

Deleting custom workpapers

And finally, something we overlooked when we provided the ability to create a custom workpaper – they can now be deleted if necessary. Make it easy to tidy up workpaper packs using this update.

That brings a bit of a wrap to the current releases to workpapers, we are expecting everything to be deployed by early January 2019. We’re working on what’s next and look forward to bringing more value to our partner products in 2019.

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