Latest product news – July 2021

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This month, we’ve released a number of updates across the Xero platform to help you maintain compliance across payroll, tax, employee time tracking and more. I’m particularly excited to share that we’re now the first accounting provider in South Africa to provide an end-to-end tax solution that connects to the South African Revenue Service (SARS) in real-time.

If you’re a Xero partner, don’t forget to register for our upcoming quarterly product update, where our education team will walk you through a demo of all the latest releases, so you can maintain your advisor certification.

New features

Simplify your pay run with Xero Me — Global

We’ve given Xero Me a new look, making it easier for your employees to access their payslips, leave and timesheets in one place. The app syncs directly with Xero Payroll, which speeds up your pay runs and means you don’t need to chase the team for information. Xero Me is an employee self-service app that’s included with all Xero Payroll subscriptions in Australia, New Zealand and the UK.

Add addresses on the go in the Xero Accounting app — Global

Add your customer’s address on the go with our new address lookup feature in the Xero Accounting App. When you start typing a physical address in contacts, the app will use Google Maps to find the location and provide a list of suggestions. Simply choose the right address, and the app will automatically populate the required fields for you. You can still manually add the address if required.

Confidently merge clients in Xero HQ — Global

When merging client records in Xero HQ, it can be difficult to know which one to keep. That’s why we’re now displaying key details like name and business type during the merge, to help you decide. In Australia and New Zealand, you’ll also see tax data displayed. If your practice has imported its Xero Practice Manager (XPM) list into Xero HQ, you’ll need to merge client records in Xero HQ.

Quickly access your favourite reports — Global

You can now favourite any of your reports in Xero. This new feature gives you one-click access to the reports you use most often in the Business menu, and speeds up your workflow during the day.

View your contacts based on income and expenses — Global

We’ve consolidated the ‘Income by Contact’ and ‘Expenses by Contact’ reports into a single report. This new Income and Expenses by Contact report shows you a snapshot of each contact based on income and expense transactions for a chosen period. You can also use the filter options to view the information that matters most to you.

Apply the new Super Guarantee rate in Xero Payroll — AU

To help you stay compliant with changing government regulations, we’ve recently updated Super Guarantee rate calculations in Xero Payroll. Any pay runs after 1 July 2021 will automatically apply the new rate for employees marked as using the ‘Statutory Rate’ option in Xero. We recommend manually checking and updating the rate for any employees not marked as using the ‘Statutory Rate’ option.

Stay compliant with the latest ATO changes in Xero Tax — AU

Our teams have been busy updating Xero Tax to reflect the latest ATO compliance rules and regulations for the new financial year. Visit Xero Central for all the latest tax changes to individual tax returns, trust tax returns, partnership tax returns, company tax returns, and self-managed superannuation fund returns.

Calculate student loan repayments in Xero Payroll — AU

You may notice a change to student loan calculations for your employees from 1 July. That’s because we’ve updated Xero to reflect the latest changes to study and training loan indexation rates for the 2021-22 financial year. The minimum threshold for repayment of these loans has increased from $46,620 to $47,014.

Save time with an end-to-end tax solution — South Africa

We’re thrilled to offer customers the ability to prepare, store and submit their VAT returns to SARS from Xero. Following the launch of our VAT Return form and VAT late claims functionality, we have now released an eFiling solution in partnership with CloudConvert. This will help you file your tax returns with greater efficiency and accuracy, while staying compliant with SARS.

View assets and liabilities in one click — US

We’ve made it easier to evaluate the overall position of your business, with a new balance sheet report that lets you view a summary of your assets, liabilities and equity in one click from the Report Centre page. You can also view day, month, quarter and year comparisons side by side, and filter by tracking category. It’s a more flexible way to look at balance sheets for your business or practice.