SaaS accounting startup Xero has rolled out some cool new features this week. Most useful is Tracking which allows categories and options to be set up for different parts of the business’ operation. The example Xero gives is different properties for a property investment company. Any transaction can then be coded to the relevant category/option and P&L reports can then be run showing income and expenditure for each separate category.

It’s an important feature for service businesses as it allows them to accurately gauge profitability for different parts of the business. One suggestion I’d make would be for the ability to split expenses over several options (for example if the hypothetical property investment company has a $1000 accountancy bill, it’d be good to split it between individual properties so each would show their “share” of the expense).

Xero is trying it’s hardest to develop with a SaaS/v strategy – the new features that have been rolled out of late are doing something to play to this – doing what the incumbents do but doing it better and thus adding value to users.

Ben Kepes

Ben Kepes is a technology evangelist, an investor, a commentator and a business adviser. Ben covers the convergence of technology, mobile, ubiquity and agility, all enabled by the Cloud. His areas of interest extend to enterprise software, software integration, financial/accounting software, platforms and infrastructure as well as articulating technology simply for everyday users.

1 Comment
  • Hi Ben – thanks for your comments. You can split a $1000 invoice into multiple lines (within the one invoice) and code/track each line separately.

    As you said, tracking shows that Xero is not just the best online accounting system – but we’re also doing core accounting better and smarter than the incumbents.

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