Xero Payroll (UK)

How to enable the Xero Payroll integration and push timesheets to Xero.

Carl Holloway avatar
Written by Carl Holloway
Updated over a week ago

Integration details

  • Installation: Self install

  • Behaviour: Real-time

  • Rotaready cost: Free

  • Authentication: Requires you to log-in via Xero

Data flows

  • Signed-off hours (timesheets): Rotaready to Xero

Rotaready will push signed-off hours directly through to your timesheets in Xero. Employees must be created within both systems, with the relevant details updated in both (e.g. pay rates must be recorded).

  • Absence: Rotaready to Xero

Rotaready will push through booked and approved absence bookings to the 'leave' tab within an employee's profile in live time. Employees must have a leave type associated with their profile in Xero in order for leave to be recorded. Absence will only push through once the integration has been made live.

👀 Find out more about the Rotaready & Xero integration in our recent Spotlight Session.

Installation

❗️ It's important to enable the Xero integration as soon as possible, as absence will only sync across to Xero once the integration has been made live - there's no way to back-date absence booked on Rotaready prior to the integration being enabled.

Connecting Rotaready to Xero

  1. Click Settings then Xero

  2. Click Connect to Xero

  3. You'll now be transferred to the Xero login screen. Sign-in with your normal Xero credentials. These aren't shared with Rotaready.

  4. If your Xero account contains multiple organisations, you'll need to select which one you want to connect. Click Allow access.

  5. You'll be redirected back to Rotaready and the organisation will appear on the settings screen. Next you need to configure the mappings (see below).

  6. To connect multiple organisations, just follow steps 2-5 again.

Configuring your mappings

Mappings allow things in Rotaready to line up with their counterparts on Xero. They link your Rotaready absence types with Xero leave types, Rotaready pay element types with Xero earnings rates, and Rotaready companies with Xero organisations.

A company might be named "Infinity Rockets" in Rotaready but named "Infinity Rocket Company Ltd" in Xero, for example. Because these names aren't identical, your mapping tells the integration what two things are the same.

Mappings are also handy because they allow you to exclude certain things that you want the integration to ignore. By not mapping a particular Absence Type, any absence of that type won't be automatically added into Xero, for example.

  1. Click Settings then Xero

  2. Scroll down to the relevant Xero organisation.

  3. Select the corresponding Rotaready company.

  4. Create mappings for your Rotaready absence types. Only map absence types that you want absence automatically created in Xero for.

  5. Create mappings for your Rotaready pay element types. If you do not map a pay element type, any worked hours attributed to it will be excluded when pushing timesheets to Xero. For this reason, we recommend you map all pay element types.

  6. Be sure to click Save!

⚠️ Don't forget to update your mappings if you reconfigure your Rotaready absence types or pay element types.

Pay runs

The integration can tell Xero exactly how many hours each employee has worked, and at what earnings rate. It does this by creating payroll 'timesheets' for each employee in a Xero pay run.

⚠️ The integration will only use signed-off hours, so please make sure you've completed Rotaready sign-off for each day of the pay run in the relevant site(s) first.

When you're ready to go, follow these steps:

  1. First, create a draft pay run in Xero. Unfortunately Xero doesn't let Rotaready do this for you yet.

  2. Now, click Reports then Export to Xero

  3. Select the Xero organisation you wish to process a pay run for.

  4. Click on the draft pay run you created earlier.

  5. You'll see a list of your Rotaready employees. This list has been filtered to people where:
    - They have an active appointment during the pay run
    - Their company (on their appointment) matches the pay run's Xero organisation
    - Their pay frequency (on their pay record) matches the pay run's pay frequency

  6. If a corresponding employee appears in Xero, you'll see a green tick. Rotaready matches the employees automatically by looking for someone with the same first name, last name and date of birth.

  7. You'll also see a green tick if the employee has signed-off data. If an employee worked zero hours during the entire pay run, it's ok to see a red cross here.

  8. Select employees using the checkboxes, or the select all checkbox in the table header. Then using the action buttons across the top, click Push timesheets. This will create the payroll timesheets in Xero for the pay run.

  9. Once done, the total hours will appear in the right-most column for each employee. You can optionally verify these in Xero.

  10. If you're happy, click Approve timesheets. Otherwise, you can revert the timesheets to draft or delete them at any time.

  11. Now return to Xero to complete the pay run.

Did this answer your question?