VOW Help Centre

Accounting Integration ​

VOW can sync invoices with external accounting software. Xero is the first supported provider; others (e.g. MYOB) will follow.

This feature requires a Professional subscription.

Connecting to Xero ​

  1. In VOW, open Settings → System → Accounting Integration.
  2. Click Connect to Xero. You'll be redirected to Xero to authorise the connection.
  3. Sign in and select the Xero organisation you want to link.
  4. After authorising, Xero redirects you back to VOW. The card now shows the connected organisation name and the date connected.

Only one Xero organisation can be linked per VOW company at a time.

Pushing an invoice to Xero ​

  1. Open a job with a sent invoice.
  2. On the invoice summary, open the actions menu and choose Push to accounting.
  3. When the push succeeds, the status chip on the invoice changes to Synced and shows the Xero invoice number.

What gets sent to Xero ​

VOWWhere it appears in Xero
Invoice ref (e.g. 20261234)Invoice Number — the primary identifier shown in Xero's UI
Billing contact's job referenceReference — the secondary reference visible on the invoice PDF the recipient receives
Bill-to name / email / ABN / phone / addressesSynced to the matching Xero contact record
Line items, amounts, GSTInvoice line items with tax exclusive amounts
Invoice date / due dateInvoice date / due date

If the same VOW invoice is pushed again (for example, after editing it in VOW), Xero updates the existing invoice rather than creating a duplicate.

Invoice sync statuses ​

  • Synced — successfully pushed, and the Xero copy matches.
  • Needs re-sync — the VOW invoice was edited after it was synced; push again to update Xero.
  • Sync error — the last push failed. Hover the chip for details, then use Clear sync status to reset, or push again.
  • Excluded — the user has opted this invoice out of sync.

Pulling payments from Xero ​

When payments are recorded against a synced invoice in Xero, VOW can pull them back so the invoice's paid status stays up to date. Payments arrive in VOW through two paths:

  • Automatically, when you push or link an invoice. Any payments already on the matching Xero invoice at that moment are imported immediately. This makes the first push of a historical invoice (one that already has payments in Xero) "just work" without a separate step.
  • On demand via the Pull payments button. This fetches recent Xero payments in bulk, useful for catching new payments recorded against already-synced invoices.

Running a pull ​

  1. Open the Invoices panel on any job.
  2. Click Pull payments in the panel header.
  3. The results dialog summarises what happened:
    • New payments recorded — payments imported for the first time and applied to the matching invoice.
    • Reviewed N Xero payments — K already recorded — how many payments Xero returned and how many were dedup-skipped because they were already in VOW. Re-pulls are safe; the same payment is never recorded twice.
    • Unmatched warning — any Xero payments that couldn't be linked. This means their Xero invoice hasn't been pushed or linked in VOW yet. Push (or link) the missing invoice and its payments will be imported automatically at that point — you don't need to re-run the pull.

Each imported payment shows a small cloud icon on the invoice card. Imported payments have no payment method set (Xero has no equivalent field); you can fill this in later for your own reporting.

What the bulk pull catches ​

The bulk pull uses Xero's recommended incremental filter (If-Modified-Since on the payment record, not the payment date), so it picks up:

  • Payments created or modified in Xero since the last successful pull — including payments backdated to an earlier date.
  • On the very first pull after connecting, payments created or modified in Xero in the last 30 days.

What the bulk pull doesn't catch:

  • Payments created in Xero more than 30 days before you first connected VOW to Xero.
  • Payments on Xero invoices that haven't been pushed or linked in VOW yet.

Both gaps are covered by the automatic import that runs when an invoice is pushed or linked (see above). If you have a historical invoice in both Xero and VOW, push it from VOW — its existing payments come across in the same operation, regardless of how old they are.

Editing imported payments ​

Imported payments are treated as a read-only mirror of the Xero record for the core fields:

  • Amount and date received can't be edited in VOW. Change them in Xero and pull again to apply the update.
  • Payment method (and any other descriptive fields) are still editable — they're for your reporting, not synced.

To remove an imported payment from VOW, delete it on the invoice. Note that the next pull will re-import it; if you want it gone permanently, delete it in Xero too.

Excluding an invoice from sync ​

Some invoices you never want to push or pull — for example, an invoice you entered directly in Xero and don't want to duplicate in VOW, or a legacy invoice that predates the integration.

  1. On the invoice summary card, open the actions menu.
  2. Choose Exclude from accounting sync.
  3. The invoice's sync status changes to Excluded and it's skipped by both push and pull operations.

To re-include a previously excluded invoice, open the same menu and choose Include in accounting sync. What happens next depends on whether the invoice was already linked to a Xero record:

  • Never linked — status reverts to Unsynced and the invoice re-enters the normal flow. Push it when you're ready.
  • Already linked — status becomes Needs re-sync, and any payments recorded in Xero while the invoice was excluded are imported automatically. Click Re-sync to Xero on the invoice card to confirm VOW's current state is in Xero. If nothing actually changed on either side during the exclusion, the re-push is a near-noop; if VOW was edited, Xero gets caught up.

VOW doesn't try to detect whether the invoice's fields drifted between VOW and Xero during the exclusion window — that's a reconciliation concern handled by a later phase. The Needs re-sync status after un-exclude is a prompt for the user to confirm parity explicitly, not a guarantee that drift occurred. If you edited the invoice in Xero during exclusion, the re-push will overwrite Xero's version with VOW's. If you need to preserve the Xero-side edits, reconcile the two manually before re-syncing.

Disconnecting ​

  1. On the same settings card, click Disconnect and confirm.
  2. VOW revokes the connection in Xero and clears the stored tokens locally.
  3. Previously-synced invoices keep their sync status for audit purposes, but no further syncing occurs until you reconnect.

If you reconnect to a different Xero organisation, VOW resets the sync status of all previously-synced invoices to prevent them from linking to unrelated Xero records.

Known limitations ​

Some VOW invoice fields can't be pushed to Xero because Xero's data model doesn't have an equivalent:

  • Invoice notes — Xero invoices don't have a notes or memo field. If you need a note on the invoice the recipient sees, add it to a line-item description.
  • Per-invoice bank account — Xero manages payment details (BSB, account number, payment instructions) at the organisation level through BrandingThemes, not per invoice. Configure your payment details in Xero under Settings → Invoice settings.
  • Attachments — the VOW-generated invoice PDF isn't currently attached to the Xero invoice. Xero will generate its own PDF from the invoice fields when sending it to the recipient.

If an invoice is edited directly in Xero after being synced, the changes aren't reflected back in VOW automatically — reconciliation tooling will be added in a later phase.