Connect Xero
Lesson 3 of 12 6 min read
Create the Xero Integration, find your way around its tile, and choose how often it runs.
With your decisions agreed, you're ready to create the Integration. In this lesson you'll add Xero in Supply Lens, connect your Xero account, and learn what each part of the Integration tile does.
Create the Integration
- Log in to Supply Lens.
- Go to Settings → Integration setup → Integrations.
- Click + ADD INTEGRATION in the top-right to see the available integrations.
- Find Xero and click ADD.
- Complete the form and connect your Xero account when asked.
- Click CONNECT to create the Integration.
If the connection fails
Connecting your Xero account was made more reliable in a recent release, and you now get a clearer message if something goes wrong. If you see an error, read the message, check you're signed in to the right Xero organisation, and try again.
The Integration tile
Click the arrow on the new Integration to expand its tile.
| Activation | Whether the Integration can run. While it's disabled, nothing is sent to or received from Xero. Leave it disabled until your configurations and Mappings are ready. |
|---|---|
| State | Live or Test. This mostly affects EDI Integrations and can usually be left unset for Xero. |
| Configurations | What this Integration sends and receives: one configuration per record type, such as Xero Invoice. The next lesson covers these. |
| Schedule | How often the Integration runs. If you disable the schedule, you'll need to run it by hand. |
| Default Unit of Measure | Forces every quantity to one unit of measure. Leave it unset to use each Product's default. |
| Manual Operation | Run the Integration now: Send & Receive, Send only, or Receive only. |
| Remove | Permanently removes the Integration and its stored credentials. Documents already created are kept. |
The key and id on the tile are set by the system. Keep the Integration ID handy: Support
will ask for it.
Choose a schedule
Click Schedule and pick an interval: 30 minutes, 1 hour, 2, 4, 8 or 12 hours.
For a Xero Integration that only sends, the schedule decides how quickly waiting invoices and bills are pushed into Xero. If you also receive invoices from Xero, it decides how often Supply Lens checks for new ones. Many finance teams are happy with an hourly or longer schedule; choose a shorter one if someone downstream is waiting on the data.
Run it by hand
During setup and testing you'll want to run the Integration on demand. In the Manual Operation tile choose Run Send & Receive, Run Send or Run Receive.
Hilltop Coffee connects a demo organisation
Hilltop's implementer creates a Xero Integration connected to Xero's demo company and leaves Activation disabled while she adds configurations. When she's ready to test she'll enable it but set no schedule, so nothing runs until she clicks Run Send herself. Once finance signs off, she'll create a second Integration connected to the live organisation.
Recap
- Add Xero from Settings → Integration setup → Integrations → + ADD INTEGRATION, connect your Xero account, then click CONNECT.
- Keep Activation disabled until configurations and Mappings are ready.
- Schedule sets how often Supply Lens sends to and reads from Xero; Manual Operation runs it now.
- Remove deletes the Integration and its credentials but keeps your Documents.
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