**Note. A Pro Plan of BusinessMind™ is required for Xero Integration. Please see the pricing page for more details: https://www.businessmind-for-jewelers.com/pricing

In order to use Xero integration with BusinessMind, it is neccessary to configure an account mapping between the two systems. BusinessMind makes this process easy. This short article will show you how.

Note: This article is not a complete configuration guide for Xero integration. It focuses on configuring account mappings only, which are a vital part of the integration. For other questions pertaining to configuration of Xero integration, please submit your inquiries to the engineers via the Help Center.

Events in BusinessMind with an accounting component will be included in a data feed to Xero when the integration is in place and activated. In order for Xero and BusinessMind to assign such events to the desired accounts, you will need to setup an account mapping for the supported accounting events in BusinessMind.

For example, inventory receiving events should debit the inventory asset account in Xero. To ensure that this takes place, you will need to configure the integration so that it knows which account is the correct target for such events.

Log into the BusinessMind Web App with your same BusinessMind Credentials. https://app.bmj.dcit.com/

Navigate to the Integrations and Addons screen in BusinessMind by clicking the puzzle piece icon in the main navigation.

This screen will display the status or the supported addons and integrations available in your BusinessMind account. Look for the section for the Xero Integration and click it.

Note: The status of the Xero integration must say Connected and enabled must say true before you can configure the account mapping. If you see a button to connect xero, you must first request this integration to be activated. To do so, ensure that you have signed up for a Xero account at www.xero.com. Trial accounts are not supported. Once you have a qualified Xero account, submit a request to BusinessMind technical support through the help center to activate the integration for your BusinessMind and Xero account. This process can take 3 - 5 days to complete. Once it is completed, the Xero integration status on Addons & Integrations page of your BusinessMind account should say Connected and enabled must say true, then you will be ready to configure your account mapping.

In the Xero integration section you will see a list of event targets and the account in Xero that they are currently mapped to. If any of the accounts indicate that they are not configured, then your Xero integration data feed will be paused. It is important that all account mappings are assigned before you begin relying on the integration's data feed.

If any of the accounting event targets needs to be mapped, A button will appear at the bottom of the display called Edit Xero Configuration. Clicking this button will bring you to the BusinessMind account configuration page.

Note: Only roles which have permission to configure Xero will be able to access these controls. Be sure you logged in with an account that has the required privileges in order to be able to configure your mappings.

The Xero section of the BusinessMind account configuration screen display will prompt you to create suggested accounts, if they are not found to exist in the Xero chart of accounts. You are not required to create and use the suggested accounts. They are presented as a convenience. If you prefer to map accounts of your own making, you should log into your Xero account and create your desired accounts before beginning the mapping configuration steps in BusinessMind.

BusinessMind will scan the Xero chart of accounts for the suggested accounts to be mapped. For any it does not find, it will present a prompt with information which allows you to let BusinessMind create them for you by clicking the Create In Xero buttons provided.

In the example screen shot shown above, BusinessMind found five accounts missing from Xero's chart of accounts and is presenting information about the account as well as a button to create it, as a convenience to the user.

If you have already created accounts in Xero that you prefer to map here, you can ignore the suggestions and simply click the Continue to account mapping button to proceed to the second phase of configuration where you will select the accounts to be mapped.

In the final step the accounting event targets are presented along side drop down lists of permissible accounts from the Xero chart of accounts.

For each accounting event target, be sure that a Xero account is selected from the drop down menu. Note that only permissible accounts of the correct type will appear in the selection menus to prevent the selection of accounts of an inappropriate or unsupported type. Permissible accounts are the listed accounts in the various drop down selections that correlate to the account type set on the account in Xero. This means only those Xero accounts with the proper account type will display in the drop down menu that correlates to that account. If you are not seeing an account in the list then that account type does not match what is required for that selection.

The name of the drop down should guide you to what accounts should be available. Again if your not seeing an account listed then its not of the correct corresponding type with-in xero.

You can also easily look at the accounts that do appear in the drop down and view them in xero to see the xero account type its populating from.

Once all event targets have been mapped to an account in Xero, click the Save Xero Configuration button. Return to the Addons & Integrations home screen to confirm that all event targets are configured.

Now there are a 2 major configurations you need to grab from Xero and supply to our Engineering Team.

When all event targets are mapped and you have supplied the 2 URLs to the support staff your Xero integration data feed will be functioning and you will see data from BusinessMind feeding into Xero.

For example, if you have 3 stores at New York, Miami, and Dallas, you need to switch to each location in BusinessMind and run through the Xero configuration steps. If you leave a geolocation unconfigured, Xero integration features for that geolocation will be disabled. 

It is important to understand that while each geolocation can have an individual configuration, the integration connects to only one Xero company account. All accounts and tax rates in Xero are shared and available to all your geolocations. You may wish to configure different tax rate mappings for different geolocations, for example.

It is not recommended to configure different inventory account mappings for different geolocations. Your geolocations should use the same inventory account mappings. This is because at this time, BusinessMind Xero integration does not trigger an accounting change when inventory is moved from one geolocation to another. Therefore, if you try to configure different inventory account mappings for different geolocations and then move inventory across geolocations, you will have to make manual journal entries between differing inventory accounts in Xero to account for the moved inventory.

Since it is possible to modify the chart of accounts in Xero at any time, BusinessMind will periodically reverify that the configured account mappings are still valid. If an account in Xero is modified or removed, it may invalidate the mapping in BusinessMind and this will generate errors. When this situation is detected by BusinessMind, it will send you a notification of the problem and you may need to revisit the steps above to amend the account mapping so that it will become functional again.

Note: As a best practice, do not modify the chart of accounts in Xero, in any way, while users are actively using BusinessMind. Changes in Xero which invalidate the mapping in BusinessMind can take time to detect and some accounting data can be lost in the interim. While BusinessMind uses a journaled task queue for processing events to try to minimize any such issues, it is still impossible to prevent the possibility of data loss completely. If data loss occurs you will need to bring the accounting data in Xero up to speed with the lost transactions manually through adjusting entries.

If you need to modify the chart of accounts in Xero after the mappings have been already configured in BusinessMind, you should first ensure that all users have logged out of BusinessMind, then make the changes to the accounts in Xero. Once the changes in Xero have been made, log into BusinessMind and use the steps above to verify or remap any accounts where it may be needed. Once all the account mappings are valid again, users may resume working in BusinessMind. In this way, you have the freedom and flexibility to modify your Xero chart of accounts when needed without disrupting the data feed within the BusinessMind + Xero integration.