Processing Payroll to Xero

RosterElf is an approved add-on to Xero, which means you can connect your RosterElf and Xero account seamlessly and send all the payroll data directly across each pay run.

Please note: RosterElf only supports Xero payroll in Australia, New Zealand and the United Kingdom.

Both software has an API integration, so uploading a payroll file into Xero is unnecessary. Instead, once you approve your payroll data in RosterElf, it is sent directly into your Xero account as a draft timesheet.

1. Click on the Payroll tab on the top menu of your RosterElf account. 

2. Select a Week and Select a Site that you wish to process.

3. If you cannot find some staff in the roster you are trying to process based on their name in your Xero account, this window will show you a list of Unmatched Staff for you to match manually (If you don't see this popup, skip to step 4). To manually match staff that are not linked, click on Match With Xero.

Another popup window will appear with a list of possible staff names in Xero for you to choose.
Once you find the correct employee name from Xero, click it, and RosterElf will match the employee records. 

If you cannot find the employee, it is most likely the employee does not exist in your Xero account.

Therefore, we recommend at this point, you log into your Xero account and add the employee before proceeding.

4. Once you have finalised the step above or if you didn't have to fix any issues. You will land on the Payroll screen.

This view shows several columns per day for every shift, including:

• Rostered Times
• Clock-in-out Times
• Auto Rounded Times
• Custom

5. For each shift, you must select one option. For example, if you want a custom payroll time different from the Rostered and Clock-in-Out Times, you can type in the fields in the Custom column.

As you select, you will notice that the Approved Times, Estimated Cost and the Financial Summary table automatically calculate statistics, including labour cost, percentage, average pay rate, and total hours. If you are a sales-based business, you can enter your ACTUAL sales results and know live what your labour percentage to sales is per day and for the week.

6. To enter sales targets, click on a day of the week and type into the $ field. Then repeat this for each day, adding your target for that day.

7. At the end of each row, you can view more information by clicking on the 'i' icon on the shift.

8. If you have unrostered shifts, you can add them manually to payroll by clicking the Add Shift button.

9. If you have employees you don't want to be included in the exported payroll file, you can untick their records.

10. If any staff have leave that requires processing in payroll, you will see an alert saying how many staff are on leave during the payroll cycle. Click on this alert to process the leave.

11. A popup will show the list of staff that have leave in the period. To approve the leave, enter the number of hours to be processed, select the type of leave from your Xero account, and then click Send to Xero. 

12. If you need to come back to finish Payroll later, you can click Save at any point. Then, click Process to proceed once you are ready and happy with the hours to be processed.

13. A new window with summary information you can review. To confirm, select Process Payroll. 

NOTE: The timesheet will update if you have an existing timesheet in Xero for the same pay period.

Draft timesheets appear in Xero

Lastly, log into your Xero account and go to the Timesheets.


You will see RosterElf has sent all the approved staff hours, broken down by pay item/rules, directly to your Xero account. Process your payroll in Xero as usual.