Using SignAndGo with Xero.

A huge number of New Zealand businesses run their books in Xero, and many accountants and bookkeepers spend part of every week moving signed paperwork into it. Connecting SignAndGo to your Xero organisation takes that step away: when an envelope is finished, the signed document can go straight to Xero.

What the connection does

Two things. Signed documents can be filed into Xero automatically once everyone has signed, and new signers can be added as Xero contacts so you are not typing a client's name and email in twice. Everything else in SignAndGo works the same whether or not Xero is connected: signers see the same email and link, and the envelope keeps its own record.

Setting it up

Connect from your SignAndGo settings and approve the connection in Xero, choosing the organisation you want documents filed in. Then decide whether completed documents should be filed automatically and whether signers should be added as contacts. Both are choices, not defaults you have to undo.

• Pick the right Xero organisation if you have access to more than one.
• Decide whether contacts should be created for every signer, or whether you would rather add them yourself.
• Send a test envelope to a colleague and look for the signed copy in Xero before you switch it on for client work.

A worked example: onboarding a client at a Hastings practice

Picture a four-person bookkeeping practice in Hastings taking on an orchard business as a new client. The practice is invented for illustration.

• The practice already has a shared template holding its engagement letter and its authority form for acting with IRD, with a Client role and a Partner role.
• The administrator picks the template, enters the orchard owner against the Client role and the partner against the Partner role, and adds text fields the template already carries for the client's IRD number and NZBN.
• Signing is in order: the client signs first and the partner countersigns, so the partner only receives it once the client is done.
• The client signs on his phone in the packhouse at lunchtime. The partner countersigns that afternoon.
• Because filing is switched on, the signed engagement letter goes into Xero, and the orchard owner is added as a contact, so the first invoice can be raised without retyping anything.
• The completion certificate and audit trail stay on the envelope in SignAndGo, ready if anyone later asks when the engagement was signed.

For businesses billing from Xero

Trades, agencies and suppliers often send a quote or terms of trade, then invoice from Xero once it is accepted. With signers added as contacts, the customer already exists in Xero when you raise the first invoice. The signed terms sit with the record if a question comes up later about what was agreed.

If you work across several organisations

Bookkeepers and practices often have access to many Xero organisations. Choose the one each connection should file into, and check it before switching on automatic filing so a client's document never lands in the wrong set of books. If a client's work moves to another organisation, update the connection rather than filing by hand.

When something is not where you expect

• The document is not in Xero: check the envelope is complete. Filing happens once everyone has signed, so an envelope waiting on a countersignature has nothing to file yet.
• It went to the wrong organisation: check which organisation the connection files into before the next envelope finishes, and move the misfiled copy in Xero.
• A client already had a Xero contact under a different email: check the contacts added after your first few envelopes and tidy any doubles in Xero. If most of your signers are existing clients, you may prefer to leave automatic contacts off.
• The client declined: nothing is filed, because the envelope stopped. Read their reason, correct the document and send a fresh envelope.

What stays in SignAndGo

The envelope keeps its audit trail, completion certificate and verification ID in SignAndGo regardless of filing. Xero holds the signed document; SignAndGo holds the full record of how it was signed.