Xero user roles and permissions explained, and how to add your accountant

Short answer: Administrator (called Adviser until July 2026) can do everything, including lock dates and every report and journal. Standard can do the day-to-day work, and only gets reports, manual journals and cash coding if you tick those permissions. Four sales and purchases roles (Sales and purchases, Sales, Purchases, Draft sales and purchases) replaced Invoice Only. Viewer (formerly Read Only) can look but not change anything. Payroll Admin runs pay runs and Employee is for staff using Xero Me. To add your accountant or bookkeeper, open Settings, then Users, then Invite a user, enter their name and email, choose Administrator, and send the invite. Xero does not charge per user, so adding them costs nothing. Nobody’s access changed when the roles were renamed: existing users keep what they had until someone with permission to edit users changes it.

The roles at a glance

Role	Who it is for	Can	Cannot
Administrator (was Adviser)	The owner, your accountant, your bookkeeper	Everything: all transactions, every report, manual journals, lock dates, Find and recode, publishing reports	Change billing, unless they are also the subscriber
Standard	An office manager who codes the bank and pays bills	Bank reconciliation, invoices, bills, contacts	Reports, manual journals and cash coding, unless you tick those permissions; bank balances can be hidden from them
Sales and purchases	Someone who raises invoices and enters bills	Both sides: quotes, invoices, credit notes, bills	Bank, reports beyond the sales and purchases ones you share
Sales	A salesperson	Quotes, invoices and customer credit notes, and approving them	Bills, bank, the full Reporting Centre
Purchases	Someone who handles supplier bills	Bills and purchase orders, and approving them	Sales, bank, the full Reporting Centre
Draft sales and purchases	A junior or a site manager	Create draft invoices and bills for someone else to approve	Approve anything
Viewer (was Read Only)	A co-owner, an investor, a lender	See most areas of Xero	Create or edit transactions, or run new reports
Payroll Admin	Whoever runs pay runs	Pay runs and payroll	Is a payroll role: give an accounting role as well if the same person does the books
Employee	Staff	Payslips, leave, timesheets and expenses through Xero Me	The accounts

The July 2026 release (Xero’s own announcement is titled “Rebuilding user permissions”) renamed Adviser to Administrator “reflecting that business owners and their teams can hold this role as well as advisors”, split Invoice Only into the four sales and purchases roles, renamed Read Only to Viewer, and gave Payroll Admin and Employee their own roles. It also lets you hide bank balances, statement lines and feeds from Standard users, and share the sales or purchases reports (such as Aged Receivables) with the sales and purchases roles without opening the whole Reporting Centre. Guides and videos from before July 2026 still say “Adviser”; read it as Administrator.

How to add your accountant to Xero

1. Sign in to Xero and pick the organisation (the business name at the top left).
2. Open Settings, then Users. You need the “Manage users” permission to see the invite button; the person who set Xero up has it.
3. Click Invite a user and enter your accountant’s first name, last name and email address. Use the address they sign in to Xero with, which is often their work email at the practice.
4. Choose Administrator for the business and accounting role. An accountant who files your VAT, GST or BAS, prepares year-end accounts or sets lock dates needs it.
5. Tick Manage users only if they will add their own staff to your file. Payroll is separate: add Payroll Admin only if they run your pay runs.
6. Send the invite. Your accountant accepts it from the email and signs in with their own Xero login.

If their practice uses Xero HQ, they leave Connect to practice switched on when they accept, so your business appears in their client list. If the invite email goes missing or expires, resend it from the same Users page (click their name, then resend the invite).

Adding a bookkeeper is the same steps. A bookkeeper who reconciles the bank, posts journals and closes the month also needs Administrator; one who only codes the bank feed and enters bills can work as Standard, with the reports permission ticked if they send you the monthly figures.

Adding a tax accountant who only does the year end: Administrator for the months they work on the file is the practical choice, because year-end adjustments are manual journals and the lock date is theirs to set. Change them to Viewer, or remove them, afterwards if you prefer.

Worked example: setting up the roles for a small business

These figures and names are made up. Harbour Coffee Roasters Ltd, a UK roaster with 12 staff, uses Xero for its accounts and payroll. The director, Sam, sets up who sees what:

Person	Job	Xero role	Extra permissions
Sam	Director and owner	Administrator	Manage users; Sam is also the subscriber who pays for Xero
Priya	Co-owner, not in the business day to day	Viewer	None
Dan	Office manager	Standard	Reports off; bank balances visible because he reconciles the bank
Leah	Wholesale sales	Sales	Aged Receivables shared, so she can chase her own customers
Tom	Warehouse lead	Draft sales and purchases	None: Dan approves the bills Tom enters
Grove Bookkeeping	Monthly bookkeeping and payroll	Administrator and Payroll Admin	Manage users, so the practice can add its own staff
Moss & Co	Year-end accounts and VAT	Administrator	None

The 12 staff (Dan, Leah, Tom and nine roasters and drivers) use the Employee role to see their payslips and book leave in Xero Me. So 7 people have accounting access, 3 of them (Sam, the bookkeeper and the accountant) with full access.

The access review. Before setting this up, Sam opened Settings, then Users, and found 11 users with accounting access. Four of them should not have been there:

Found	Role they had	Why it was wrong	Action
The previous accountant	Adviser (now Administrator)	Left a year ago, still had full access	Removed
A junior from the previous accountant’s firm	Adviser (now Administrator)	Same	Removed
A former salesperson	Invoice Only (now Sales and purchases)	Left in March	Removed
A web developer	Standard	Connected the online shop once, two years ago	Removed, after checking the shop’s connection did not depend on their login

After the review, 7 users have accounting access instead of 11, and the number with full access fell from 5 to 3. Two outsiders had been able to see every bank balance, wage and customer for a year. Removing a user does not undo their work: the history on each transaction still shows who did what.

Connecting apps: which role you need

Apps connect to Xero through the person who clicks Allow access. Xero’s developer documentation says that user must have the Standard or Administrator role with the Connected apps permission, and the app then sees what that user could see:

• An app that reads reports (the Profit and Loss, Balance Sheet, aged debtors) only works if the connecting user has reports access. A Standard user with reports switched off can connect an app that then cannot read any figures.
• An app that reads payroll needs the connecting user to be a Payroll Admin.

So the owner or the bookkeeper (Administrator) should be the one who connects reporting apps. You can see and disconnect every app under Settings, then Connected apps; check it during the access review, because an app connected by someone who has left keeps working until it is disconnected there.

Change or remove a user

• Change a role: Settings, Users, click the person, change the role or the permissions, and save. Do this when someone’s job changes, not only when they leave.
• Remove a user: Settings, Users, click the person, then remove them. It takes effect straight away and does not delete their past work.
• The subscriber: the user who pays for Xero. Only the subscriber can change the plan and billing; other Administrators cannot. If the subscriber is leaving, or your accountant’s practice pays for Xero on its partner plan and you are moving away, transfer the subscription to another user before removing anyone, so the file is not left without a payer.

Common mistakes

• Giving everyone Administrator because it is the default people pick. A salesperson needs Sales, an office manager usually needs Standard.
• Never removing former staff and old accountants, as in the example: 4 of 11 users had left.
• Connecting a reporting app as a Standard user without reports access, then wondering why the app shows no figures.
• Removing the subscriber before transferring the subscription.
• Giving a Viewer to the accountant who then cannot post the year-end journals or run new reports, so the year end stalls.
• Sharing one login between people instead of inviting each person. Users are free, and separate logins keep a record of who changed what.

Common questions

What are the user roles in Xero? Administrator (called Adviser before July 2026), Standard, four sales and purchases roles (Sales and purchases, Sales, Purchases, Draft sales and purchases), Viewer (formerly Read Only), Payroll Admin and Employee.

Is the Xero Adviser role the same as Administrator? Yes. In July 2026 Xero renamed Adviser to Administrator, because business owners and their teams hold the role as well as advisers. Users who had Adviser kept exactly the same access.

What role should my accountant have in Xero? Administrator, if they prepare your accounts, file VAT, GST or BAS, post journals or set lock dates. Add Manage users only if they will invite their own staff, and Payroll Admin only if they run payroll.

How do I add my accountant or bookkeeper to Xero? Settings, then Users, then Invite a user. Enter their name and the email they use for Xero, choose Administrator, and send the invite. They accept from the email with their own Xero login.

Does Xero charge for extra users? No. Xero plans do not charge per user, so you can invite your accountant, bookkeeper and staff at no extra cost.

Can a Standard user see reports in Xero? Only if you tick the reports permission for them. Without it they can do the day-to-day work (bank, invoices, bills) but not open the Reporting Centre.

What user role do I need to connect an app to Xero? Standard or Administrator with the Connected apps permission. An app that reads reports also needs the connecting user to have reports access, and a payroll app needs a Payroll Admin.

How do I remove my old accountant from Xero? Settings, then Users, click their name and remove them. Check Settings, then Connected apps for anything they connected, and if their practice pays for your Xero subscription, arrange the transfer first.

Where ReportPilot fits

ReportPilot is one of those connected apps. It connects to Xero with read-only access (it can read reports, invoices and contacts, and cannot change anything in your file) and sends you a plain-English email every Monday: sales and profit against last month, cash in the bank, who owes you money and what is overdue, and the bills due soon. Because it reads reports, connect it as an Administrator, or as a Standard user with reports access. A bookkeeper can connect each client and send the same email under the practice’s name (for bookkeepers). The Owner plan is US$19 a month after a 14-day free trial with no card (pricing), and you can see a sample email first.

Related guides: the bookkeeping client onboarding checklist (getting access to a new client’s Xero), Xero lock dates (what Administrators can still change), the Xero year end checklist, how to send Xero reports to clients, and Xero’s monthly cost.