Xero how to
Xero tracking categories or Xero Projects, for a clinic
Tracking categories are reporting tags that Xero reads back inside the standard reports. Xero Projects is a workspace for one job, with time, expenses and profitability of its own. A clinic billing repeated appointments gets revenue per practitioner from a tracking option on the invoice line, so the category is the usual fit and a project earns its place on quoted, time billed work.
Key facts
- The split in one line
- Categories are reporting tags, and Projects is a workflow for time and expenses on a job9
- The tracking limit
- Four tracking categories in a Xero file, two of them active at a time14
- How many options fit in a slot
- Xero gives 100 options per category as the figure to stay under so reports load quickly, rather than as a count the software refuses14
- What carries a tracking option
- All types of transactions, as well as contacts and payroll employees13
- What Projects tracks
- Time on the job, project expenses and profitability, with bills, spend money and expense claims assigned to the project5
- What Projects reports
- Its own three reports, the project summary, the project details and the project financials5
- What Projects costs in Australia
- Project tracking sits on the Ultimate 10 plan, listed at A$143 a month and tracking projects for ten users, with A$7 for each additional project user6
- The two slots in the canonical template
- Slot one Practitioner and slot two Location, both matched by name and created with the practice's consent12
- What Splose sends
- Tracking categories created in Xero, assigned to locations and practitioners in Splose and carried on the invoice1
- What Cliniko sends
- No tracking category, so revenue cannot be split by location or business through the native integration3
- Where the pressure is
- Xero's own idea board carries 244 votes on lifting the category limit, marked in discovery on 1 Sep 20267
The question a clinic is actually asking
Almost nobody types this question because they want a feature list. They want one number at the end of the month: what each practitioner brought in, and what each site cost to run. The published comparisons answer a different question, which is how to cost a job, and a clinic does not sell jobs.
A job has a start, a scope and an end. A clinic's unit of work is an appointment that repeats, week after week, for a client whose plan may run for years. That difference settles more of this than any feature does, and it is the part the general guides leave out.
What each one is
A tracking category is a second label on a transaction line. The line still posts to its account, and the label lets the standard reports slice that account by the option on the line. Nothing new is created, and nothing is billed differently. It is a reporting dimension, and it costs nothing to turn on.
categories = reporting tags; Projects = a project/time and expenses workflow9
Xero Projects is a workspace instead. A project holds tasks, time recorded against them, expenses assigned to it, and a view of what it is making against what it was budgeted to make. Xero's own tracking article describes where a tracking option can sit, on all types of transactions as well as on contacts and payroll employees, and does not send job costing anywhere, so the line that tracking is the wrong tool for a job is a reading of the two features rather than a quote.
The unit of work test
Run the test before running the features. Write down the thing the practice sells, then ask whether it closes.
- A workplace assessment closes. It is quoted, worked and delivered, and the hours behind it are worth logging.
- A standing weekly session does not close. It repeats until the plan ends or the client stops, and no one wants to open a project for it.
- A practitioner does not close either. A person is a dimension the practice reports on every month for as long as they are there.
- A site does not close. It is a place with rent and staff, and it wants a column on the profit and loss rather than a workspace.
Three of those four are the bulk of a clinic's revenue, and none of them is a job. That is why the answer for most practices is the category, and why the practices that reach for Projects tend to be the ones with a program or an assessment arm beside the appointment book.
Who puts the tag on the line
In a clinic the invoices are not typed into Xero. They arrive from the practice management system, one per appointment, and whatever that system can set is what the line carries. The general comparisons stop short of this part, and it decides the question on its own for a lot of practices.
| System | What it can set |
|---|---|
| Splose | Tracking options for practitioner and location, mapped once and applied as invoices sync |
| Cliniko | Sales accounts by billable item, product and practitioner, and no tracking categories at all |
| Zanda | Two tracking categories with options of their own, set in the Xero export settings rather than chosen per appointment |
No practice system's Xero documentation that could be read for this page mentions Projects. So a project would be chosen by hand, on invoices that were created by a machine, which is a monthly job somebody has to own. A tracking option on the same invoices is set once in the mapping and then arrives on its own.
Where the numbers come back
Tracking reports inside the accounts you already have. Profit and Loss by tracking category, in its comparison form, puts the options in columns beside each other, so one report shows what each practitioner billed against the accounts the fees posted to.
Projects reports beside them. It has three reports of its own, the project summary, the project details and the project financials, and Xero's Projects page does not say that project figures can be read as a column inside the standard profit and loss. An open idea on Xero's own board asks for project names as column options in financial reports, which is the shape of the gap rather than a statement of it.
For a practice that already reports by funder in the account code, that difference matters. A category slices the same profit and loss the accountant is reading. A project sits next to it and has to be carried across by hand.
What each one costs
Tracking categories come with the subscription at every level. Project tracking does not. On Xero's Australian pricing page it sits on the Ultimate 10 plan, listed at A$143 a month, which tracks projects for ten users and charges A$7 a month for each project user above that. Planyard's write up puts it the same way and says Projects is not in the plans below Ultimate.
So for a practice on a lower plan the comparison is not really between two features. It is between a setting that is already paid for and a plan change, which is a conversation with the owner rather than a decision the bookkeeper can make on a Tuesday.
The two slots are usually already spent
Even where a category is the right shape, the room may be gone. Xero holds two active categories at a time. The canonical allied health template spends both of them: slot one on Practitioner, slot two on Location, each matched by name and created only with the practice's consent.
That is why the template puts funding source in the revenue account code instead of asking for a third slot. Medicare, the NDIA, a plan manager and a private client each reach their own revenue account, and the two tracking slots stay free for the person and the place. A practice that spends a slot on funding source has to give up one of those two.
Where a project earns its place in a clinic
There is work in allied health that looks like a job. A workplace assessment quoted as a piece. A funded program with a budget and an end date. A medico legal report where the hours are the product and somebody is going to ask what it took to write. For that work, time logged against a task and a profit figure at the end is exactly what Projects is built to give.
Using both is a real answer. The appointment book reports through the practitioner and location categories, and the quoted work runs as projects beside it. What this page will not do is tell a practice which side its revenue sits on, because that is a question about the practice rather than about Xero.
When the room runs out
Plenty of businesses have hit this ceiling and said so. The idea asking Xero to lift the limit on active categories and options carries 244 votes and is marked in discovery, with a Xero community manager saying on 1 Sep 2026 that the company is exploring how it might enhance tracking categories. One poster on that thread writes that the lack of tracking categories will push their business to look at another accounting system by the end of the year.
Until something changes there, the practical moves are the ordinary ones. Put the dimension that changes least in the account code. Keep the two slots for the dimensions a person is measured on. Archive an option when a practitioner leaves rather than reusing it for the next hire, so last year's report still reads.
What Ledger Map does with it
Ledger Map holds one standing map for the practice, approved before anything syncs. The map carries the two tracking slots by name and creates an option only with the practice's consent, and it carries funding source on the revenue row instead of asking for a slot that is not there.
A funder deposit is then posted as one balanced document set, leaving one exact match in the bank feed for a person to accept. The wage side of the same question is on Xero payroll tracking for practitioners, and how it works shows the map and the approval step it goes through.
Questions
Can a clinic use tracking categories and Xero Projects together?
Yes. The appointment book can report through practitioner and location options while quoted, finite work runs as projects beside it. The two do not collide, because a project is a workspace and a tracking option is a label on a line. The cost of running both is the plan Projects sits on and the hand work of putting invoices onto projects.
Do I need Xero Projects to see revenue by practitioner?
No. A tracking option on the invoice line gives revenue by practitioner inside Profit and Loss by tracking category, and most practice systems can set that option as the invoice syncs. Projects is built around time on a job, which is not how a repeated appointment is billed.
What does Xero Projects cost in Australia?
Xero's Australian pricing page puts project tracking on the Ultimate 10 plan, listed at A$143 a month, tracking projects for ten users with A$7 a month for each project user above that. It is not included in the plans below it, so for many practices the real question is whether the plan change is worth it.
Will my practice management system put invoices onto a project?
No article from a practice system that could be read for this page mentions Xero Projects. Splose assigns tracking categories to locations and practitioners, Cliniko's native integration sends no tracking category, and Zanda sets two categories in its Xero export settings. Assume a project has to be chosen by hand until a vendor says otherwise.
What if two tracking categories are not enough?
Put the dimension that changes least into the revenue account code, which is what the canonical allied health template does with funding source, and keep the two slots for the person and the place. Xero's idea board carries an open request to lift the limit, marked in discovery, so this is a known constraint rather than a setup mistake.
Does archiving a practitioner free up room?
Archiving frees an option inside a category, not a category slot. It keeps last year's reports readable, because the option is held with its name rather than removed. The slot itself stays spent for as long as the category is active.
Read next
- Xero how toXero tracking categories for a clinic
- Xero how toXero payroll tracking for practitioners
- Xero how toReport by tracking category in Xero
- Xero how toArchive a practitioner in Xero tracking
- ProblemsAll practice revenue lands in one Xero account
- ProblemsSplitting Cliniko revenue by location in Xero
- HubXero how to
Sources
Open questions
- That tracking is not built for job costing is a reading of what the two features do rather than a sentence Xero publishes, so a person should test it in a live Xero organisation before this page is published.
- Whether an invoice created in Xero by a practice system can carry a project at all could not be confirmed from any vendor page that could be read. The Splose and Cliniko Xero articles describe sales accounts and tracking categories and say nothing about Projects.
- Whether project figures can be read back as a column inside the standard profit and loss is not stated on Xero's own Projects page. An open idea asks for it, which is the shape of the gap rather than a statement of it.
- Whether Zanda assigns its two tracking categories to a whole export batch or to each invoice line is not stated in the readable text of its Xero article, and it matters to a practice that exports more than one site at a time.
- Xero's Australian pricing page was read while a promotional rate was showing on it. The prices quoted here are the standing ones, and the promotional rate is not quoted, so a reviewer should re-read the page once the promotion ends.
- The sentence the research corpus quotes from Xero's healthcare guide, that tracking categories separate revenue and costs by practitioner or by clinic location, is no longer on that page after its August 2026 update. It is not used here.
- Tracking categories, increase the maximum number of active categories and options
Xero Product Ideas. Retrieved 3 Sep 2026. Source updated 1 Sep 2026.
secondary
- Tracking categories in Xero, the practical setup for job costing
Planyard. Retrieved 3 Sep 2026. Source updated 18 Feb 2026.
secondary
- Xero tracking categories, a setup guide
LedgerLogic. Retrieved 3 Sep 2026. Source updated 20 Feb 2026.
secondary
Review
Last reviewed 3 Sep 2026 by Shane
General information for Australian allied health practices, not tax advice. Confirm a treatment with your BAS agent or accountant before you post it.
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