Tracking Categories / Departments

Tracking categories are designed to let you see how different parts of your business are performing. Examples include:

• Routes to market (e.g. trade, agent, retail, web)

• Sales people (e.g. Alex, Bob, Chris, Della)

• Locations (e.g. Yeovil, Exeter, Taunton)

• Departments (e.g. Small Works, Railways, Roads)

• Services (e.g. routine maintenance, call-outs)

• Products (e.g. power tools, plumbing, electric)

• Brands (e.g. Brand A, Brand B, Brand C)

• Types of Customer (e.g. Key Customer 1; Key Customer 2; Key Customer 3; Small Customers)

You can have two active tracking categories, with up to 100 options against each.

Tracking categories aren't designed for job costing, however they can help provide some insight into job performance, particularly where you have a just few key customers, perhaps with a pool of smaller customers alongside these.

Keep your chart of accounts clean

When you use tracking categories, you can use fewer codes in your chart of accounts.

For instance, you may only need one Sales code, rather than one for each department. You can 'track' (slice) sales by department.

More

Read more about tracking categories in Xero Central.

Go to Accounting > Advanced > Tracking Categories then click + Add Tracking Category.

Enter the Tracking category and Category options then Save.

Using tracking categories

To get the most out of tracking, it's important to track sales and costs. Just add the relevant category when adding invoices, bills and receipts.

Check and update any 'unassigned' sales or costs by using Xero's Find and Recode function.