Xero to Business Central Migration for a Growing Australian Distributor
A 120-person Australian professional services firm had outgrown Xero. Project profitability was tracked in Excel, multi-entity consolidation took three days every month, and the board had no real-time visibility into the business. Weblink Plus delivered a migration to Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central — with a Power BI reporting layer that gave leadership the visibility Xero could never provide.
Discuss Your Xero UpgradeResults at a glance
Australian Professional Services Firm
120 Staff · Three Entities (AU, NZ, UK) · Xero Multi-File
The Organisation
The client is a mid-sized Australian professional services firm with 120 staff across consulting, advisory, and managed services practices. The business had used Xero since its early growth phase — it was the right tool at the time. By the time the engagement with Weblink Plus began, the firm had grown to three legal entities, was billing across multiple currencies, and was managing a project portfolio of over 200 active engagements. Xero was no longer fit for purpose.
The Decision to Move
The decision to move from Xero to an ERP was driven by the CFO and CEO together. The CFO was spending three days every month producing consolidated group reports in Excel. The CEO could not get a clear picture of project profitability without waiting for the monthly close. Both agreed that the business had outgrown its accounting software and needed a platform that could grow with it. Business Central was selected over NetSuite based on the firm\'s existing Microsoft 365 investment and the lower total cost of ownership.
The Limitations That Forced the Move
Xero is excellent accounting software for small businesses. These are the specific gaps that emerge when a professional services firm grows beyond it.
No project-level profitability tracking
Xero has no native project module capable of tracking time, expenses, and revenue against individual engagements at the granularity the business needed. Project profitability was calculated monthly in Excel by the finance team — a process that took three days and was always out of date by the time it was complete.
Multi-entity consolidation done manually
The business operated three legal entities — an Australian consulting practice, a New Zealand subsidiary, and a small UK operation. Xero handled each entity separately. Consolidated group reporting required exporting data from three Xero files and manually combining them in Excel. The process was error-prone and consumed significant finance time each period.
No purchase order or approval workflow
Xero has no native purchase order module. The business was managing supplier commitments through email and spreadsheets, with no system-enforced approval process. This created budget overruns on projects and made it difficult to track committed costs against project budgets in real time.
Reporting limited to what Xero could produce
Management reporting was constrained by what Xero's built-in reports could generate. The business had outgrown these reports — the board wanted project-level margin analysis, resource utilisation reporting, and forward revenue forecasting that Xero simply could not produce without significant manual intervention.
How Weblink Plus Delivered the Upgrade
A five-phase approach designed around the firm\'s specific professional services requirements.
Requirements mapping and platform validation
Weblink Plus began with a structured requirements workshop — mapping every reporting requirement, workflow, and integration the business needed against Business Central's native capability. This confirmed that Business Central's Projects module, combined with Power BI for reporting, would meet the requirements without third-party add-ons. The scope was defined before any configuration began.
Multi-entity structure design
The three-entity group structure was designed in Business Central before any data was migrated. Intercompany posting rules, currency handling for the NZ and UK entities, and the consolidated chart of accounts were all configured and tested with sample transactions before the migration window opened. This eliminated the most common source of post-go-live issues in multi-entity implementations.
Data migration from three Xero files
Open transactions, customer and vendor master data, and chart of accounts were migrated from all three Xero files. Historical transaction data was migrated for the current and prior financial year to support comparative reporting. The migration was validated by reconciling Business Central opening balances against Xero closing balances for each entity before go-live was approved.
Projects module configuration
Business Central's Projects module was configured to match the firm's engagement structure — project types, billing methods, resource rates, and WIP accounting rules. Time entry was configured for all billable staff. The project budget and actual reporting was connected to Power BI, giving project managers a live view of margin and utilisation without waiting for the monthly finance process.
Power BI reporting layer
A Power BI reporting layer was built on top of Business Central — covering consolidated group P&L, project profitability by engagement and client, resource utilisation by team, and forward revenue from the project pipeline. This replaced the Excel-based reporting process entirely and gave the board the visibility they had been asking for.
What the Business Gained
Results measured in the first quarter following go-live.
Consolidated group P&L available within 3 business days of period end — down from a 3-week manual Excel process
Project profitability visible in real time for all 200+ active engagements — no waiting for month-end
All three entities (AU, NZ, UK) running on a single Business Central environment with automated intercompany posting
Purchase order workflow live across all practices — all supplier commitments system-controlled with budget checking
Time entry for all 120 billable staff captured directly in Business Central — no separate timekeeping system
Power BI dashboards replaced 14 separate Excel reports used by the finance team and leadership
Resource utilisation reporting available weekly — previously not tracked at all
Board reporting pack produced in 3 hours — previously a full-day manual process
Signs Your Business Has Outgrown Xero
You have more than one legal entity
Xero handles single entities well. The moment you need consolidated reporting across multiple companies, you are doing work in Excel that an ERP would do automatically. This is the most common trigger for the move.
Project profitability is tracked outside the system
If your finance team is maintaining a separate spreadsheet to track project costs, time, and revenue — and that spreadsheet is always a week behind — you have outgrown your accounting software.
Reporting requires manual extraction and manipulation
Xero's reports are designed for standard accounting outputs. If every management report requires exporting data and reformatting it in Excel, the system is not serving the business — the business is serving the system.
Explore Further
Ready to Move Beyond Xero?
If your business is running on Xero and you are starting to feel the constraints, the move to Business Central is more straightforward than most businesses expect. Weblink Plus can assess your current Xero setup and give you an honest picture of what the migration involves.
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