Frequently Asked Questions

Yes – we’re built to be the world’s best finance team, which means that we get properly involved in the business, not just your tax returns. We’ll run or manage day to day finance functions, being on hand to answer questions and ensure results. When you think “my finance team should handle this”, that’s where we come in.

Not required, but recommended. Xero is user-friendly for basic bookkeeping, but complex tasks such as tax compliance, financial reporting, and setup optimisation benefit from professional help. Many accounting firms specialise in Xero and offer implementation services. At Creative CFO, we’ve done hundreds of implementations across multiple industries since 2012, and can walk you through the ideal setup for your business.

Only the best, cloud-based. We’ve built up experience on really good technology built for high-growth SMEs and will have strong opinions on accounting, payroll and reporting software. But when it comes to revenue collection, CRMs, inventory management, expenses and payment platforms, we’re able to utilise your chosen platforms and make suggestions on what we’ve seen work best.

Basic setup takes 1–2 days, while full Xero implementation takes 1–4 weeks, depending on complexity. Simple businesses can be running within a week, while more complex setups with data migration and integrations may take up to a month. A professional setup, facilitated by certified advisors, significantly speeds up this process.

Within 30 days, you’ll have 70% of your current reporting deployed in a modern, automated system.

Cin7 has a range of integrations, and they follow the best practice we’ve seen.

The integrations are logical and well-documented, and there are error queues that are useful to resolve issues.

For example if a transaction in Shopify is still pending processing in Cin7, or if a transaction in Cin7 could not sync to Xero, you can find these on the queues, which is very helpful in resolving them.

You do need to monitor the queues, as there may be good reasons transactions don’t sync (trying to change transactions in a locked period, or altering a paid off invoice, for example). All of this is part of the monthly process in running an up to date inventory and accounting system (which we can help with!)

Absolutely. Xero excels in South African VAT compliance, offering automatic 15% VAT calculation, integrated VAT201 return preparation, and direct SARS eFiling integration. You can handle zero-rated exports, exempt supplies, and submit returns electronically by the end of the month (instead of the 25th for manual submissions). Xero also supports provisional tax (IRP6) submissions and integrates seamlessly with local payroll providers such as SimplePay for EMP201 eFiling.

We’ve found Xero is great for a variety of SMEs, and we’ve run large businesses on it (+R200m revenue per annum). What we focus on upfront for a successful implementation is whether business operational flows align with Xero’s functionality. For example, Xero allows for one level of invoice approval; if you need three, an app plugin is required.

In terms of actual volume limits, it works best for companies with fewer than 1,000 monthly invoices. Some other key limits include 4,000 inventory items, with potential performance issues arising above 2,500 transactions per month.

Yes, Xero is the superior choice for growing businesses. While QuickBooks costs significantly more ($35–$200/month vs. Xero’s $20–$80) and charges per user, Xero offers unlimited users at no extra cost and better international capabilities. FreshBooks is limited to basic freelancer needs without full accounting features. Xero’s 1,000+ app integrations, modern cloud-first design, and excellent bank reconciliation outperform competitors. Most businesses that try alternatives ultimately switch to Xero, thanks to its intuitive interface and comprehensive feature set, which offers better value.

We augment your team, not replace them. We handle the infrastructure and engineering so your people can focus on analysis and decisions.

You own everything we build. Our code is documented, version-controlled, and designed for handover.

It’s a great question, and one that addresses the heart of what it takes to manage inventory exceptionally.

Cin7’s monthly subscription cost should bring substantial efficiency to the team, as that is where the bulk of the ‘cost of ownership’ sits, but to get the best out of an inventory system, your team needs to feed it with data:

• Stock received quantities – do they match the supplier invoice, or did they short send?
• Assigning stock to sales: Picking and packing stock needs to be done accurately, especially if you have serialised or batch products.
• Performing stock counts – identifying any stock that has moved in or out without your knowledge.

This definitely takes time and effort, and some of these processes may need to be improved or done more diligently than at present to get the results you are looking for.

We’re here to help with this and do an upfront exercise of mapping out what each team member is required to do in the system. This will help you gain clarity on the true total resource cost of exceptional inventory management.

Xero, Cin7 Core, Shopify, PostgreSQL, MySQL, SQL Server, and custom APIs. If it has an API, we can connect it.