Guides → Move invoices entered in the wrong organisation: a guide for Xero users
Move invoices entered in the wrong organisation: a guide for Xero users
A month of a client's invoices went into the wrong organisation, or a bookkeeper picked the wrong company from the list before a batch of bills. There is no move button. This guide sets out the route Xero's help pages do describe, export and import, with the checks that stop it going wrong, how to carry the attached files across, and how to void the originals in bulk.
Checked against Xero Central on 16 October 2026.
Why there is no shortcut
Each organisation is its own set of books, with its own contacts, accounts, tax rates and numbering. Xero's help pages offer a move for imported bank statements, but for invoices and bills the route they describe is to export the data and import it elsewhere; its restart article uses the same route for a whole organisation (Restart your Xero organisation). The originals then have to be removed from the wrong organisation.
The manual way, step by step
- Stop new entries. Check whether a repeating template, an integration or a colleague's habit still points at the wrong organisation, and fix that first.
- Export from the wrong organisation. Open the right tab, narrow it by date or search, and export. Each line item becomes a row in the format the import expects, up to 500 transactions per file; a sales and purchases user's export leaves out some details, such as contact addresses (Export invoices and bills).
- Check the file against the right organisation. Contact names must match exactly or new contacts are created, and an invoice number that already exists is not imported (Import customer invoices). Bills in one file that share a reference are combined, even across contacts (Import bills and credit notes). Make sure the account codes and tax rates in the file exist there too.
- Import into the right organisation. Everything arrives as a draft. Review the drafts, then approve them.
- Carry the files across. The CSV holds no attachments. Download each file from the original (View, download and delete files in transactions) and attach it to the new document (Attach a file to a transaction).
- Move the payments. If payments were recorded against the originals, remove them in the wrong organisation (Delete an invoice or bill payment) and record them in the right one, where the money actually arrived.
- Void the originals. Sales invoices one at a time; bills several at a time from the Awaiting Payment tab (Delete or void an invoice, Delete or void a bill).
Where the manual way runs out
- Attachments are one file at a time, downloaded from one organisation and uploaded to the other.
- The originals are voided one by one when they are sales invoices; Xero says awaiting payment invoices can't be voided in bulk.
- Payments are removed one by one before a void.
- Lock dates in either organisation stop the change for anything dated on or before them (Set up or remove lock dates).
The faster way for the files and the originals: Unapprove
Unapprove is a web app that works with Xero. It does not copy documents from one organisation to another, so the export and import above stay with you. It takes over the two repetitive ends of the job.
- Every attachment in one download. Connect the wrong organisation and run the attachment export for the date range: every file attached to its invoices, bills and credit notes comes as dated ZIP files with an index of which file belongs to which document. The export only reads.
- A backup of what you are about to remove. The preview offers a CSV of the selection, with numbers, contacts, dates and totals, to tick off against what was imported.
- Void the originals together. Select them by date range, contact, number or reference, type the count, and they are voided in batches of 50, each with a history note.
- Originals with payments. The "Remove payments and void" run removes unreconciled payments and credit note allocations, then voids. Reconciled and batch payments are never removed.
What it skips, and tells you why: documents in a locked period (why) and documents for an archived contact (why). Several organisations can be connected; each has its own plan.
Price: free for 14 days, with unlimited previews and three documents processed in total, plus a 25-file attachment sample. After that, $29 per month per connected organisation, or a one-off $49 Clean-up Pass for 7 days and up to 500 documents. Prices are in US dollars and exclude VAT and sales tax (added at checkout); the pricing page has the details.
Connect and preview free See pricing
Questions
Can I move an invoice to another organisation directly?
Not with a move button. Export the invoices from one organisation, import
them into the other, then void the originals.
Will the imported invoices keep their numbers?
The number in the file is imported, unless that number already exists in
the receiving organisation, in which case that invoice is not imported. Check
the numbering in the receiving organisation first.
Do attachments come across in the export?
No. The export is a CSV of transaction lines. Files are downloaded from
the original documents and attached to the new ones.
Should I void or credit the originals?
If the invoices were never sent from the wrong organisation, voiding is
usually enough. If customers received them from it, ask your accountant
whether a credit note is the better record.
Who makes Unapprove?
Atesen Software, an independent developer. Unapprove works with Xero
through Xero's public API; Xero does not make it and has not endorsed it.
Related guides
- Unapprove an invoice or bill, one or many: a guide for Xero users
No unapprove button: the void, copy and re-attach routine, where it stops being practical, and running it on a whole batch.
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- Delete all invoices, or start over: a guide for Xero users
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- Wrong tax rate on approved invoices and bills: a guide for Xero users
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- POS daily sales posted twice: a guide for Xero users
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- Redo a migration whose open invoices and bills landed as approved: a guide for Xero users
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- Export receipts and supporting documents for an audit: a guide for Xero users
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- Move bills back to draft, whatever their status: a guide for Xero users
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