In this guide · 7 sections
Short answer
In Xero, go to Purchases, Bills, New bill and copy your organisation's bills email address; attachments sent to it become draft bills. In QuickBooks Online, create a forwarding address under Receipts, Forward from email. Keep every emailed bill as a draft until someone checks it.
Xero vs QuickBooks Online: the built-in bill email addresses
Both products have a free, built-in way to email documents in. They behave slightly differently.
| Xero: email to bills | QuickBooks Online: forward from email | |
|---|---|---|
| Where to find it | Purchases, Bills, New bill, copy the bills email address | Receipts, Forward from email (admin creates a custom address) |
| What it creates | A draft bill with the file attached | An item in the Receipts list to review, add or match |
| What it accepts | Bills as attachments; not HTML bills or e-invoices in the email body | PDF, JPEG, JPG, GIF or PNG; one receipt per image |
| Size limit | 25MB total per email | 46KB to 20MB per attachment |
| Who can send | Any sender who has the address | Users given permission, sending from their registered email |
Xero's details come from its help article Email bills to your Xero organisation. QuickBooks' come from Intuit's article on emailing receipts and bills, which is written for the US edition; check the Receipts menu in your Singapore file, as menus and address formats can differ by region.
Setting up Xero's bills email address
Xero gives each organisation its own bills address. You don't choose it.
Copy the address
In Xero, open Purchases, then Bills, click New bill and copy your bills email address.
Save it as a contact
Add it to your email contacts as something like "Xero Bills" so staff can forward to it without hunting.
Send a test bill
Forward a real supplier PDF. Check that a draft bill appears with the file attached and the supplier, date and amount filled in.
Check the draft before approving
Confirm the supplier, amount, GST and account code. Fix supplier defaults so the next bill from them codes itself.
Set up the forwarding route
Decide whether staff forward manually or an accounts mailbox forwards automatically (next section).
Xero Central notes that resetting your Files inbox email address also resets the bills email address, so update any saved contacts or forwarding rules if you ever reset it.
The risk of a public bills address
It is tempting to give the Xero bills address straight to every supplier. Don't. A bills address accepts anything sent to it, and a fake invoice that arrives as a tidy draft bill in your accounting software looks more legitimate than one sitting in an inbox.
Giving suppliers your own accounts@ address and forwarding from there keeps the accounting address private and gives you a copy of every bill in a mailbox you control. If the Xero address does leak, reset it.
When to use Hubdoc, Dext or AI extraction instead
The built-in addresses are basic. They read the main fields and attach the file. Add-on capture tools do more: supplier rules, line items, bank-detail checks and approval queues.
Built-in email address is enough when
- You get a handful of supplier bills a month
- Bills are clean PDFs from regular suppliers
- One person enters and approves bills
Consider a capture tool when
- Dozens of bills a month, or several entities
- Staff also submit receipts and expense claims
- You need line items or automatic supplier coding
- You want an approval step before bills reach the ledger
Our comparison of Dext and Hubdoc covers the two common add-ons, and our guide to AI invoice and receipt data extraction covers custom options.
Do it yourself or get help?
For one person forwarding a few bills a month, copying the Xero address or creating the QuickBooks one takes ten minutes. The fiddly parts are the mailbox forwarding rules, Microsoft 365's external forwarding policy and supplier coding defaults.
Before you rely on it
Our Receipts & Bills Capture (S$290) sets up Dext, Hubdoc, Xero Expenses or your software's own capture, one forwarding address for supplier bills, supplier rules, a simple approval step and end-to-end publishing tests, with a one-page guide for staff. It doesn't include bookkeeping. For the approval side, read our guide to approving supplier bills in Xero.
Frequently asked questions
In Xero, open the Purchases menu, select Bills, click New bill and copy the bills email address shown there. Each organisation has its own unique address. Emailing a bill attachment to it creates a draft bill with the file attached. If you reset your Files inbox address, the bills address resets too.
The most common reason is that the bill was in the email body rather than attached. Xero says HTML bills and e-invoices in the body are not accepted, and the total size limit is 25MB per email. Also check that the forwarding rule actually sent the email, especially in Microsoft 365, which can block automatic external forwarding.
They can, but it is safer not to give it out. Anyone with the address can create draft bills in your file, including scammers sending fake invoices. Give suppliers your own accounts email and forward from there. That way you also keep a copy of every bill in a mailbox you control.
An admin creates a custom forwarding address under Receipts, Forward from email, then turns on permission for each user who may send. According to Intuit's help article, users must send from the email they sign in with, and attachments can be PDF, JPEG, JPG, GIF or PNG, with one receipt per image.
Microsoft 365's outbound spam policy can block automatic forwarding to external addresses, and new tenants have had it off by default since 2021. The bounce usually shows error 5.7.520. An admin can create a custom outbound spam policy that allows forwarding only for the accounts mailbox, keeping it blocked for everyone else.