A year ago, we shared our vision to reimagine accounting using AI and mobile, recognizing the transformative potential for small businesses and the industry.
As part of delivering on that vision, we launched Just Ask Xero (JAX), our smart and reliable generative-AI business companion, to make accounting tasks easier and save you time through simple conversation within everyday apps.
Today, JAX is one of several AI-powered tools within Xero making life easier for you, and represents a fundamental shift in how technology can help your business thrive. Seamlessly handling tasks like sending invoices, editing quotes, and summarizing bill payments, both within Xero and in commonly used apps, JAX is already proving its value to our initial beta testers.
Steve Aylward, managing director of Australian small business, Ven Agency, said: “We’ve been truly impressed by JAX. Its natural language functionality and ability to handle invoicing through a simple text message has been a real game-changer for us, especially when travelling for work. By effortlessly creating or modifying invoices on the go, JAX has helped streamline our financial processes and save valuable time.”
But this is just the beginning of what JAX can do – in time, you’ll also get access to even more useful tools and valuable business insights to help your business thrive.
We’re excited to announce that the JAX beta access is expanding to all customers with the subscriber role, and we’re introducing new capabilities that we’ve been hearing are important from our initial users.
JAX in action: Supercharging your workflows inside and outside of Xero
Once you’ve got access, you can use JAX to help complete core everyday tasks and supercharge your workflows. These include:
Seamlessly find, create, and stay on top of your invoices and quotes
Many of you have told us that getting paid and managing cashflow is a top priority for small businesses. That’s why our first features in JAX focus on helping streamline invoices and quotes, helping users get paid even faster, including:
- Quickly create and send invoices and quotes in seconds, with all the right details.
- Get quick answers to questions about your invoices and quotes, such as how much you’re owed.
- [new] Create invoices faster by using our newly integrated inventory item codes, saving you time and reducing errors.
- [new] Quickly get summarized info on paid, unpaid, or overdue invoices with smarter invoice search and summarization. Responses are based on criteria you care about, for example, on a certain date or from a certain contact
[new] JAX answers all your top questions about using Xero
Besides offloading tasks to JAX, from this month you can also get quick and accurate answers to common questions from Xero Central, ensuring you get exactly the information you need, when you need it. We’re starting with Xero help content, but will be expanding to other information over time.
JAX meets you where you are, integrating with your favorite apps on the go
Business owners are busy running their day-to-day operations. And we know a lot of business tasks happen outside Xero. To make it even easier for our users, we’ve brought JAX to you, seamlessly integrated into SMS, email, and WhatsApp* so that we meet you where you are. Create invoices quickly through SMS or Whatsapp while on-the-go. Or forward an email to JAX to instantly create a quote. No need to wait until the end of the day to take care of the paperwork – Just Ask Xero anytime, anywhere.
Our commitment to ongoing responsible AI innovation
We’re committed to responsible AI innovation across our platform, helping you streamline tasks and gain insights. And we take data security seriously, with our company-wide commitment to responsible data use aligning with our vision of being the most trusted small business platform.
Additionally, JAX is underpinned by a proprietary control system called JAX Assure, which is designed to deliver significantly higher accuracy compared to other approaches that rely solely on large language models (LLMs). It employs a control system to filter data fed to the LLMs, ensuring relevance to specific tasks such as creating invoices.
Expanding beta access to all subscribers
We’ve been hearing from many of you that you’re excited to start using JAX, so I’m happy to announce that over the next month we’ll be expanding JAX beta access to all users with the subscriber role. If you spot the JAX icon in your navigation bar and an invitation in a pop-up box, you’ve been selected to join the beta. Just send a message from within JAX, and you’ll be automatically enrolled.
If you don’t see JAX in your navigation bar just yet, we’re rapidly expanding access and it shouldn’t be too long before you can test out JAX for yourself. Keep an eye on your dashboard for that JAX icon.
Beau Gaudron, accountant and tech ninja at Growthwise, and an early JAX beta user said: “I’m excited about JAX’s potential to revolutionize how people learn Xero. The conversational interface allows users to interact within familiar apps. For instance, I simply typed ‘make an invoice for customer 2 hours labour at $75 ex.’ JAX clarified the customer and then generated a draft invoice.
“JAX also streamlines tasks like checking what clients owe money. By providing immediate answers without requiring the small business to log in to Xero, JAX can significantly change the game in how small businesses manage their accounting.”
We have big plans for JAX and will continue to ramp up its capabilities, including streamlining more tasks, offering personalized insights to empower business decisions, and enhancing client conversations for accountants and bookkeepers.
I’m excited about the progress we’re making in AI. The possibilities it brings for efficiency, innovation, and competitive advantage to the businesses that embrace it are vast. We’re just getting started, and I hope you come on the journey.
* Currently SMS is available in AU, US, UK and NZ, while WhatsApp is available in all regions.
