Multi-currency for purchase orders

Multi‑currency in lets you create and manage Purchase Orders (POs) and Bills in foreign currencies while still reporting in your organisation’s base currency.

This article covers:

• What multi‑currency does (and doesn’t) do
• How to set up base currency and enable multi‑currency
• Setting supplier and PO currencies
• Working with exchange rates and foreign unit costs
• Printing and reporting in multi‑currency

• Supplier currencies

  Defining supplier currencies helps pre‑fill PO currencies.

  Setting a supplier currency:

  1. Go to > .
  2. Add a new supplier or edit an existing one.
  3. In the Currency dropdown, select the supplier’s default currency.
  4. Save.

  Behind the scenes:

  • loads available currencies from its FX provider.
  • Supplier currency is used as the default PO currency when creating new POs for that supplier.
• PO currency and FX rate

  Creating a PO and default currency behaviour

  When you create a new PO:

  • The PO currency is initially set to your organisation base currency.
  • When you select a supplier:
    • If the supplier has a currency defined: the PO currency automatically updates to that currency.
    • If the supplier has no currency defined: the PO currency remains your base currency.

  You can override this selection at any time while the PO is in draft.

  Selecting and overriding PO currency:

  • On the PO screen, use the Currency dropdown to choose the currency for the PO.
  • This controls how amounts are entered and displayed, the exchange rate used to convert to your base currency, and how costs and bills are calculated.
  • You can change the PO currency while it is in draft. Once the PO is issued, the currency and rate become fixed for that PO and its related bills.

  FX rate display and editing:

  • When a PO currency is selected, automatically fetches an exchange rate from the FX API.
  • Under the currency dropdown you’ll see:
    • FX Rate
    • The current foreign exchange rate.
    • Descriptive information in the format: 1 [Base Currency] = X [PO Currency] (Source: API, [Date])
• Foreign unit costs in Cost Admin

  Foreign unit costs in Cost Admin

  In Cost Admin, each cost item can store:

  • A base unit cost in your base currency.
  • One or more foreign unit costs in specific currencies.

  These are stored in a dedicated table and allow to:

  • Use the appropriate unit cost automatically when you raise a PO in a matching currency.
  • Avoid manual re‑typing of foreign prices.

  When you add a cost item from Cost Admin, any pre-defined foreign unit cost is automatically carried through and applied if the currency matches.

• Draft Bills created from POs

  Creating a Bill from a PO

  When you click Add Bill on a PO, :

  • Brings across purchase order costs (POCs) with their foreign unit costs (if any).
  • Lets you add additional line items to the Bill in the PO currency.

  FX rate on Bills

  • On the Bill screen, below the Currency dropdown you see the same FX Rate field and API/source line as on the PO.
  • While the Bill is in draft, you can edit the FX rate and trigger recalculation of all Bill line amounts and the Bill header total.
  • When the PO is issued, the corresponding Bill’s FX rate becomes read‑only to keep amounts consistent and auditable.
• Printing and templates

  Standard PO template

  When the PO currency is different from the org base currency:

  • Column headers and totals are updated to show the PO currency, for example: Amount USD and Total USD.
  • All amounts on the printed PO are shown in the PO currency, matching typical Xero behaviour.

  Custom PO templates

  If you’re using custom templates, new merge fields are available so you can include:

  • POCurrency
  • FXRate

  You can customise your template to clearly show both the PO currency and (if desired) base‑currency equivalents.