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Using bank rules in Xero to speed up Shopify-PayPal reconciling

When using the PayPal bank feed in Xero, it's wise to set up bank rules

Daniel Little avatar
Written by Daniel Little
Updated this week

If you've read our help article on Reconciling Shopify Sales & Fees – Other Payment Gateways then this help article will help you to further automate the process of reconciling your non-Shopify Payments sales and fees including those from PayPal.

πŸ‘‰ Looking for QuickBooks bank rules setup? They're here.

A basic overview of the process (click to skip to that section)

1) Send Shopify-Paypal invoice for the month from Link My Books

Each month Link My Books generates a summary invoice for Shopify sales through the PayPal payment gateway.

The first step is to send that to Xero:

A cropped screenshot of a bank reconciliation page, showing a transaction dated "31 Jan 2022" with details including "John Doe," an ID, and "Express Checkout API," with an amount of 45.00. A blue "OK" button is visible, indicating that a rule has been applied. On the right, the rule "Shopify Gateway Clearing -" is applied, and the "Contact name" is "Shopify."

2) Allocate all PayPal order payments to the Shopify Gateway Clearing account (via rule)

Next, set up a Receive Money bank rule matching the below:

Once saved, any payments for Shopify orders paid via PayPal should look like this on the PayPal bank reconciliation page:
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All you need to do now is click OK on each of them and they will be allocated to the Shopify Gateway Clearing account.

πŸ‘‰ You should also set up a "Spend Money Rule" using the same criteria to capture any Shopify PayPal refund. Instead of "Express Checkout API" use "Payment Refund" as the Analysis Code.

3) Allocate all PayPal fee payments to your chosen PayPal fees account (via rule)

Next, set up a Spend Money bank rule matching the below:

A cropped screenshot of a bank reconciliation page, showing a PayPal transaction dated "31 Jan 2022" with a value of 1.61, described as "PayPal (Related to XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX) Fee Fee Fee." A blue "OK" button is visible, indicating that a rule has been applied. On the right, the applied rule is "PayPal Payment Processing Fees," and the "Contact name" is "Paypal."

Once saved, any PayPal fees should look like this on the PayPal bank reconciliation page:

All you need to do now is click OK on each of them and they will be allocated to your chosen PayPal Fees account.

πŸ‘‰ You should also set up a "Receive Money Rule" using the same criteria to capture any PayPal fee refunds.

4) Allocate all PayPal withdrawals as transfers to your bank account (via rule)

Next, set up a Transfer Money bank rule matching the below:

A screenshot of the "Apply a bank rule" configuration page for creating a transfer rule. Section "1. Apply a bank rule" shows a condition where "Payee" "equals" "General withdrawal from PayPal account." Section "2. Create a transfer" prompts the user to select a "Bank account" for the transfer, and "LMB Marketplaces" is set to "Shopify." Section "4. Add rule details" shows the rule name "PayPal Transfers."

Once saved, any PayPal withdrawals should look like this on the PayPal bank reconciliation page:

A cropped screenshot of a bank reconciliation page, showing a PayPal transaction dated "31 Jan 2022" for a "General withdrawal from PayPal account" with an amount of 43.39. A blue "OK" button is visible, indicating a rule has been applied. On the right, the applied rule is "PayPal Withdrawal," and there is a dropdown menu labeled "Select a bank account" with "Your bank account here" shown in red.

All you need to do now is click OK on each of them and they will be allocated as transfers to your chosen bank account.

5) On your bank account connected to PayPal, all PayPal related transactions should go green and be easy to reconcile.

Your last step is to return to your bank account reconciliation on the bank account connected to your PayPal account (where PayPal deposit your funds) and reconcile the PayPal withdrawals you have made.
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Since we implemented the rule in step 4 above and allocated all PayPal withdrawals as transfers to your bank account, they will look like this:

A cropped screenshot of a bank reconciliation page, showing a PayPal transaction dated "31 Jan 2022" with an amount of 43.39. A blue "OK" button is visible. On the right, a matched transaction is highlighted in green, showing "31 Jan 2022," "Bank Transfer from PayPal," "Ref: 9M138560XJG94013L," and the amount 43.39.

This should speed up the monthly task of reconciling your PayPal sales from Shopify considerably!
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β€‹πŸ‘‰ If you have any follow up questions after reading this article then please get in touch with support via the blue message widget at the bottom right of this page.

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