Every supplier bill, split by line, posted against the right job
Make scenarios read each supplier bill from Xero, split it into its lines and post every line against the right job and cost category on monday.com, so a job's actual costs sit next to its budget. Two businesses had a version built, and the larger one also brings in credit notes and sales invoices.
Where this applies
Builders, fabricators, joiners and any project business that books supplier bills in Xero and tracks each job's budget on monday.com.
- cost categories, one route each
- 12
- half-year cost boards, one sub-scenario each
- 4
- builds of the flow, both switched off
- 2
The problem
A project business knows what a job should cost from its estimate, and finds out what it did cost from its supplier bills. The bills go into the accounting system and the budget lives with the job. Until someone copies one into the other, nobody can see that a job is running over until it already has.
Copying the bill total is not enough. One supplier bill can cover materials for three jobs, or cabinetry and appliances on the same job, so the useful unit is the line, not the bill. A credit note has to come off a job the same way a bill went on.
What we built
Line by line, not bill by bill
The trigger watches Xero for bills. An iterator splits each bill into its line items and every line is handled as its own posting, matched to its job on monday.com. A bill that spans several jobs or several categories is therefore split correctly without anyone dividing it by hand.
A route per cost category
In the kitchen builder's version, a router with twelve routes, one per cost category (cabinetry, benchtops, appliances, labour and the rest), writes each line's amount into that category's column on the job's budget. If the job has no matching budget item yet, the scenario creates one instead of dropping the cost.
Tracking categories and a board per half-year
The fabricator's version routes each line four ways on its Xero tracking category, finds the project and sub-job on monday.com and hands the line to a sub-scenario for the half-year it belongs to, July to December or January to June. Each half-year has its own cost board, so no board grows without end, and the next half is a new sub-scenario rather than a change to the parent.
Credit notes take the same path
Supplier credit notes run through a parent of the same shape and the same four half-year sub-scenarios, so a credit is matched and posted exactly as a bill is, onto the same project and sub-job.
Sales invoices, with their PDFs
A further scenario mirrors each sales invoice onto its project: it looks for the invoice on monday.com, updates it or creates it, writes the line items, then lists the invoice's attachments in Xero, downloads them and uploads them to the item. An ignore handler on the upload means a file that will not attach does not stop the amounts being written.
The outcome
Two builds of the same flow. For a kitchen and joinery builder, one scenario of about 45 modules with seven routers and three iterators. For a steel fabricator, eleven scenarios: a bills parent of about 79 modules with four half-year sub-scenarios of about 25 each, the same structure for credit notes, and an invoice mirror of about 25 modules.
All twelve are switched off and Make holds no run history for them in its retention window, so this page describes a design rather than a volume.
Where it stops
Neither build is switched on, so neither has been measured. Routing is fixed in the scenarios: a line that fits none of the routes is not posted, and a new cost category or tracking category needs a new route. In the fabricator's version each half-year needs its sub-scenario in place before its bills arrive. Its first-generation sync, its purchase-order and receivable credit-note scenarios and a large scenario that keeps project links in step across boards are not described.
Built with
- Make.com
- Xero
- monday.com
Patterns used
- Iterate bill lines
- Route per cost category
- Sub-scenario per period
- Create if missing
Page copy drafted with AI assistance. Skofi is accountable for it. Editorial policy
Have something shaped like this?
If any part of the above resembles a problem you are living with, a short call is the fastest way to find out whether it is the same problem underneath.
What happens on the call
- 15 minutes, no deck
- We map the process on the call
- A written scope, or an honest no