Profit & Loss Report
Income statement showing revenue, expenses, and net profit. Supports multi-period comparison and tracking category filters.
Parameters
| Parameter | Required | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Date Range | Yes | From/To dates for the reporting period |
| Comparison Periods | No | How many earlier periods to add as rows (0–11). None means no comparison. |
| Period Length | No | How far back each row steps: a month, a quarter or a year. |
| Tracking | No | Filter by up to 2 tracking category/option pairs |
| Cash Basis | No | Show only paid transactions (default: accrual) |
| Costs & Expenses as Negative | No | Show cost of sales and operating expenses as negative numbers (default: ON) |
| Hide Totals | No | Remove total/subtotal rows from the output (default: OFF). Available for Balance Sheet, P&L, and Trial Balance. |
Output
Revenue, expense, and profit lines grouped by section, using your org's custom P&L layout from Xero.
Existing reports keep their columns
P&L reports you insert from now on include the AccountCode column. Reports you inserted earlier keep their current columns when you refresh. Re-insert the report to add the code.
Date Range Limit
The date range cannot exceed 365 days (Xero API limitation). The wizard prevents selecting a longer range in Fixed date mode.
Multi-Period Comparison
Add earlier periods to see trends over time. Each comparison row covers the same length of time as your report, one month, quarter or year earlier. Set the count under Compare with the previous and choose Months, Quarters, or Years. Each period becomes its own row with a Date and Amount column:
| Account | Date | Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Sales | 31 Dec 24 | 50,000 |
| Sales | 30 Nov 24 | 45,000 |
| Sales | 31 Oct 24 | 48,000 |
| Expenses | 31 Dec 24 | -30,000 |
| Expenses | 30 Nov 24 | -28,000 |
| Expenses | 31 Oct 24 | -29,000 |
Comparison isn't available on the rolling Last 30 Days and Last 90 Days presets. Pick a month, quarter or financial-year preset.
Tips
- Use Compare for board reports showing monthly or quarterly trends
- Use Tracking filters for departmental P&L (list your categories and options with the Tracking Categories table)
- Enable "Cash Basis" to match bank reconciliations
- The Date column uses absolute dates that update on refresh
After Creation
Some settings can be changed after inserting a report; others are locked because they affect the output structure.
- Editable: Cash Basis, Hide Totals, Costs & Expenses as Negative, Organizations, Date Range
- Locked: Tracking Filters, Comparison Periods, Period Length (insert a new report to change these)