Revenue by customer in Xero: ranking your largest customers
A customer ranking is only useful if it adds up to the total beside it. Ask Alex builds both from the same invoices and credit notes.
By Manny Sidhu · Practical guide · Published · Updated
One set of records for the total and the ranking
Ask Alex works out net invoiced sales, which are posted sales invoices minus sales credit notes, both excluding tax, by each document's date. It then groups the same records by Xero contact and ranks customers from highest to lowest.
Because the total and the ranking use the same records, the customer figures add up to the total.
How many customers are listed
The answer names the five largest customers by default, or from 1 to 20 if you ask for a specific number. If fewer customers had sales in your dates, it says how many did. The receipt holds every customer's figure.
A credit note is deducted from the customer it was issued to. Each Xero contact is ranked separately, so a business with two contacts in Xero appears twice.
An illustrative example
Illustrative example, not customer data: net invoiced sales for the half-year are A$500,000. The three largest customers by net invoiced sales are A$90,000, A$70,000, and A$45,000.
Invoiced, not collected
This ranking is by money invoiced. It is not cash received, profit, or recognised revenue in your profit-and-loss report. A customer who was invoiced heavily late in the period may rank higher here than in a ranking by cash collected, which is covered in the guide on how much of your cash comes from your biggest customers.
When the ranking is withheld
If any invoice or credit note in your dates has no verified customer, Ask Alex says it cannot reliably rank customers rather than leaving part of the total out of the ranking.
All documents must be in one currency. If the last day of your range was only partly synced, the answer says so.
What each answer shows
Every Ask Alex answer lists its source, scope, time, assumptions, and calculation, along with the Xero invoices and credit notes behind each figure. The total and the ranking are calculated by code from those records.