Xero is the world’s easiest online accounting system. Xero announced Paycycle acquisition on 21 July 2011. You can read more about this announcement on Stuart’s blogpost or Chris Ridd (MD for Xero Australia) post. For more information on the company you can check www.xero.com. 

Paycycle will remain as is and you'll continue to receive the same great service from The Paycycle Team as you do now until Xero’s integrated Payroll functionality is released, in Q1 2012. 

At that point in time you'll switch to access Paycycle payroll from within Xero and pay just a single subscription fee for both products. If you aren't already a Xero customer you will have the option to switch to Xero for your accounting solution or just continue to use Payroll on its own. 

The team is very excited to be staying on at Xero since there is a very strong cultural fit between both teams and everyone has been offered fantastic roles. 

- Stuart will assume General Manager Payroll, leading Xero integrated Payroll functionality. 

- John & Dave will now form the Payroll Product Development team. 

- Agus will continue as Marketing Manager for Paycycle in Australia. 

- Joe will join the Partner Enablement team, bringing his particular payroll skills to the broader team. 

- James will continue to bring support for Paycycle and when the transition takes place, will join the Xero Support Team. 

Paycycle and its product roadmap (including HTML5 release) will continue as it is today until Paycycle is integrated into the Xero platform in Q1 2012. 

Paycycle will continue to provide the current standalone Silverlight version and is likely to upgrade to HTML5 before the end of October 2011. It is this HTML5 version of the software that will be integrated into the Xero platform. 

Through the normal channels: checking our support page or dropping us asupport email. 

During the transition phase, Paycycle's support will roll into Xero's support page. We'll make sure that our entire knowledge base is available. 

Until Xero integrated Payroll functionality is released, Paycycle’s pricing will remain as is. After that date, it’s likely Paycycle will be included in Xero’s Medium and Large plans (with no price change for these plans), although feature sets for each plan are still to be defined. 

Once Xero Integrated Payroll functionality is released, the outstanding pro-rated months will be credited to your Xero account. If you no longer wish to use Paycycle under Xero, you will be able to get a refund for the remaining days of your annual subscription. 

Paycycle will continue to innovate the product up until the release of the integrated Xero Payroll offering. The technical transition per se will be very straightforward, with your data being transitioned seamlessly. All that will happen is that after the integration, instead of login in through Paycycle you’ll login from xero.com. 

That’s great, when the Integrated Xero Payroll functionality is released, instead of having two logins, you’ll only login from one place, Xero, and you’ll only pay for the Xero subscription. 

Paycycle's product will ultimately be rolled into the Xero functionality, however it will be possible to utilise only the Integrated Xero Payroll Functionality from within Xero. It won't be necessary to use all of Xero's general ledger functionality. Xero's Integrated Payroll Functionality will be available under the existing Xero subscription arrangements. 

Ultimately, the choice is yours. 

Partners will continue to use their existing contacts, as they have to date. This process won't change until the integrated Xero Payroll functionality is transitioned. Further information on your account management arrangements will be provided at a later date. 

All Paycycle data will be transitioned to the integrated Xero Payroll functionality.

Export functionality will be made available prior to the transition to the integrated Xero Payroll functionality. 

Your payroll system is an important decision. The acquisition of Paycycle by Xero shouldn't alter this decision in any way. In fact there is now more certainty around the future of Paycycle, with more resources allocated to the team. Of course, you can subscribe and use Paycycle as usual, but it’s likely the annual pricing plans won’t be available. Bear in mind that after Q1 2012 Paycycle will be integrated into Xero. 

This release has been cancelled. The Paycycle Team will work exclusively for the delivery of the Integrated Xero Payroll functionality after the HTML5 version of Paycycle is released. 

Feel free to send us all your questions to support [at] paycycle.com.au and we’ll endeavour to answer them as best as we can.