How to survive the great Xero crash of 2025
When Xero Goes Down: An Accountant’s Guide to Surviving the Great Cloud Crash of 2025
You log into Xero, morning coffee in hand, ready to work on the 87 Xero tasks that have been giving you side-eye all week. You click… and wait. Then wait some more. The spinning circle of doom appears, that is if you can even get into the software. Suddenly, your once-trusty accounting software has gone AWOL faster than a client who’s just heard the words “ATO audit”.
So, what’s an accountant or bookkeeper to do when Xero takes an unscheduled nap (thanks, Amazon Web Services)?
Let’s take a deep breath, put down the stress snacks, and walk through what you can do when Xero’s having an existential crisis.
1. Step Away From the Refresh Button
Yes, I know. It’s tempting to hit refresh 47 times in the hope that this time — this time! — it will load. Spoiler: it won’t make things happen faster.
Instead, head over to Xero’s Status Page to confirm the issue (again – if the status page is working). If it’s a known outage, you can officially stop blaming your Wi-Fi, the moon’s alignment, or Mercury retrograde. The cloud really is on fire.
If the status page won’t help you, the 4879 posts in the Xero Community Facebook Page will surely tell you about the outage so enjoy your coffee whilst it is still hot and follow the steps below of what else you can now do.
2. Communicate With Clients Before They Panic-Email You
If you’re a bookkeeper or accountant, your clients might already be typing an all-caps “WHY CAN’T I LOG IN TO XERO???” email. Beat them to it. And you know they will write the panic email in caps. I can literally see you nodding whilst reading this. Why they do that – I don’t know. But they do. So get in early.
Send out a calm (and maybe slightly cheeky) message:
“Xero’s currently down due to an AWS issue — which means we’re all getting a surprise digital detox. As soon as it’s back up, we will resume reconciling/tax returns/work like the superheroes we are!”
It makes you look proactive and keeps your inbox from turning into a panic parade.
3. Do the Old-School Stuff
Since the cloud is momentarily on strike, it’s a perfect time to:
- Review your to-do list – what have you been ignoring since last week that you can now do?
- Can you work on advisory reports or budgets in Excel or Google Sheets?
- Organise your desktop/files (no, you don’t need that 2019 tax meme saved four times).
- Prep for client meetings — or better yet, schedule some for the next month
- Maybe write a blog post (jeez I don’t know – maybe about the Xero outage ha ha)
- Inbox Zero (pardon the pun) is now your goal. Clear those emails, respond, action, file, tidy.
“Non Xero” productivity is a thing, I promise.
4. Use the Downtime for Education (and “you time”)
Pop on a short training video, do that educational webinar you have been putting off for weeks, read up on payroll updates, or listen to a business podcast.
Or, get moving. Yes, you are not glued to your desk now so put on the trainers, get your active wear on (if you were not already wearing it) and get outside (or hit the treadmill) and take a walk. Heck you can even listen to podcasts on your walk. Or what about listening to the Blinkist app for some inspiration. Our team loves this app #yourwelcome
You can call it “strategic thinking time”, but please don’t think of it as “wasted time”.
5. Reflect on Your Contingency Plan
Outages happen. Whether it’s Xero, MYOB, QuickBooks, or the internet itself, we all need a plan B. Think about:
- Where key client data lives
- Whether you have offline backups or exported reports to enable work to continue
- How you will communicate with clients (and what will you say)
- What happens to staff during these outages ?
- What work is urgent and what is not? Can priorities move around?
- What if you need to run payroll – what contingency do you have to make sure it is done?
A little prep now by creating your work plan, reviewing your priorities for the week and updating internal policies, means next time Xero sneezes, you won’t catch the panic flu.
6. Impromptu Karaoke Anyone?
When was the last time you checked in with your staff and did a team building event? If it was “before covid” then hello, I suggest you sort that asap before the fun police come and investigate.
There are so many online options these days – drag bingo, escape rooms, trivia, karaoke. All of these can be done online so no matter where your team is, they can all be involved. You will just need to find a provider that is also not impacted by the AWS outage !
7. Embrace the Silver Lining (Because It’s Definitely There)
You’ve been gifted unexpected time. I mean how many times in our days and weeks and months do we complain about not having enough time?
We have now been given some time – no reconciling, no journal entries, no staring at the spinning wheel of software despair. Maybe the universe is gently reminding you to step away and breathe. Do a meditation, sit in the sun and have a cup of tea, do some yoga stretches, pump the tunes and have a mini office disco. Or maybe it’s just telling you to finally clean your desk #guilty
Either way, take it as a win. Attitude is everything.
Don’t Panic. Pivot. (And Laugh.)
Xero being down is a shared trauma in the accounting world (did I mention the 4879 posts in the Xero Community Facebook page), but it’s also a chance to show clients (and yourself) that you can handle anything, even a cloud meltdown, with grace and humour.