FMT & Xero Fuel Cost Integration for Mining Services
Automated fuel cost allocation from FMT SmartFill to Xero for a mining services company operating across three remote sites in Western Australia. Eliminated manual data entry and caught $45K in fuel discrepancies in year one.
Mining services company — plant hire and support services across Pilbara operations
A mining services business running a fleet of 35 vehicles and heavy plant across three remote Pilbara sites. Each site has on-site fuel tanks managed by FMT SmartFill — controlling who can draw fuel, recording litres dispensed, and identifying the driver and vehicle for every transaction.
The finance team in Perth used Xero for all accounting. But FMT fuel data stayed inside FMT's web portal. Every month, someone downloaded CSV reports from each site, re-keyed the transactions into Xero, and tried to allocate costs against the right project codes. It took two people roughly 12 hours each month and mistakes were common.
What needed to change
Three sites, 35 vehicles, one accounting system — and no connection between them. FMT tracked every litre dispensed at the pump. Xero tracked every dollar spent. But the data lived in separate systems and had to be manually reconciled each month.
Cost allocation was the biggest pain. Each vehicle operated on a specific mining contract. Fuel costs needed to land against the correct project in Xero. With manual entry, costs were regularly allocated to the wrong project — creating problems with client billing and internal reporting.
Fuel discrepancies were invisible. The company bought bulk fuel from a supplier and dispensed it through FMT tanks. Supplier invoices were paid without any automated reconciliation against what was actually dispensed. Variances between litres delivered and litres dispensed went unnoticed for months.
What we built
A custom integration pipeline connecting FMT SmartFill transaction data to Xero. Fuel costs are allocated automatically against the correct project based on vehicle-to-contract mapping. Supplier invoice reconciliation flags discrepancies before payment.
Transaction Sync
SmartFill fuel transactions — driver, vehicle, litres, timestamp, site — synced nightly to Xero as coded expense entries. GST and fuel tax credit eligibility flags applied automatically based on vehicle type and usage category.
Project Cost Mapping
Each vehicle is mapped to a mining contract/project in Xero. When fuel is dispensed, the cost lands against the right project automatically. When a vehicle moves between contracts, the mapping updates and future transactions follow.
Supplier Reconciliation
Bulk fuel deliveries recorded by SmartDip tank gauging are matched against supplier invoices. Variances above a configurable threshold are flagged for review before the invoice is approved in Xero.
Reporting Dashboard
A simple fuel cost dashboard showing consumption by site, by vehicle and by project — combining FMT data and Xero cost data in one view. The finance team and operations managers use the same numbers.
How it works
SmartFill records the transaction
A driver swipes their SmartTag at the pump. SmartFill records their ID, vehicle, litres dispensed, tank drawn from, site and timestamp. All stored in FMT's web portal.
Nightly sync pulls new transactions
At 2 AM AWST, our integration pulls all new transactions from FMT. Each transaction is validated, mapped to the correct Xero account, project and tax code, then queued for posting.
Expenses posted to Xero
Mapped fuel transactions are posted to Xero as expense line items. The project code, GST treatment and fuel tax credit flag are applied automatically. The finance team sees them in Xero by morning.
Supplier invoice reconciliation runs
When a fuel delivery is recorded, SmartDip tank level data is compared against the supplier's delivery docket and invoice. Variances are flagged and emailed to the accounts payable team before payment.
Monthly reports auto-generate
End-of-month fuel reports compile from both FMT and Xero data — per-site, per-vehicle, per-project. Finance and operations get the same report on the 1st of each month without anyone building a spreadsheet.
Measurable outcomes
We used to spend two days each month pulling CSVs out of FMT, re-keying them into Xero, and hoping the project codes were right. Now it all happens overnight. The first thing we noticed was how many fuel deliveries didn't match what the supplier invoiced. That alone paid for the integration in the first quarter.
How we delivered it
Discovery & Mapping
1 weekSpent 3 days understanding the FMT setup across all three sites, the Xero chart of accounts, project structure and vehicle-to-contract mapping rules. Documented the data flow and exception handling requirements.
Integration Build
3 weeksBuilt the nightly sync pipeline — FMT data extraction, transaction mapping, Xero posting logic, error handling and retry mechanism. Included supplier reconciliation matching against SmartDip tank data.
Validation & Parallel Run
1.5 weeksRan the integration in parallel with the manual process for two weeks. Compared automated Xero entries against the manually entered data. Fixed three edge cases around vehicle transfers between contracts.
Go-Live & Handover
0.5 weeksLaunched all three sites simultaneously. Monitored the first two monthly cycles. Trained the finance team on the dashboard and exception handling workflow.
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