Hive Finance is a workspace app for service and project-based businesses that already run delivery work in Hive.
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It connects your operational documents — expenses, purchase orders, billing worksheets, and customer invoices — to accounting, reconciliation, and financial reporting in the same workspace where your team manages projects and time.
Note: Hive Finance is separate from your Hive subscription billing.
Who Hive Finance is for
In Settings → Launch checklist, you pick a business profile and Hive shows the setup checks for it. Common profiles:
Business type | Fit |
Small business owners (service/project businesses) | Core workflow |
Agencies and contractors | Core workflow |
Freelancers and self-employed (with team/project billing) | Supported with connected tools |
Bookkeepers and accountants/CPAs | Supported with connected tools |
Nonprofits | Core workflow |
How to enable Hive Finance
Hive Finance is available in Premium Apps as a paid add-on. A workspace admin can turn it on for your workspace.
Open Apps in Hive to launch the App Library.
Under Premium Apps, find Finance and turn it on.
Review any trial or subscription details shown, then follow the prompts to confirm. If a Confirm billing impact dialog appears, select the acknowledgement checkbox and click Turn on.
Once Finance is enabled, click Open on its app card. You can also use the pin icon to add Finance to your sidebar.
Trial availability and billing depend on your subscription and any existing Finance access. Review the terms shown, including what happens when a trial ends, before confirming.
Choose who can use Finance
After Finance is enabled, an organization admin can go to Workspace settings → Apps → Finance and use Finance seat access to choose who can open the app.
Everyone allows all internal workspace members to open Finance.
Specific users limits access to the people selected in the Users field.
External users cannot open Finance. Access to the app is separate from the Finance permissions that determine what someone can view or do within it.
For paid Finance subscriptions, charges are based on workspace seats. Selecting fewer people under Finance seat access does not reduce the number of billed seats.
Getting started
1. Complete the Launch checklist
Open Finance → Settings → Launch checklist and pick your business profile. Then complete the launch checks, such as:
Services — Billable service codes and rates
Items — Billing, purchase, and expense items
Tax codes — Sales tax and jurisdiction settings
Dimensions — Office, department, class, and custom
Employees — Finance profiles, default services, and bill/cost rates
2. Connect integrations (optional)
Go to Settings → Connections:
QuickBooks — Sync customers, vendors, invoices, and bills.
Xero — Connect your Xero organisation.
Bank connections — Connect bank accounts through Plaid to import transactions into Bank feeds.
3. Import opening balances (if migrating)
If you are moving from another system, go to Settings → Data management → Import data to import your trial balance, open accounts receivable (AR), and open accounts payable (AP). Select Validate only first and review the results before you import.
Navigating Hive Finance
Finance uses a left sidebar. Overview, Queues, and Reports are at the top. The other pages are in groups below them.
Overview, Queues, and Reports
Overview — Today’s work, financial health, setup status, and recent activity
Queues — All Finance queues and how much work each one holds
Reports — Billing, profitability, AR, AP, GL, and financial statements. The Cash forecast and GL detail are reports here.
Sales
To bill — Billing worksheets, review, write-offs, deferrals, and invoice drafts
Invoices — Draft, approve, send, and post customer invoices
Payments & credits — Customer payments and credit memos
Retainers — Client retainer agreements and funds
Advance billing — Deferred revenue
WIP — Work-in-progress posting batches
Budget baselines — The current budget baseline for each project, and its earlier versions
Purchases
Bills — All bills that you owe, and vendor payments
Purchase orders — Vendor commitments and bill posting
Expense reports — Employee expenses with approval workflows
Vendor tax — W-9/W-8 status and 1099 eligibility
Banking
Bank feeds — Imported bank transactions. Use the Bank rules tab for automatic categorization.
Close
Period close — Period-close readiness, open work, and close actions
Reconciliations — Bank and account reconciliations
Accounting periods — Open, close, reopen, and lock periods
Accounting
Chart of accounts
Journal entries — Manual and system-generated journals. Use the Posting batches tab to see the links between source documents and journals.
Elimination entries — Adjustments across companies for consolidation
Fixed assets — Asset register and depreciation
Allocation rules and Allocation runs — Shared-service cost allocations
Revaluation runs — Revaluation of open foreign-currency balances
Recurring schedules — Documents that repeat each period, such as accruals and depreciation
Settings
Master data and configuration: Services, Items, Tax codes, Dimensions, Payment terms, Numbering, Invoice layouts, Employees, GL companies, GL company mapping, Accounting mappings, Exchange rates, Tax providers, Approval rules, and Project templates.
Settings also has Connections, Launch checklist, Data management, and Audit log.
Some pages show only when your workspace uses them. WIP shows when WIP posting is on. Exchange rates and Revaluation runs show when you use more than one currency. GL company mapping shows when you have two or more GL companies.
Core workflows
Create a record
Open the page for the record, then click the create button at the top, for example Create invoice or Create purchase order.
Sales and project billing
Start here when: you need to track a project budget or turn delivered work into a client invoice.
The main revenue path: budget baseline → time and expenses → billing worksheet → customer invoice → payment.
Save the project budget as a budget baseline: go to Budget baselines and click Create project budget version. Hive also creates a baseline when a client accepts a CRM proposal and you start the delivery project from the deal. You cannot edit a baseline after it is created.
Team members log time and expenses against the project.
A billing manager creates a billing worksheet in To bill.
A project manager reviews the worksheet, then billing approves it.
Generate a customer invoice draft from the worksheet.
Approve, send, and post the invoice.
When the client pays, click Record payment in Payments & credits.
Purchasing and payables
Start here when: you’re submitting expenses, creating purchase orders, or paying vendors.
An employee submits an expense report, or a buyer creates a purchase order.
The document goes through your approval rules.
Approved items appear in Bills.
Post the bill to create the accounting entries.
Period close
Start here when: you’re reconciling accounts, reviewing financials, or closing an accounting period.
Review Bank feeds and apply bank rules for auto-categorization.
Complete reconciliations for bank and GL accounts.
Open Period close and check for blockers (unposted journals, open approvals, unreconciled accounts).
Run key reports (trial balance, AR/AP aging, P&L, balance sheet).
Click Close period when everything balances.
Integrations
QuickBooks Online
Go to Settings → Connections → QuickBooks to:
Connect via OAuth
Monitor sync status
Reconnect if the connection expires
Hand off customers, vendors, invoices, and bills
Xero
Go to Settings → Connections → Xero and click Connect Xero. See Connect Xero to Hive Finance.
Plaid (bank feeds)
Go to Settings → Connections → Bank connections and click Connect bank. Imported transactions appear in Bank feeds, where you can:
Categorize transactions
Match them to GL accounts
Apply bank rules for automatic categorization
Post eligible transactions to the ledger
How Finance connects to other Hive apps
Hive Finance composes with existing Hive features rather than replacing them:
Projects — Live project budgets feed worksheets; Finance stores each project’s budget baseline
CRM — Client and vendor records link to finance documents. Deal estimates and accepted proposals set project budget baselines.
Time tracking — Billable time flows into billing worksheets
Users — Employee profiles gain finance-specific fields (default service, bill rate, cost rate)
Troubleshooting
I don't see the Finance app
Ask a workspace admin to confirm that Finance is enabled in Apps → Premium Apps and that any required trial or billing steps are complete.
Ask an organization admin to check Workspace settings → Apps → Finance → Finance seat access. If Specific users is selected, you must be included in the selected users.
If Finance appears in the App Library but not in your sidebar, click Open on its card or use the pin icon to add it to your sidebar.
If your trial has ended, follow the subscription or upgrade prompts shown in the App Library to continue using Finance.
I can't post a document
Check whether the accounting period is closed or locked.
Review Accounting mappings — a "needs mapping" status means a required GL account is not configured.
Confirm your role includes post capability (typically Accountant or Finance admin).
Bank transactions aren't posting
Check the connection in Settings → Connections → Bank connections.
Check that the bank account is mapped to a GL account.
Review categorization status in Bank feeds — transactions may need manual categorization or rule matching first.
QuickBooks sync issues
Open Settings → Connections → QuickBooks and check connection status.
Use Reconnect if OAuth has expired.
Review sync error details before retrying.
Migration import failed
In Settings → Data management → Import data, run with Validate only first.
Confirm trial balance debits equal credits.
Verify chart of accounts and mappings exist before importing open AR/AP.
Permission denied on an action
Being able to open Finance does not automatically grant permission to perform every action. Ask your admin to review the Finance permissions required for the action you are trying to complete.
Related articles
Introducing Buzz — Buzz can help guide you through Finance onboarding
Resourcing — Time and utilization connect to billing worksheets
External users — How external members interact with workspace permissions
Code ledger lines by project and dimension — Tag lines with a project or dimension and filter reports by them
Year-end equity and Prior years' earnings — Show equity that resets each fiscal year for the current year only
Need help?
If you run into an issue not covered here, contact Hive Support from your workspace or reach out to your Customer Success Manager.