The steps from "the practice is set up" to "the first client report is issued", who does each one, and what the practice should have ready before it starts.
Most of onboarding is gathering this. With it in hand, connecting up to 50 clients is roughly an afternoon's work for the practice manager.
| Item | Why it's needed | Who usually has it |
|---|---|---|
| The first partner's name and work email | Catalyst staff copy this partner's invitation link and send it to them by hand. The email can't be one that already belongs to an Catalyst staff account. | The practice |
| A passkey for each partner | Partners sign in with a passkey as well as a password, because they approve tax, compliance and going-concern content and manage the team. A laptop with fingerprint or face sign-in, a phone, or a security key all work. Other roles can add a passkey if they want one. | Each partner |
| The team list, with roles | Name, work email and role (Partner, Advisor, Practice manager or Read only) for everyone who will use Catalyst Platform. | The partner |
| The client list | Which clients to connect first. The practice can connect up to its Xero connection limit, normally 50. | The partner and practice manager |
| A Xero user at each client with the right role | Someone with access to the client's Xero signs in and approves the connection. Their Xero role must include reports: Standard + Reports or Adviser. Without it the balance sheet and reports can't be read, and the client's data reliability drops. | The client, arranged by the practice manager |
| Each client's business numbers | CIPC registration number, income tax reference, VAT number, PAYE, UIF and SDL references. They tie one client together across systems and catch a wrong link. | The practice's client records |
| Knowledge of unusual accounts | For example a director's loan or a call account. Catalyst Platform asks the practice to classify any account it can't place with confidence. | The practice manager or the client's accountant |
| Report branding | The practice's main and accent colours, and whether reports show "Powered by Catalyst Platform" (shown unless the practice asks for it off). Catalyst staff set these when they add the practice; changing them later isn't in the dashboard yet. The logo is added by a partner after signing in: PNG, JPEG or WebP, up to 256 KB, not SVG. Without a logo, reports show the practice's initials. | The partner |
| The practice's company registration number | Optional. Recorded with the practice when it is set up. | The practice |
Each step names who does it and where to find it in the dashboard. Every step is recorded in the audit trail. A screen for the practice to search it (Activity log) is listed as coming soon.
Catalyst staff enter the practice name, its company registration number (optional, not checked with CIPC), its Xero connection limit (50 unless changed) and its report branding: main colour and accent colour, picked with colour pickers, and whether to show "Powered by Catalyst Platform" (ticked to start with). Left as they are, the colours are Catalyst Platform navy and teal. They also enter the first partner's name and work email; an email that belongs to an Catalyst staff account is refused, because staff can't also be users in a practice.
The practice exists at once. Catalyst Platform emails the first partner a single-use invitation link, and the dashboard shows the same link once so staff can send it themselves if the email doesn't arrive. It works for 7 days; if it is lost, staff make a new one from the practice's page. Catalyst staff can't see the practice's client data; they see how far it has got as counts only.
Catalyst staff accounts are not created in the dashboard. Catalyst Platform sets each one up separately, and each staff member adds a passkey the first time they sign in to the staff console.
The partner opens the link, chooses a password of at least 12 characters (or, with an existing Catalyst Platform account, enters its password to add this practice to it) and signs in. The first time, the dashboard asks them to Set up your passkey on this device or a security key. From then on, every sign-in needs the password and the passkey.
For each person: name, work email and role. The partner gets a link to send them; it works once and expires on the date shown with it. Only a partner manages the team. Roles can be changed or access removed at any time; a change applies straight away. Any further partners set up their own passkey at first sign-in.
Under Branding, the partner uploads the practice's logo: PNG, JPEG or WebP, up to 256 KB. SVG files are not accepted. The logo appears at the top of every report and in the dashboard's rail, next to the practice's name.
| Role | For onboarding, this role |
|---|---|
| Partner | Can do everything, including the team and Checks and scoring. |
| Practice manager | Connects Xero, starts syncs, records identifiers and classifies accounts. Can't approve or issue reports. |
| Advisor | Reviews findings and prepares, approves and issues standard reports. |
| Read only | Sees clients and issued reports. Changes nothing. |
The practice manager starts the link; Xero then asks a user with access to the client's Xero to sign in and approve access. Each organisation they choose becomes a client file in the dashboard. Linking doesn't start a sync by itself yet: see step 7.
Record the business numbers for each client: CIPC registration, income tax, VAT, PAYE, UIF and SDL. They are checked for shape, not verified with CIPC or SARS. Catalyst Platform uses them to suggest links between a client and its other systems, with the reason it matches, and someone in the practice confirms every link. A match on the name alone can be confirmed only with a written reason. If two clients' numbers clash, the dashboard says what is wrong and what to do.
Catalyst Platform places each Xero account in a standard chart of accounts, and does so on its own only when it is at least 80% sure. The rest are listed here, grouped by client, with a suggestion where there is one. Confirm it or choose the classification yourself. Until then, figures that use those accounts are less reliable.
A decision made for one client is reused for similar accounts at the practice's other clients, but only when the practice's decisions agree. If they disagree, the account comes back for review.
In the current build, linking a client doesn't start a sync. The first sync is the nightly one (around 02:00 South African time), or Sync now on the client's Data and sync tab. Both read the latest two months from Xero. Reading a new client's full 24 months of history is built into the Xero connection, but the dashboard has no way to start it yet; that is planned. Until it is added, a newly linked client has only recent months, and its twelve-month trends and year-on-year figures fill in as the months pass.
After that, the books sync every night and refresh the latest months. Each sync tidies the books, scores data reliability from 0 to 100 with the reasons, calculates the health score and runs the checks. Whatever a check finds becomes a finding for the practice to review.
Check each client's Data and sync tab. A data reliability score below 70 means the report shows that its figures should be read with caution. The usual causes are named in words: a missing month, bank lines not reconciled, accounts not classified, amounts in suspense, a trial balance that doesn't balance, or a change of base currency in Xero. Fix them in Xero or in classification, then sync again.
Fifteen Catalyst Platform standard checks run on every sync. A partner can hide a check from the practice's findings (it still runs and is recorded) and set how much each area counts towards a client's health score. Going-concern risk is always checked and can't be hidden. Each change needs a reason of at least 10 characters and applies from the next sync; issued reports are never recalculated.
The standard health score weights are profitability 25, liquidity 25, working capital 20, revenue quality 15, payroll 10 and leverage 5, adding up to 100. A practice can't change a check's thresholds; it asks Catalyst for that.
The Client Report Guide explains each page of the report.
Each practice has a limit on how many clients it can connect to Xero at once. The standard limit is 50.
The first real practice goes live in prod, the one hosted environment, set up on 14 October 2026. The steps above are the same there; these points are particular to prod.