How To Manage Your Time and Billing Systems
(c) Tracey Lawton 2006

If you're one of the many solopreneurs who provide services to clients and charge them your time (like I do!) then you need to keep accurate time recording systems.

Do you know exactly how much time you're spending working for a client, or do you just take a rough guess?

If you're just guessing then you could be losing money by not correctly recording your time. Worse still, you could be overcharging your clients!

There are many ways that solopreneurs charge out their time. Some charge by actual time worked; some by the hour; some by the half/full day; and some by the session or course.

However you charge your clients you still need to keep accurate records of time spent working for them, otherwise how can you correctly invoice them?

Whichever method you use for billing your clients, I've given you some tips below on how you can keep an accurate track of your time.

Charging Actual Time Worked/Charging By The Hour

For both of these I recommend using software where you punch in and out as you're working for your client. There are two very popular ones available TraxTime (free but you can also upgrade to the paid version) and TimeStamp ("donationware").

TraxTime

TimeStamp

Both of these software packages will allow you to punch in and out of each project, add notes as to what you're working on, and produce reports so that you can accurately bill your clients. They are both very good packages and do the job. I have used both, but my preference is for TraxTime.

If you're billing your clients hourly, then you can easily round up/down to the nearest hour using either one of these packages.

Once you have your data printed off each month, then invoicing becomes a cinch! You simply transfer the data to your invoicing system. And if you don't have an invoicing system yet, look out for an article coming later in the year!

Charging Half/Full Day

The above packages can be used if you're charging your clients a half or full day, just so that you can keep a report of which day(s) you carried out your work for them. But a spreadsheet will work just as well.

You can set up a workbook per client, and it can contain two worksheets - one for tracking half/full days worked, and the other for tracking expenses. Then at the end of the month you can easily see how much you have to bill your clients for - and you have a record of work undertaken!

You can even take this a step further and set up a summary workbook that will total up all the time spent and expenses incurred for the whole year by linking it to each client's individual workbook!
 

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About the author:  Online Business Manager & Virtual Assistant, Tracey Lawton, supports professional speakers, coaches, and authors to operate an efficient, organized, and profitable business.  Learn how to create an efficient and organized office in 7 EASY steps, and receive free how-to articles at http://www.OfficeOrganizationSuccess.com

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