In the world there are mainly two freelance forms of budget a project: based on a flat rate or fixed price or based on a price per hour of work. If you belong to the latter group you need to track the time you spend on each project, task or client.
Do this work manually is cumbersome and inaccurate, and this is why today we present six time management tools with which you can track your work hours.
1. Harvest
It has a nice and intuitive interface that works on all devices (including the Apple Watch). It allows you to track the time you spend per customer, project and individual task. You can even deduct the “downtime” of your hours for those cases where you distracted the project. Once you have finished with the project, Harvest produces an invoice breakdown that can deliver to your customer.
What differentiates this tool is that it fully integrates with other business management tools, including QuickBooks, Slack, Stripe, Trello and Asana.
Like most software, Harvest has a free version and a payment. The free version is perfect if you are a freelancer who works alone with no more than four clients and two projects at once. However, if you need to expand this service and have unlimited projects and clients.
You maybe interested to read another article on LifeStyleQA: How to make better decisions with the money?
2. Toggl
Toggl offers all the basic features you would expect from it: manage your time and generate invoices. Once you’ve completed a project or need an invoice, you can export reports to Excel, CSV or PDF to share with your customers. You can also organize your time sheets for projects, customers, or other unique labels. Like Harvest, Toggl works well on all mobile and desktop operating systems, and even includes an application for Google Chrome.
Toggl is also an excellent solution if you work as a team for a project, and you can segment and limit the activity of each member according to their tasks.
Toggl free plan offers almost everything needed to work independently: basic time tracking, reporting, unlimited projects, and teams of up to five people. If you want some extra functionality you will spend the pro plan.
3. Hours
Built exclusively for Apple devices, Hours is another time management application that you should consider. Its user interface is very simple and focuses almost exclusively on time tracking functionality.
You can easily manage multiple projects or tasks codifying color, and download simple reports in CSV or PDF format to send to your customers.
Due to its simple and practical approach, Hours lacks some features and integrations with other applications of time management, but it makes up for with its low price: it’s totally free, making it ideal for those freelancers who want to keep costs operation to a minimum.
4. Tick
Tick is designed to be more than just a time manager as it helps you optimize it the most. When you log on Tick and start working with task cards, you will receive feedback on the time remaining to complete each task or draft, this way not only you manage time, but you know what the estimated time to complete each task.
Time cards can be organized by project or client, and offer subcategories to measure time more specific tasks. You can set budgets of time and money for individual tasks within each project, so you will be able to identify the problem areas within your workflow from the beginning.
Tick connects with more than 400 third-party platforms and web applications, including highly functional integration with management software Basecamp projects and QuickBooks accounting tool. It also has an app for the Apple Watch.
You maybe interested to read another article on LifeStyleQA: Eight indicators of your financial situation
5. Timely
Timely is a manager and working time. Its simple interface resembles a standard calendar application that gives you the ability to proactively schedule your daily workflow.
From an organizational point of view, this application is powerful enough for team projects. As specific projects or team members are assigned tasks, you can check their individual workloads and rearrange as needed. You can also quickly compare the recorded time with the expected time to make sure your project is on the right track.
Timely integrates with other popular applications, such as Apple and Google calendar, allowing you to synchronize your calendar with the timesheets. It has a free plan that is perfect for a freelance professional who want to track up to 5 projects at once.
6. TrackingTime
Finally we present TrackingTime a simple management tool totally free time. This tool gives you the ability to create an unlimited number of projects, user accounts and customers without increasing your overhead. It works great on all devices and operating systems, and like Toggl, includes an application for Chrome. With TrackingTime you can also manage small projects or pending tasks. As Hours, TrackingTime is perfect for a freelance professional who wants to minimize their expenses.
Leave a Reply