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A friend of mine is running a consultancy company and she needs a software to manage the people that go to their customers. I've been using Project Management Software before, but this case is slightly different. Basically, the workflow would be:

  • Manager assigns a Consultant to a customer site, possibly on a calendar (e.g. John Smith has to go to Mr Customer on 3rd of April from 10AM to 6PM).
  • Consultant goes to customer for an X amount of hours. At the end of the day, he/she writes in the software how many hours were spent (and, eventually, doing what).
  • Manager generates a monthly report of billable hours and produces invoices to send to customers.

It should be relatively simple to manage, but I wouldn't be able to recommend a specific software for this. Funnily enough, I've been a Consultant for 10 years, but, at the time, we did everything on paper...

Any suggestion is appreciated, thanks.

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6 Answers

up vote 2 down vote accepted

I've used Freshbooks for over a year, we are a team of 10 and it works great.

  • Web based time tracking
  • Mobile time tracking
  • Web based invoicing
  • Email invoices or click print an they get stuffed, mailed automatically. You don't have to do anything, it happens from their location.
  • API's to integrate with other systems
  • Reporting
  • Clients can pay online by credit card if you allow it
  • Has recurring billing to automatically send invoices

It has saved me hundreds of hours and probably tens of thousands of dollars.

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Thanks, +1 for you too for the extra details. :) – Diego Mar 13 '12 at 12:59
May I also ask you what extensions (if any) do you use, and if you can write in a calendar where and when your people have to work? That's vital for a Consultancy business. :) – Diego Mar 13 '12 at 13:03
We run Freshbooks for invoicing. Wave Accounting for our official accounting. Redmine for project management. We have a custom dashboard that hangs on the wall that pulls all the data together that shows everyones logged time, hot tasks, and some custom Redmine screens to list out everyones stuff to do. We are evaluating going back to Basecamp from Redmine... we'll see. – Ryan Doom Mar 14 '12 at 2:38
up vote 0 down vote

Using paper and pen method for time tracking is outdated and I appreciate your friend to have come up with such a question. There are several tools for time tracking and there are various options too.

Firstly, you must decide on the platform, whether you want to own the software or you just want to use the software. Since there are on-premise software's as well as SaaS based time tracking tools available in market.

Secondly, you must be sure on what you want, whether its just tracking employee time or would require additional services such as client billing, invoicing, expense and bill tracking, etc.

I had used several time tracking tools in the last 6 years, both for tracking employees and freelancers. The tool that worked well for me is Replicon.

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up vote 1 down vote

At www.timecockpit.com we are working on a time tracking application. It has quite a comprehensive feature list, some of the gems:

  • Graphical Calendar for time booking
  • Online as well as offline capable (using synchronization)
  • Dynamic data model allows you to customize time cockpit to your needs
  • Activity tracker collecting hints on what you have been doing through out your day. Privacy is respected using encryption.
  • Scriptability using IronPython/.NET
  • Comes as a Saas/Pay-As-You-Go model
  • Friendly and responsive support/dev team :)

Disclaimer: I am one of the devs on the team.

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up vote 1 down vote

Diego - did you end up selecting a solution for your consulting problem?

I run a small firm (<10 people) and we use Harvest for time & expense tracking. It works very well (for time tracking...and expense reporting) but that's about it. It won't do the 'calendar scheduling' thing you're looking for. I believe that would fall more into a HR software category - specifically for the consulting industry, since that's a relatively unique feature. I don't really need it myself - as our projects are rather lengthy & therefore managing the schedules becomes something that happens 2-3 times a year.

I used Freshbooks for a while, but mostly because I had a lot of contractors. I thought it was okay - but it lacked flexibility for my business (e.g. contractors having multiple rates on different client engagements, different client billing periods, etc...were not possible when I was using).

With all of these - integration is the #1 barrier. There are some 'integration' SaaS providers out there who say they can tie together Time, Expense, Project Management, and Accounting...but I'm not going to spend time mapping fields. I'll just rekey until it gets too painful (just like my clients do).

So - until then...my firm uses Harvest (time, expense), Expensify (expense automation), Xero (accounting, invoicing), Basecamp/Highrise (PM, CRM?), and Google Apps (everything else).

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up vote 1 down vote

Hm, Diego maybe you should try to look for some CRM solution with billing support because, after all, it is all about your need to track at one place everything you or your employes interact with a customers (what kind of work is done, how many hours spent, etc.), and after that billing them based on those trackings.

Many of invoicing systems (Freshbooks and others) have good billing systems but maybe not so good CRM systems. On the other side there are some useful CRM systems but without billing system, so if you want to manage your problem you'll probably have to combine those two (for example Highrise + Freshbooks) but that are 2 aps and 2 monthly fees to pay.

My friend and I are small startup and currently we're searching for new idea for project (will be webapp + mobile version) and one of our idea is some kind of "hybrid" system like I mentioned earlier - simple CRM + simple billing. Currently our main problem is that we're from the market that is still developing and don't have "normal needs" as the rest of the world, so we can't check if this idea is worth, but since Diego didn't find good solution for 10 years it might be something that is ok.

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Thanks Milan, you raised some good points. You also made me laugh, which is a good thing, and I tell you why: it's not that I never found a solution for 10 years; in the past, I was employed by a company who sent me to customers as a Consultant. In that period, everybody (employer, customers, etc) wanted to have everything on paper, paper and more paper, in 3 copies. Therefore, I didn't have to look for a solution at all, as it was not my problem! :D However, I'm sure the software you're developing might come useful, it's always good to have integrated solutions! – Diego Mar 13 '12 at 12:57
Aha, my bad for those 10 years - I misunderstood something :D – Milan Stosic Mar 13 '12 at 19:01
Hm, Diego do you think one webapp like this would be interesting for consultants and small startups to cover their basic needs (clients list, interactions with clients and billing) so day will pay ~$15-$20 monthy fee? – Milan Stosic Mar 13 '12 at 19:11
I think they certainly would, if the application is stable enough (remember, features come after reliability). After all, they already pay more for other services! :) – Diego Mar 13 '12 at 21:03
up vote 1 down vote

I'd look at FreshBooks. I've used them for invoicing, but they also offer time tracking. Worth taking a look. Hope this helps.

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Thanks, +1 for you. :) – Diego Mar 13 '12 at 12:58

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