Organising work into projects

Create fixed, hourly or retainer projects, add out-of-scope charges when work grows, and watch each project's tracked, unbilled and billed totals.

4 min read

A project is the unit Billable does its arithmetic on: time is tracked against it, invoices are raised under it, and its totals tell you what a piece of work was actually worth.

Step by step

  1. Create the project — Give it a name, attach it to a client, and pick how it is billed: fixed price, hourly or retainer.
  2. Set the terms — Add the rate and currency, a status, and the dates it runs between. This is what later turns tracked hours into an amount.
  3. Work against it — Track time under the project and raise invoices from it. Everything you do rolls up automatically.
  4. Charge for what fell outside — When the client asks for something the original scope did not cover, add an out-of-scope charge rather than absorbing it.
  5. Archive when it is done — Finished projects can be archived. The history stays, and if you are on the free tier the active-project slot is freed up for the next job.

Reading the totals

  • Tracked — every hour logged against the project.
  • Unbilled — tracked work you have not yet put on an invoice.
  • Billed — what has already gone out on an invoice.

If unbilled is climbing on a live project, that is your cue to raise an invoice.

Quirks worth knowing

The small things that trip people up.

Only active projects count towards the free tier

The free tier covers one active project. Archiving finished work frees the slot, so a long history of completed projects never costs you anything.

The billing model is per project

Fixed price, hourly and retainer can live side by side. You do not have to force every engagement into one shape to keep the numbers tidy.

Out-of-scope charges exist for a reason

Adding the extra work as an out-of-scope charge is what keeps scope creep visible instead of quietly eating the margin on a fixed-price job.

Rate and currency are set on the project

A project carries its own rate and currency, so tracked hours turn into the right amount without you doing conversion maths at invoice time.

Three totals, three different questions

Tracked is what you did, unbilled is what you have not charged for yet, and billed is what has gone out. The gap between the second and third is the work worth chasing.

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