Client Delivery
Part of Project budgets and time tracking
Choosing time-tracking features for billable work
Compare billable time features through entries, rates, approvals and invoice preparation, with documented limits for Harvest, Teamwork.com and Clockify.
Choose time-tracking software by following a chargeable hour from entry to a reviewed draft invoice. Check whether the right client, project, task, rate, billable status and approval decision survive that journey. A timer alone cannot establish that a client should be charged the resulting amount.
Define the billing rules first
For a typical engagement, record who may log time, what work may be charged, which rate applies and who checks entries before invoicing. Decide how to handle fixed-fee work, expenses, corrections and hours beyond an agreed allowance.
The engagement and your internal process determine chargeability; a software label does not.
Use the same questions for each candidate:
| Check | What to ask for in a demonstration |
|---|---|
| Entry detail | Person, date, duration, client, project, task and useful note |
| Billable control | Clear treatment of chargeable and non-chargeable work |
| Rates | The intended project, person or task rate and its effective date |
| Review | Who can correct or approve time before billing |
| Invoice handoff | Which entries appear, which are omitted and why |
| Correction history | What changes after an approved entry or draft invoice is edited |
Check permissions too. Contributors may not need access to internal cost rates, while billing reviewers need enough information to verify charges.
Three documented options
These are starting points for investigation, not a ranking or results of product testing. Confirm the plan and account configuration you intend to use.
Harvest — project types and invoicing. Harvest's help centre documents project types and invoicing for Time & Materials projects. Confirm the project type and the billing and invoicing steps that apply to your account in Harvest's help centre.
Harvest's public plan table places timesheet approval and the activity log on Enterprise and Enterprise Plus; its Free plan lists one seat and two projects. Check how your chosen configuration handles billability, and check the approval process before relying on an invoice draft.
Teamwork.com — billable time within a project workspace. Its current plan comparison lists time tracking and billable time on Free Forever, Basics, Accelerate, Optimize and Enterprise. User rates and basic invoices start on Accelerate.
Timesheet approvals and financial budgets start on Optimize. If those latter controls matter, assess a qualifying plan and check the reviewer's permissions. A timer on a lower plan does not establish that the full billing workflow is available.
Clockify — time classification and billing reports. Clockify documents billable and non-billable entries, project rates and reports filtered to billable work. Billable rates require a paid plan. Its help page says entries are marked billable by default, making the classification check especially useful before invoicing.
Time approval starts on Standard; expense approval and monetary project budgets require Pro or Enterprise. Its monetary project-budget bar reflects billable amounts, with billable expenses included only if that option is enabled. It is not an internal labour-cost forecast.
Billable Time Features Comparison: Harvest, Teamwork.com, Clockify
- Time Tracking & Billable TimeAvailable on all plans (Free Forever to Enterprise)
- Timesheet ApprovalEnterprise and Enterprise Plus (Harvest); Optimize and above (Teamwork.com); Standard and above (Clockify)
- Project Budgets (Monetary)Optimize and above (Teamwork.com); Pro and above (Clockify)
- Expense ApprovalPro and above (Clockify)
- Billable Rate ConfigurationSupported in all platforms with paid plans
- Default Billable ClassificationYes (Clockify); depends on project type (Harvest)
- Activity Log AccessEnterprise and Enterprise Plus (Harvest)
Key Billable Time Metrics Across Platforms
- Minimum Plan for Timesheet Approval
- Enterprise (Harvest), Optimize (Teamwork.com), Standard (Clockify)
- Monetary Project Budgets Available From
- Optimize (Teamwork.com), Pro (Clockify)
- Expense Approval Required Plan
- Pro or Enterprise (Clockify)
- Default Billable Status
- Enabled in Clockify; configured by project type in Harvest
Rehearse the invoice handoff
In each candidate, set up a fictional client project with two people at different rates, a non-billable meeting, a billable task, one correction and an expense. Have a contributor enter the work, a reviewer inspect it and a billing user prepare a draft invoice.
Compare its lines and amounts with the engagement rules, then check what changes after a correction. Record the plan, permissions and manual steps shown.
Choose the setup that lets the responsible people trace each proposed charge to reviewed work. Keep the contract's charging rules and the software's calculated amounts separate until they agree.
