Harvest
Time Tracking
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Calculate Billable Hours

Harvest helps law firms accurately calculate billable hours, addressing common errors that lead to a 15-20% revenue loss. With detailed tracking, Harvest ensures precise billing.

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What should you charge per hour?

Most freelancers and consultants dramatically undercharge. This calculator accounts for what most people miss: non-billable time, taxes, and overhead.

$
Accounting for vacation, holidays, sick days
60%
Most freelancers can bill 50-70% of their time. The rest goes to admin, marketing, proposals, and learning.
$
Software, insurance, equipment, accounting, taxes beyond income tax, etc.
Your break-even rate $0
Recommended rate (+20% buffer) $0
Billable hours per week 0h
Equivalent daily rate $0

Start tracking your billable hours

Walk through the entire flow below. Start a timer, check your reports, and create a real invoice — all in three clicks.

Go ahead — start tracking!

One click and you're timing. Try it right here: start a timer, add an entry, edit the details. This is exactly how it feels in Harvest.

  • One-click timer from browser, desktop & mobile
  • Works inside Jira, Asana, Trello, GitHub & 50+ tools
  • Duration or start/end — your call
  • Day, week & calendar views to stay on top of it all
  • Friendly reminders so no hour gets left behind
Acme Corp
Website Redesign
Homepage layout revisions
1:24:09
Content Strategy
Blog calendar planning
1:30:00
SEO Audit
Technical audit report
0:45:00
Brand Guidelines
Color system documentation
2:15:00
Logo Concepts
Initial sketches round 1
1:00:00
Today's total 6:54:09

Understanding Billable Hours in Legal Practice

Billable hours are the cornerstone of revenue generation in law firms, representing the time lawyers spend working on a client's case that can be charged. Typically, these hours are calculated in standard increments such as 6, 10, or 15 minutes, which facilitates precise billing. However, accurately tracking these increments can be challenging, leading to potential revenue loss if not managed properly. Studies show that 80% of timesheets contain errors, which can result in a 15-20% reduction in billable income.

Harvest addresses these challenges by providing a robust time tracking system that captures every billable minute with precision. With one-click start/stop timers and manual entry options, lawyers can ensure every moment spent on client work is logged accurately. This meticulous tracking helps law firms avoid the pitfalls of under-billing and enhances their ability to maximize profits from billable work.

Best Practices for Tracking and Maximizing Billable Hours

To maximize billable hours, law firms need to implement best practices that streamline time tracking and billing. Ensuring detailed time logs is critical, as they form the basis for accurate client invoicing and transparency. Harvest's detailed reporting capabilities allow firms to maintain comprehensive records of billable and non-billable hours, helping to avoid the common pitfall of block billing.

Research suggests that maintaining detailed time logs can increase revenue by up to 25%, as it enables firms to justify their billing practices to clients effectively. Additionally, tracking non-billable hours is crucial for assessing their impact on productivity and profitability. Harvest empowers law firms to easily differentiate between billable and non-billable tasks, ensuring that all work is accounted for and billed appropriately.

Leveraging Technology to Enhance Billing Transparency

Transparency in billing practices is essential for maintaining client trust and satisfaction. Block billing, where multiple tasks are consolidated into a single time entry, often leads to disputes and undermines client trust. With Harvest, law firms can avoid block billing by generating detailed invoices that itemize every task and time spent. This level of detail not only enhances transparency but also helps firms communicate billing practices effectively to manage client expectations.

In addition to transparency, using a time tracking tool like Harvest can streamline the invoicing process, reducing administrative overhead and allowing lawyers to focus more on client work. By integrating with popular platforms such as QuickBooks, Xero, and Stripe, Harvest facilitates seamless financial management, ensuring that all billable hours are accurately captured and invoiced.

Tools for Precise Calculation of Billable Hours

Accurate calculation of billable hours requires not only meticulous tracking but also the right tools to streamline the process. Harvest stands out as an ideal solution for law firms seeking to optimize their time tracking and billing practices. Its comprehensive suite of features, including automatic timers, manual time entry, and detailed reporting, makes calculating billable hours both efficient and reliable.

By using Harvest, law firms can leverage integrations with platforms like Asana, Trello, and Slack to enhance project management and team collaboration. This integration ensures that all project-related activities are tracked and billed accurately, providing a complete picture of each team member’s contributions. By adopting Harvest, firms can achieve greater accuracy in billing, reduce disputes, and ultimately enhance their profitability.

Calculate Billable Hours with Harvest

See how Harvest tracks and calculates billable hours, ensuring accurate invoicing for law firms.

Screenshot of Harvest tracking billable hours for law firms.

Calculate Billable Hours FAQs

  • Billable hours in a law firm represent the time spent on client-related work that can be charged to the client. They are typically tracked in standard increments such as 6, 10, or 15 minutes to ensure precise billing. Harvest helps law firms manage these hours effectively with detailed tracking.

  • Effective tracking of billable hours requires precise time logging and clear differentiation between billable and non-billable tasks. Harvest offers one-click timers and detailed reports to ensure accurate tracking, helping law firms maximize revenue.

  • Law firms often use increments such as 6, 10, or 15 minutes for billing time. These increments help ensure that every minute spent on client work is accurately billed. Harvest supports flexible time tracking to accommodate these standard increments.

  • Harvest helps avoid block billing by providing detailed tracking and reporting of each task and time spent. This transparency allows law firms to generate itemized invoices, enhancing client trust and satisfaction.

  • Tracking non-billable hours is crucial for assessing their impact on a lawyer's productivity and profitability. Harvest helps law firms monitor these hours, offering insights into how they affect overall efficiency and revenue.

  • Yes, Harvest integrates with popular platforms like Asana, Trello, Jira, and Slack, allowing seamless project management and time tracking. These integrations ensure that all project-related activities are tracked and billed accurately.

  • Best practices for invoicing based on billable hours include maintaining detailed time logs, using standard billing increments, and ensuring transparency with detailed invoices. Harvest supports these practices with its comprehensive time tracking and invoicing features.