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Hourly Rate Calculator for Remote Teams

Struggling with accurate hourly rate calculations for your remote team? Harvest simplifies this process by factoring in expenses, non-billable hours, and geographical differences.

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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 Remote Work Expenses in Hourly Rate Calculations

Calculating the right hourly rate for remote teams involves understanding and factoring in various expenses unique to remote work. These costs can include software subscriptions, internet expenses, and home office supplies, which often represent a significant portion of your operational budget. For instance, remote workers might spend up to $1,000 annually on essential remote work tools and subscriptions. To ensure profitability, these expenses must be reflected in your hourly rate calculations.

Harvest makes this process seamless by offering comprehensive expense tracking features. You can log all relevant expenses, from software subscriptions to one-time purchases, ensuring they are accurately accounted for in your rate calculations. By incorporating these costs, Harvest helps remote teams and freelancers maintain a clear picture of their financial health and set rates that accurately reflect their true operating costs.

Account for Non-Billable Hours in Your Rate Calculation

Non-billable hours, such as administrative tasks and meetings, can significantly impact the profitability of remote teams. It's crucial to incorporate these hours into your hourly rate to ensure you're adequately compensated for all your time. On average, non-billable hours can account for up to 20% of a remote team's total work week, a considerable factor when determining your rate.

Harvest provides the tools needed to track both billable and non-billable hours efficiently. By using Harvest's one-click start/stop timers and manual time entry, you can capture all hours worked, ensuring your rate calculations are comprehensive. This allows remote teams to set rates that cover all aspects of their work, not just client-facing hours, ultimately leading to more sustainable income.

Geographical Differences and Hourly Rates

Geographical location can greatly influence the appropriate hourly rate for remote teams. For example, remote workers in urban areas may face higher living costs compared to their rural counterparts. This discrepancy needs to be considered when setting hourly rates. According to recent data, remote workers may earn up to 12% more than their on-site counterparts, reflecting these cost differences.

Harvest supports location-specific rate adjustments through its flexible rate settings. Whether you're managing a team across different states or countries, Harvest allows for per-project and per-person rate customization. This flexibility ensures your team is compensated fairly, taking into account varying living costs and market conditions, thereby promoting pay equity across your distributed workforce.

Leveraging Harvest for Accurate Hourly Rate Calculations

Accurate hourly rate calculations are essential for remote teams aiming to maximize their income while covering all related expenses. By integrating tools like Harvest, you can streamline your rate-setting process and focus on your core work. Harvest's capabilities, such as detailed report generation and integration with popular platforms like QuickBooks and Xero, offer a holistic view of your financials.

With Harvest, you can create, send, and manage invoices directly from tracked time, ensuring all hours are accounted for. Additionally, Harvest's project budgets feature alerts you when you're approaching financial limits, helping to prevent budget overruns. These features, combined with the ability to track travel costs and other expenses, make Harvest an invaluable tool for remote teams seeking to optimize their hourly rates and improve overall financial management.

Hourly Rate Calculator for Remote Teams with Harvest

Discover how Harvest helps remote teams calculate accurate hourly rates by including expenses and non-billable hours.

Harvest dashboard showing hourly rate calculation features for remote teams

Hourly Rate Calculator for Remote Teams FAQs

  • Remote teams should consider expenses such as software subscriptions, internet costs, and home office supplies. On average, these can total around $1,000 annually. Factoring these into your hourly rate ensures you cover all operational costs.

  • Non-billable hours, like administrative tasks, can take up about 20% of your work week. Including these in your rate calculation helps ensure you are compensated for all your time. Harvest's tracking tools make it easy to log these hours.

  • Reasonable hourly rates for remote teams vary based on role and location. Generally, remote workers earn 12% more than their on-site counterparts to cover additional expenses. Harvest's flexible rate settings help adjust for these variations.

  • Harvest allows you to track expenses, non-billable hours, and set flexible rates per project or person. These features, along with integration with accounting tools, provide a comprehensive solution for accurate rate calculations.

  • Yes, Harvest supports location-specific rate adjustments, allowing you to customize rates based on living costs in different areas. This ensures fair compensation across your distributed team.

  • Geographical differences impact living costs and market conditions, affecting hourly rates. Remote workers in urban areas may require higher rates. Harvest's per-person rate flexibility helps account for these differences.

  • Yes, Harvest enables tracking of both billable and non-billable hours, ensuring comprehensive time management and more accurate rate calculations for remote teams.