Billable Hours: A Guide for Professional Services Businesses

February 19, 2024

what are billable hours

Keep up with Michelle’s CPA career — and ultramarathoning endeavors — on LinkedIn. Like “Placeholders” that let you plan for future projects without fully committing to assigning team members right away. It allows you to manage what are billables projects, resources, and financial operations in one integrated system. This unified approach gives you more control and visibility across all aspects of your business. For example, a speedier contract analysis process could accelerate the negotiation of a deal. More widely, there is also the benefit of reduced risk by eliminating scope for human error.

what are billable hours

What is a Utilization Report and 5 Steps to Build an Effective One

They can help assess efficiency for individual employees as well as for different projects and tasks. Billable hours are the time spent working on tasks directly related to a particular client project. It combines project management, resource scheduling, and client collaboration all in one place. In February, Lexis Nexis published research which found the amount of lawyers using generative AI had doubled since July 2023, with 26 per cent of lawyers now using it on a monthly basis. The study also found that around 40 per cent of law firms had introduced AI-powered products across their business, performed training and built policies around its use. Once you’ve got your hours worked, it’s time to apply your billable rate to see how much you’re earning.

Resource Forecasting

  • When I first entered accounting, I was astounded by my colleagues’ preoccupation with racking up billable hours.
  • Take your project and resource management to the next level with our AI-driven platform.
  • If a professional cannot keep accurate records of their work hours, this can lead to billing complications.
  • A flexible time tracker like Toggl Track also allows you to add manual time entries later.
  • By tracking how many hours are billed against a project, it becomes easier to see how productive a team is, and if they are performing above or below expectations.
  • With that in mind, remember to incorporate breaks into your schedule to get enough rest throughout your workdays.

A research found that billable hours only constitute around 50-60% of total working hours. While manually logging hours is the traditional and most common method of tracking, it is also more prone to errors. SAVIOM offers advanced utilization reports and color-coded heatmaps to identify billable and non-billable projects and optimize employee utilization levels promptly. Mastering the balance between billable and non-billable hours is about working smarter and ensuring every hour contributes to your company’s success. This way, non-billable hours are no longer a financial burden since the price includes these hours as well.

What are billable hours vs regular hours?

what are billable hours

The client will get a clear overview of exactly what they’re paying for. They’ll know the time https://www.bookstime.com/tax-rates/florida spent on each specific task that you’ve done for them and can clearly see where their money is going. This instills the client’s trust in your company making them more likely to use your organization in the future. Now that we’ve explained the meaning of billable hours, let’s take a look at a few examples. It goes without saying that no staff member wants their hard work going unnoticed. So, the benefits of staying abreast of each employee’s billable hours should never be underestimated.

what are billable hours

Track Your Billable Time:

what are billable hours

It may make sense to outsource a non-billable activity or two by hiring an employee. You can choose from a wide pool of competent virtual assistants to match your requirements and budget. This includes anything related to the task at hand — from answering a quick phone call to sending how is sales tax calculated out a work email. Then, take the salary you have in mind and divide it by the number of working hours in a year. You’ll need to do some online research to check if your expected income is on par with similar services.

  • More on this later, when we discuss how you can track and maximize your billable hours.
  • Many businesses, from legal professionals to freelancers, use billable hours to calculate revenue.
  • Tracking your billable hours gives you a clear overview of how time is spent on each project.
  • Time trackers like Time Miner can be integrated into your communication app to track how much time is being spent on calls, text messages, and meetings.