Timesheet app for contractors: hours by client and job
Muster records each entry against the client's job, adds up a contractor's hours by job, and turns them into the client's timesheet or your invoice.
Hours by the job, not by the day
A contractor's week is rarely one job. Two clients, three sites, and a day that starts on one and ends on another. A timesheet by the day loses which hours were whose; a timesheet by the job is what the client signs and what the invoice is built from.
In Muster every entry is recorded against a job, a project under the client it is for, and an activity, what you were doing. Switching from one job to another is one press on the clock. The hours then add up two ways at once: by the week, for the overtime rules, and by the job, for the client.
How Muster does it
- Your own clients and jobs. With Project changes from the app ticked for you, you add clients and jobs yourself, from your phone, and hide a finished one without losing its hours. See Jobs.
- Hours by job. Each job is a row with its hours and its miles, and its own screen with the entries, so a client's query is answered from the record. See Reports in the manual.
- The client's timesheet. If the client gave you a workbook, Muster fills it in; otherwise the period downloads as Excel, CSV or PDF, every column totalled, with a fingerprint of the sheet as it left. See Your timesheet as Excel, CSV or PDF.
- Or the invoice. Working for yourself, the hours on a client's days become a numbered invoice, with your mileage at HMRC's approved rate, shared as a PDF. See Contractor timesheet to invoice.
- Overtime, if your terms have it. A contractor paid by the hour at one rate needs no overtime rule, and Muster applies none to the self-employed unless you set one. A contract with time and a half past a weekly threshold is a setting.
Try it in the demo: switch between its invented jobs and read the hours by job on Reports.
A worked example
A week for a contractor on two clients.
| Day | Recorded |
|---|---|
| Monday and Tuesday | 8 hours a day on client A's job |
| Wednesday | 4 hours on client A, then a switch, and 4 hours on client B |
| Thursday and Friday | 9 hours a day on client B |
| By job | Hours |
|---|---|
| Client A | 20 |
| Client B | 22 |
| The week | 42 |
Client A's sheet shows 20 hours on its job; client B's, 22. Your own week shows 42, and if your terms have a 39-hour threshold, 3 of them at the overtime rate.
Questions people ask
Does it work through an agency?
Muster records your hours and gives you the sheet. Who you send it to, an agency, an umbrella or the client, is yours to choose, and the manual's employed words apply: the agency is the HR the period goes to.
Can I record the same day on two jobs?
Yes: two entries, one per job, and switching jobs on the clock does exactly that. Saving one entry over another of your own asks first, so a day cannot be counted twice by accident.
Can the client see my other clients?
No. A sheet is the hours on that client's jobs. If a client runs Muster for its own team and you are on it, HR there sees your hours on its jobs, never your travel.
Related
Try the demo - invented data, no account. Request a demo to use it for real. The manual has every screen.