Jonathan Bird
Freelance web developer in Brisbane, Australia. Creator of Hour Cap.
Who writes this
I write every article on this site. If something here is wrong, email me and I'll fix it.
I have been a freelance web developer for over fifteen years, working from Brisbane with startups, universities, government departments and enterprise teams, including Culture Kings, Griffith University, Wotif Group and the Museum of Brisbane. I hold a university degree in Information Technology and build mostly in Laravel.
I bill that work the way this blog describes. Retainers with monthly caps, fixed-price projects and hourly jobs, tracked as time and invoiced through Xero. What I write about utilization, write-downs and retainer overruns comes out of running that business.
I built Hour Cap for my own client work: time tracked against a retainer cap, invoiced through Xero with the descriptions intact. My time tracking, invoicing and profitability run through it now.
What I write about
Xero
Getting tracked time onto a Xero invoice: draft invoices, tracking categories, GST, and what the integrations in other tools cover.
Billing economics
Utilization, realization, blended rates and write-downs, and how to work out whether a project made money.
Client support
Client email as billable work: shared inboxes, response times, and putting the hours on the conversation they came from.
21 articles and glossary entries published so far. Browse the blog or the glossary.
Recent articles
Client Request Management for Agencies: Turning Email Into Billable Work
Unlogged client email is a common source of lost margin. How to run client requests as a shared queue, and how to make sure the hours around the work reach an invoice.
Read moreHow to Send Tracked Time to Xero as Draft Invoices
Turn billable hours into a Xero draft invoice you review before sending, with descriptions intact and four ways to group the line items.
Read moreHow to Track Billable Hours and Invoice Through Xero
The complete walkthrough from logging the first billable hour to sending a finished Xero invoice, with the rate, tax, grouping and review steps in order.
Read moreAgency Profitability: 2026 Benchmarks and How to Improve It
Agency profitability benchmarks for 2026, the levers that move the margin, and why client and retainer-level profit matters more than project averages.
Read moreBest Xero Time Tracking Add-ons for Agencies (2026)
A fair rundown of the time tracking and invoicing apps that work with Xero, what each one does well, and where the gaps are for agencies billing time.
Read moreRetainer Billing Explained: How Agencies Bill Retainer Clients
How retainer billing works, drawdown versus logged hours, over and under-servicing, and how to invoice a retainer period straight through Xero.
Read moreTry Hour Cap
Hour Cap tracks billable time against retainers and caps, then pushes it to Xero as a draft invoice. Start free, no credit card.