How Hour Cap works
How client work stays profitable, in three parts: track what the work is costing, cap what you agreed to deliver, then bill it through Xero.
Watch the workflow from time to invoice
No voiceover, so it is safe to play anywhere. Jump to the part you came for.
The model, in one screen
Most of the confusion with time tracking tools is not knowing what lives inside what. Start with a client for ad-hoc work, or a project for work with its own scope, rate or budget.
Track directly against a client or choose a project. Retainer usage comes from time logged against its project.
Track
Start a timer when you begin, or enter the time afterwards as a duration. Hour Cap accepts what you would naturally type: 1h30m, 1:30 or 8h.
The important part is the description. Write it now, in full, because hourly entries can carry this text onto the invoice.
- Timer or manual duration, whichever suits the task
- Multi-line descriptions, with room for the detail a client will read
- Billable rate resolves automatically: project, then member, then organisation default
- Log against a project, or straight against the client for ad-hoc work
Redesigned the header navigation to support mobile breakpoints.
Tested on iOS Safari and Chrome Android. Fixed z-index layering issue with the dropdown menu.
Cap
For fixed-fee work, enter the agreed fee and target hourly rate to calculate an hours budget. Hourly projects can have an hours estimate. A retainer resets on its own schedule, weekly through to quarterly or a custom period, so you are never manually rolling numbers into a new month.
The point is to find out at 80%, not at invoice time.
- Recurring retainers that reset each billing period
- Fixed-price caps for scoped projects
- Progress shown against the cap as hours land
- Budget warnings and overrun alerts by email and in the app, sent to the managers and administrators you choose
- All time on the project counts towards its hours budget, including non-billable work
Bill
Pick a client and the billing method: selected hourly time, a remaining fixed project fee, or retainer periods. Hourly retainers bill eligible time from completed periods; fixed retainers bill the agreed fee for started periods, including the current one. Review the amount before creating the invoice.
Push it, and a draft invoice appears in Xero. You approve and send it there, exactly as you do today.
- Group hourly lines per entry, project, date or team member; fixed charges use project or period descriptions
- Per-entry hourly lines preserve your descriptions; grouped lines combine them
- Optional 6-, 15- or 30-minute billing increments, rounded nearest or up, keep tracked time unchanged
- Hours and rates carry across, with tax and tracking categories applied
- It lands as a draft, so nothing is sent without you
Redesigned the header navigation to support mobile breakpoints.
1.75 hrs × $150.00
Fixed cart totals rounding on multi-currency orders.
2.25 hrs × $150.00
Weekly check-in and sprint planning.
1.00 hrs × $150.00
Receive
Track, cap and bill assume the work has already reached you. For most client teams it reaches you as an email, and that is where the first hour goes missing: somebody reads the request properly, answers it, and never logs the time because logging it meant opening a second application.
Customer Support Inbox puts that mail where the clients, rates and retainers already are, so the loop starts one step earlier.
- Forward your support address, no mailbox password and no migration
- Match senders using synced contacts or link an unmatched conversation to a client
- Write to a client first, save a draft, or schedule a message for later
- Start a timer or log a duration from the conversation itself
- The retainer meter sits beside the thread while you answer
Could we get the checkout page updated before Friday? Also the confirmation email is still showing last year's address.
The hour lands on the same timesheet as everything else.
What you need to get going
Less than you would think. You can be tracking time in a couple of minutes and worry about the rest later.
An account. That is it. Add a client, start the timer, and you are running.
A project with a retainer or fixed-price cap. Retainers are on the Team plan and above.
An active Xero subscription and the Team plan or above. Connecting takes one OAuth click.
Frequently asked questions
See it on your own work
Add one client, track an hour, and push it to Xero. That is the whole loop, and it takes about five minutes.